Portside

Spies, politics and murder in Channel 4’s poised new 1945-set espionage thriller.

New play, about Reconstruction. This was really a turning point in US history when America almost did the right thing. The South was writing new state constitutions and African Americans were getting elected to local and national offices.

In an era of endless war and more war, poet Eve Sutton contrasts a world of peace and safety.

Two books look to the histories of the Communist International and the Tricontinental movement to evaluate how organizing around color and region can effect global struggles against oppression and grow in tandem with multiracial workers’ movements.

This study, published as Appeasing Hitler in the UK, focuses on a vain, narrow-minded prime minister, and on how few Britons understood the Third Reich. The book will be published in the USA in June under the title Appeasement.

In post-industrial Ohio, a Chinese billionaire opens a factory in an abandoned General Motors plant, hiring two thousand Americans. Early days of hope and optimism give way to setbacks as high-tech China clashes with working-class Americans.

Koji is a fungus believed to have been domesticated in Asia. As the spores grow, they release enzymes that break down proteins and starches into sugars. This reaction is also why koji mold is used to turn soybeans into miso, and rice into saki.

As with many epic fantasies, the show’s heroes are framed as liberators and defenders of the common people—despite holding absolute power.

The son of Mexican immigrants, the poet José Olivarez explores the ambiguities (and realities) that determine who labels whom in the discourse of ethnic identity.

A look at the state of investigative reporting and long form journalism, a former New York Times editor details threats to an informed public coming from the decline of newspapers and the rise of social media gimmicks that beggar fact-based writing.