Back from a mini tour of Yorkshire and Stockport and cheering for supporting act Indignation Meeting
The disillusion of a top BBC journalist
JOHN GREEN is disappointed by a marred critique of the British establishment by someone who was part of it
MB
ALISTAR FINDLAY is mesmerised by this multiple ‘Visions of Scotland’ assault on the audience’s eyes and senses
The Star's critics ANGUS REID, ANDY HEDGECOCK and MICHAL BONCZA reviews I Am Love, The Penguin Lessons, Freaky Tales, The Thicket
MAYER WAKEFIELD has reservations about the direction of a play centered on a DVLA re-training session for three British-Pakistani motorists
New releases from Steve Knightley, Jupiter & Okwess, Jason Palmer, Lisa Knapp and Gerry Driver, Kin'Gongolo Kiniata, Ingrid Laubrock/Tom Rainey, Dan Sealey, Simin Tande, PAZ
JOHN GREEN relishes photography that unfolds a longstanding and poetic relationship with Leeds
A uncomfortably misogynistic authorial voice that sometimes seems to lack insight troubles FIONA O’CONNOR
Strangeland – How Britain Stopped Making Sense
Jon Sopel, Ebury Press, £22
FROM the start, I was sceptical about this book. After all, someone like Jon Sopel, who was for many years a top BBC correspondent — for eight years its man in Washington — must be completely in tune with Establishment ideology or he would not have been given such a job.
Here he takes a critical look at a country that has dramatically changed since he left it in 2014. “Returning to the UK in some ways has been disconcerting,” he writes. “It is, after all, my home; a country I love and am proud of. But either it’s changed, or I have. Maybe both. It just feels like a strange land. This book is, I suppose, about Britishness — the values that have guided us.”
More from this author
While the group known as the Colourists certainly reinvigorated Scottish painting, a new show is a welcome chance to reassess them, writes ANGUS REID
ANGUS REID recommends an exquisite drama about the disturbing impact of the one child policy in contemporary China
The phrase “cruel to be kind” comes from Hamlet, but Shakespeare’s Prince didn’t go in for kidnap, explosive punches, and cigarette deprivation. Tam is different.
ANGUS REID deconstructs a popular contemporary novel aimed at a ‘queer’ young adult readership
