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Peter Bach

Peter Bach

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Letter From London: Stop It, Repeated the American in London

It was from the US that the grey squirrel was first introduced to the UK. Two of them have now moved into the attic. I woke to their scurrying the...

30.01.2025 7

CounterPunch

Peter Bach

Letter from London: Formed of Frailty and Error

Against a backdrop of continued change in the world, the artist here in London has come to the end of another large piece. It is challengingly good,...

23.01.2025 10

CounterPunch

Peter Bach

The Future of Organized Labor in the Time of Trump and Farage

It never used to be the case here in the UK that people ignored the unions. As the Grateful Dead sang back in the 1970s: ‘What a long, strange trip...

19.01.2025 6

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Peter Bach

Letter From London: Bully for You

My first ever fight was with a bully of sorts. I was seven years old. His was a case of cruelty over animals rather than humans. The fight took place...

15.01.2025 10

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Peter Bach

Letter From London: Moscow-upon-Thames

Even recently, Russians did not so much dominate as assist London with continued global prowess, despite the forefinger and thumb of Brexit having...

09.01.2025 7

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Peter Bach

Letter Not from London: the English Countryside

It’s always dramatic when you leave London for a spell in the English countryside. In the English countryside, people still say hello. Trees are...

01.01.2025 2

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Peter Bach

Poetry From Today’s Frontlines

Someone said recently that AI might know more about the history of the First World War than all human historians put together but that he knew more...

29.12.2024 7

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Peter Bach

Letter from London: You’d Better Watch Out, You’d Better Not Cry

An example of just how challenging Christmas can be, even when away from all the bloodshed in the world, is the latest update from...

18.12.2024 5

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Peter Bach

Letter from London: Striking Home and Away

I don’t know if it was murdered UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson or not, but I saw Taxi Driver again for the first time in years. Watching...

11.12.2024 3

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Peter Bach

Letter from London: Book of the Dead

One of the more consequential political stories here last week was the prospect of MPs legalising assisted dying in England and Wales. This was for...

04.12.2024 4

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Peter Bach

Canterbury Tales

Voltaire once said of religion: “Those who can make you believe absurdities, can make you commit atrocities.” The Archbishop of Canterbury Justin...

01.12.2024 4

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Peter Bach

Letter from London: Barry Flanagan’s Wake

Someone recently watched a film I was lucky enough to make about the late artist and sculptor Barry Flanagan. They asked me how the idea came about...

27.11.2024 6

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Peter Bach

Letter From London: Urban Wildlife

While the rest of the world realigns, the little reported super-fast 200mph peregrine falcon is once more king of the London skies. There is even...

13.11.2024 3

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Peter Bach

Letter From London: Urban Wildlife

While the rest of the world realigns, the little reported super-fast 200mph peregrine falcon is once more king of the London skies. There is even...

13.11.2024 2

CounterPunch

Peter Bach

Letter from London: The Poet, the Leader, the Bishop, and the Post-Punk Maker

An early love of poetry kicked in after listening to Bob Dylan and reading Wilfred Owen. But there was always the Penguin Modern Poets series in...

06.11.2024 3

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Peter Bach

Letter from London: An Ocean Apart?

Betty Boop is not the only remarkable figure on show in Florida. Henry McLeish is visiting professor of UK and European politics at the University...

30.10.2024 3

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Peter Bach

Letter from London: My Week with The Artist

Often the success of a painting today is measured in terms of how much it sells for and not how much it may or may not affect us. Everything we...

23.10.2024 3

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Peter Bach

Letter from London: I Read the News Today, Oh Boy

London, 4.44am. I used to catch minicabs to airports around this time. To Kabul, via Dubai, or a plane direct to New York. Back then, a quick blast...

16.10.2024 7

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Peter Bach

Letter from London: The Zombie Knives Are Out

A teenage boy last week was stabbed to death close to where we live here in south-east London. He was reported as saying, ‘I’m 15, don’t let me...

02.10.2024 4

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Peter Bach

Letter from London: Hush

The giant harvest moon in the London sky sent me scurrying back to Neil Young, though rather than moonlight for harvesting farmers, it got me...

26.09.2024 4

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Peter Bach

Letter from London: Whose Strength is Spent in Vain

News rolls in, news rolls out. Somewhere in the waves we lose our compassion. Occasionally, on beaches, we find it again. Like a not so rigid...

11.09.2024 10

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Peter Bach

Letter from London: Braveheart Asymptote

I write this from a London hospital bed having—most powerfully—imagined bagpipes the moment I came round from my operation. Drugs will do that for...

28.08.2024 2

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Peter Bach