GABRIELE NEHER draws attention to an astoundingly skilled Flemish painter who defied the notion that women cannot paint like men
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A shrewd observation of the absurdities of modern labour
Lee Scott’s native Runcorn a simulacrum for Churchtown
[Rept0n1x/Creative Commons]
The Bard pays homage to Hull’s finest promoter and venue, and awards Douze Points to Laibach
KEVIN DONNELLY outlines how the bourgeois institutions inhibit our ability to to view art in revolutionary ways, and suggests some tactics to overturn it
ANDY HEDGECOCK welcomes an accessible - and optimistic - take on our relationship to new technology
JOHN GREEN suggests that a new, biased, and highly readable re-hash of the story of the Cambridge Five be taken with a large pinch of salt
BRENT CUTLER welcomes a timely reminder of the long history of protests and the outdoor spaces in which they takes place
Swan Songs
Lee Scott
Repeater £10.99
THERE aren’t enough novels about work – despite it taking up so much time, of each day, of each life.
Lee Scott’s debut novel Swan Songs is about working in a Big Pharma factory where a mysterious chemical solution is transferred into vials that are packed and then dispatched.
Our hero and narrator, Leonard Swanson, has been compelled by the Job Centre in Churchtown (a simulacrum for Scott’s native Runcorn) to take on shifts as a line-picker. His job is menial in the extreme, but also soul-destroying because Leonard is an aspiring rap legend and would much prefer to be at home working on “the best album ever” – the Swan Songs of the title.
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