Planet 249

Editorial

Helen Sandler draws on her personal experience to discuss ways in which at community level we can respond to the myriad crises discussed in the issue, and remain alert to warnings for the future. Many thanks to Helen for stepping in to write the editorial as our editor receives cancer treatment.

Power to the People

Leanne Wood makes the case for community-based renewable energy schemes as an answer to the cost-of-living crisis and a way of empowering people in some of the hardest-hit areas of Wales.

Jin, Jiyan, Azadi: Women, Life, Freedom: The Kurdish ideology behind the current uprising in Iran

As the world watches the brutal repression of women protesting in Iran, Shara Atashi examines the roots of ‘Jineology’, a radical feminism born of the Kurdish resistance movement.

The Wish

A short story by Emily Blewitt explores motherhood, sisterhood and loss set in a quintessential Welsh indoor market and on the banks of the swollen Ogmore – where things are not as they seem.

Foetal Movement

Poem by Emily Blewitt

‘Radical Empathy’ - hearing different voices

Sophie McKeand explores the challenging path of radical empathy as a way out of the increasingly bitter polarisation which infects public discourse and social media.

A Series of Sweeps, Rounds and Journeys: Inside the process of performative art

Maria Hayes describes how the revolutionary multi-perspective art of Cubism informs her practice and that of fellow artist Ellen Bell.

Welsh Keywords: Cynefin

This is the forty-fifth contribution to our Welsh Keywords series – inspired by Raymond Williams’ Keywords – which offers contemporary perspectives on contested meanings of words in Welsh and how these shifting meanings continue to shape our society. Here, Owen Shiers dives into the place-centred concept of cynefin, and asks how its ‘deep quality of relatedness’ can help us live in a shifting, fragmented world.

Quaker Graveyard in Wales

Poem by Damian Walford Davies

Breathing Freely: The insights gained from living with a disability

In a series that proposes how Wales can change after lockdown, Grace Quantock argues that the ‘hyper-vigilance’ of those who live with a disability can offer valuable models of thinking for society at times of crisis.

‘If you stop writing, you’re dead!’ – Harri Webb, the People’s Poet

Desmond Clifford digs up a lost recording of what was probably the last interview with the swashbuckling seaman, librarian and bardd gwerin from Swansea.

Invective for an Imminent Investiture

A poem by Nicholas Murray

Book Review Section

Throughout 2023, Helen Sandler will be our guest book review editor.

Putting together the books section for Planet is a gratifying process, but I am not the first guest review editor to report a nagging regret that there can never be enough space for all the new releases that might interest our readers. Still, in this issue we manage to cover a fascinating range of titles, across several genres. My thanks to the contributors for their insightful and often entertaining critiques.

We open with a roundup of four new poetry books from distinctive voices; followed by a rollicking road trip of a novel and a ‘wild array’ of short stories. Three vibrant art books take us from the chapels of Wales to the tents of Tibet. A primer on trans and non-binary lives stands alongside a lyrical memoir of a family with disparate roots. We end with big questions of history and prediction: whether the Celts can be traced through time; and – joltingly – how humanity might survive climate change via planned migration.

Whether you open Planet at the back or save these pages till last, I look forward to a year of guiding you towards your next read.

Helen Sandler is a writer, editor and event organiser who lives near Machynlleth. She co-programmes Aberration, the LGBT+ arts night in Aberystwyth.