Solidarities

On whose face do the shadows of a divided history fall? This short story by Asghar Wajahat – translated from Hindi by Aditya Vikram – observes a refugee camp set up in the aftermath of the 2002 pogrom in Gujarat, India, haunted by the spirits of lost loved ones. Writing in an unabashedly Muslim voice, the story is narrated similarly to a dastaan, an oral form of Urdu storytelling from North India, and examines the psychic wounds of marginalisation based on faith, class, and gender pervading a rotting democracy. With an illustration by Simone Khanyi Hadebe. 

Ramallah-based poet and playwright Dalia Taha offers three poems that bear close witness to the occupation and genocide in Palestine — 'The sound of trees and children riding bikes through the windows. / The towers they blasted.' Originally written in Arabic, these poems meditate on the intimacy of objects, faces, and daily scenes amid an atmosphere of loss, grief, and destruction. The text's spare, beautiful English translations are by Sara Elkamel. 

Our 2026 International Writer in Residence Safia Elhillo speaks to us about her reading lists, writing rituals and practices, what 'global solidarities' means to her, valuable advice she has received as a writer, and more in this new interview. Stay tuned for more news on Safia's residency, including upcoming workshops and new writing from the renowned Sudanese American poet, author, and editor.

Can a group of grassroots campaigners collaborate with a 140-year-old trade union that is resistant to change? In this essay, Martin Reed and Noreen Masud identify the tensions between grassroots activism and established union structures, discussing the challenges to labour activism in the creative industries. They specifically examine the Society of Authors, one of the UK’s largest trade unions for creators, from their perspectives as members of the bookworkers collective, Fossil Free Books. 

The AWETHU School of Organising is the first programme of its kind in the UK teaching young people effective methods for political and community organising, while centring Climate Justice and Black Liberation. In this piece, Jess Mally – who co-founded the organisation with Mikaela Loach in 2022 – dives into AWETHU’s origins, methods, and mission, as well as their own journey as an organiser, asserting that our hope and actions must be interconnected as much as our struggles are.

In June 2025, we held a live conversation with R T Samuel and Ruby Hembrom – editor and founder-director from Blaft Publications and adivaani, respectively – two indie publishers championing some of the most exciting and radical work in India's literary scene. The discussion was facilitated by Ananya Mishra and Prerana Kumar, and explored India's contemporary publishing industry, anti-caste expression, science fiction, and promoting Adivasi-Indigenous literary cultures.

As part of our Writing the Self, Writing Berlin series, editorial intern Divya Ghelani spoke with Siddhartha Lokanandi, who runs Hopscotch Reading Room, a Berlin-based English-language bookshop he founded in 2017. A haven for the intellectual – and political – bibliophile, Hopscotch is regarded as ‘an outlier of a bookstore’ in both its home city and beyond, for its intentional centring of non-Western, anti-racist, Global South, and anti-colonial perspectives, as well as minor literatures.

‘What becomes of gender and sexuality amidst the collapse of the liberal world order?’ In this essay, Dr Abeera Khan from SOAS, University of London’s Department of Gender Studies examines our current moment as one after homonationalism, where ‘the sparse and vanishing wages of inclusion lie exposed.’