For his study of anti-Muslim Muzaffarnagar Riot, HENRY BELL applauds Joe Sacco for a devastatingly effective combination of graphic novel and investigative journalism
A fascinating moment of solidarity
ALEX WHITE reveals the radical side of Maya Angelou in her newly uncovered writing from Egypt and Ghana
Maya Angelou (far right) protesting outside the US Embassy in Accra, Ghana, alongside Julian Mayfield, Alphaeus Hunton and Alice Windom (1963)
[The New York Public Library/CC BY]
SUSAN DARLINGTON swoons in the presence of a magnetic frontman
ANDY HEDGECOCK recommends an unflinching examination of the chaos and suffering wrought by US foreign policy, told through the story of a child’s simple quest
PAUL DONOVAN applauds a new play that revisits in old age the well-known characters of Margaret Thatcher’s favourite TV series
MARIA DUARTE and ANGUS REID review "Wuthering Heights", Little Amelie or the Character of Rain, Crime 101, and Stitch Head
The economy collapses and London is abandoned by the wealthy. Determined to survive, a working-class woman struggles with scarcity and dejection
MARY CONWAY becomes impatient with the intellectual self-indulgence of Tom Stoppard in a production that is, nevertheless, total class
ON August 28 1963, a group of activists gathered opposite the US embassy in the Ghanaian capital of Accra. Inspired by the March on Washington unfolding 5,000 miles away, the protesters carried placards urging the US government to “wipe out racism” and claiming that the US now faced a choice between “civil liberties and civil war.”
In the front row of the demonstration was a face that would later become famous – the American author and poet Maya Angelou.
The Accra march reflected Angelou’s growing engagement with radical politics. Frustrated by American racism and fascinated by African decolonisation, she moved to Egypt in 1961 and then Ghana in 1963. In both countries, she found work as a journalist within the state-controlled media.
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