Community Facebook Pages are my Kardashians
“Did anyone hear strange noises at 4.00am this morning?” During one long night spent under the UV lights of Hertford’s (soon to be demolished) windowless library basement, I decided to join my local community Facebook page. In doing so, I hoped to feel the warm, albeit virtual, embrace of my s
Laurel and Sausages: ‘The Anachronistic Procession’ Unmasked
Spring arrived in German country. Over ash and rubble The first green of birch unfurled Tentative, delicate, and bold Out of the villages, as from the South A tattered procession of voters went forth Who carried with pomp, Two old banners. The stitches were ragged and worn And the inscription faded
Nostalgia Blues: The Music of Cowboy Bebop
I’m watching tomorrow with one eye While keeping the other on yesterday. Shinichirō Watanabe’s Spike Spiegel has one critical affliction: his two eyes do not match. With the vision in one eye he sees the future, whilst the perception of his other eye is glossed over with colours of the past. Hi
Artist of the Week: Joni Brown
Joni Brown is a visual artist. Tell us a bit about yourself. I’m a first-year student at LMH, studying Fine Art at the Ruskin School of Art. Previously to university I took a foundation year in Art and Design, specialising in Fine Art, and spent a lot of my time walking the Coast Path of [&hel
Complaints from the Chinese Boudoir
“At daybreak, I pace idly in the courtyard with a silk fan. Cold autumn is at hand, and I know the fan will soon be discarded. A crow flits by and secures its position on the palace roof. The croaking bird is no match for my complexion, smooth as jade. Yet why is it able […]
Observances
I was staring at the spidery print and into the fresh whiteness of my copy of Beowulf one Friday evening last September, while far away and unbeknownst to me, tales older and stranger had begun to sprawl inside my phone. A reticent but attentive member of an English freshers’ Facebook group, I scr
Grass Island
Guernsey was built to be on a postcard. Sand crocuses and sea thrift flowers carpet its long coastal dunes; thatched stone cottages with open shutters bask in its continental sun; yellow and pink bunting canopies its narrow, cobbled streets. It is a polite place. Road signs instruct vehicles to R
Bedtime Stories
“Sometimes I think I deserve bad things because I’m a bad person,” a girl murmurs to an ex-boyfriend. She is digitised and sports beautiful bangs, a puzzle of pixels dancing across the nation’s laptop screens three weeks into lockdown. But the tragedy of it rings true: falling in love with
