The human form undefined

This week CW goes to London’s Mime Festival, where Matt Trueman finds themes of fragmentation and inertness in both a puppet retelling of a Biblical tale of disguised identities and the static contortions of USSR was here. Dave Clements discovers in the legacy of the ambitious ‘Lunar Men’ who inspired Birmingham’s grubby dynamism a superficial sort of city pride that sells Brummies short. Meanwhile, Dan Travis argues that a new critique of positive thinking shows how it infantilises its adherents by advising them against acting in the world. And editor Dolan Cummings reflects on how attempting to trade off security with liberty ossifies the real meaning of human freedom. 

21 January 2010