Ruth, Roger, and Me
Ruth Roger and Me, by Andrew Dean Published by Bridget Williams Books Ruth, Roger and Me was a bit of a left field media sensation when it came out earlier this year. Andrew Dean, Rhodes scholar at Oxford, is an unlikely voice for the struggling youth of 2015. However, his reflections on the challenges faced […]
Nice Work if You Can Get It
Nice Work if You Can Get It; Notes from a Musician’s Diary By Don Franks (Steele Roberts, $19.99) If you’ve ever wondered what it would be like to be a fly on the wall of the social functions of the rich and powerful but not be tainted by that experience, then Don Frank’s Notes are […]
Call Mr Robeson
Call Mr Robeson The Moorings, 31 Glenbervie Terrace, Wellington Until 1st March. Tickets $18/$14 0800 BUY TIX www.fringe.co.nz Call Mr. Robeson is written and performed by Tayo Aluko. Through monologue and song, he brings to life the memory of a man who the American ruling class would rather we forgot. Paul Robeson, born in New […]
Review: Poata: Seeing Beyond The Horizon
Tama Te Kapua Poata [Ngāti Porou; 1936 – 2005] was born in Tokomaru Bay, on the East Coast. He represents the generation of Māori who migrated into the cities, and continued on to become leaders and fighters in the vanguard of the working class. He was part of all the key struggles of the ‘Māori […]
Proving a villain: the Bacchanals’ Richard III
Richard III, directed by David Lawrence. Bats Theatre, Wellington, until 31st January. Stabbings, strangulation, child murder, an earl drowned in a barrel of wine, sword fights, dirty politics, and – naturally – one of the best baddies in the whole of literature: Shakespeare’s Richard III sets out how villainy needs to be done. The Bacchanals’ […]
The Pitmen Painters
The Pitmen Painters – Lee HallCirca Theatre, until 8 November The Ashington Group were pitmen – miners in the United Kingdom who surprised the art world by creating celebrated and striking pieces of artwork, and Lee Hall’s piece traverses their story from the mid 30s to just after the second world war and the start […]
Inequality: A New Zealand Crisis
Gayaal Iddamalgoda reviews Max Rashbrooke (ed.), Inequality: a New Zealand Crisis (Bridget Williams Books, 2013). You can find out more about Inequality here. The title of this book is a compelling challenge of one of the great myths of New Zealand capitalism; that being, that real poverty and inequality exists elsewhere. It is an honest, […]
Review: Mandela: Long Walk to Freedom
Chadwick’s Mandela: Long Walk to Freedom is a biographical film about the late Nelson Mandela’s life. The film takes its audience through Mandela’s life from his early years as a lawyer to him eventually becoming president. One of the first things which stood out to me about this film was the amount of violence. Long […]
Daniel Bensaïd’s Slow Impatience
Daniel Bensaïd, An Impatient Life, trans. David Fernbach (Verso, 2013) This absorbing, affecting memoir is a beautiful testament to a richly productive and dignified life. Daniel Bensaïd spent over forty years as a partisan of the revolutionary left in France, writing, campaigning, organising and agitating. Drawn into Communist politics as a young man and then […]
Film Review: Spirit of ’45
The Spirit of ’45 was a movie centred around the political atmosphere in Britain after World War Two. With the victory over Hitler, British workers felt empowered, and felt they deserved more than the poverty of old Britain. They chose to kick out Churchill and elect Labour for the first time and implemented its radical […]
