1976: One hot summer night in a gay bar in Liverpool, Martin, a white gay man from Stockport, meets Marshall, a black West African sailor. They drink, dance and fall in love – fast. Marshall’s Big Score chronicles the ups and downs of their relationship over the course of three years. The book is by John Gowling, who was a member of the Commonword group...
Read MoreReview of flowers like blue glass Dr Martin Kratz Martin De Mello’s introduction to fukudapero’s new collection flowers like blue glass suggests that the poems in this book have the capacity to challenge our ‘habits of mind’. A particular challenge is extended to minds habituated to certain kinds of translation: either those in which source language and...
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Commonword was part of my life before I even knew that it existed. In the early 2000s, I started to explore Manchester’s spoken word scene without realising that many of the poets and writers that I had seen perform were part of Commonword at some stage or another. Almost two decades later, and I find myself working on its archive. I’ve been cataloguing...
Read MoreIn her debut book, Keisha Thompson presents a series of new poems alongside the script for her award-winning play, Language affords us the capacity to describe our world(s), our experiences, our perspectives and thoughts. Keke Thompson’s Lunar is the kind of work that offers proof of poetry’s omnivorous appetite, the joy of its myriad...
Read MoreJob Title: Project Co-ordinator: Commonword Community Archive Project Contract: PART-TIME, PAYE 24 Month Salary: £16,600 (NJC 31: pro rata of a full-time salary of £27,668) Hours: 21 hours per week Job Overview: This new post will work alongside Commonword’s core team. The project, in identifying, recording and managing the heritage represented in our...
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