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Nothing, says ANDY HEDGECOCK, can rescue this undistinguished amalgam of ponderous melodrama and shallow philosophical speculation
Gleaming vision of a supreme co-operator
William Hazell’s Gleaming Vision: A Co-operative Life in South Wales, 1890-1964 , by Alun Burge (Y Lolfa, £9.95)
JAMIE BRITTON invites readers to visit 3,500 locals as part of a marathon artistic pub crawl
JOHN GREEN welcomes a valuable and incisive analysis of a world become hyperpolitical but without the mass movement institutions to represent it
JAMES WALSH is moved by a provocative and original take on the relationship between ecology and architecture, and a plea to work with, not against, the materials and minerals of our world
An immersive, participatory display by a queer Australian Aboriginal performer, and a rebellious unravelling of traditional Scottish dance
Reading this biography of a man who spent most of his life as a coal miner, suffered considerable personal hardship and yet achieved so much, is a humbling experience. William Hazell’s contribution to local organisations was immense and he was a prodigious writer on a vast swathe of subjects.
Ynysybwl is a village four miles from Pontypridd, a dead-end but for mountain roads over to the Rhondda Fach and Aberdare valleys. Hazell (pictured) was born in St Pancras in 1890 but by the time he was 16 he was a miner in Lady Windsor Colliery, the main employer in Ynysybwl.
It is unclear how or why he came to this close-knit community in south Wales, with its population of just over 5,000, but he quickly made an impression.
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