We are told that love is a primal force: innate, ahistorical, transcendental and above society. But how can something be truly innate if it is a concept that exists within the act of telling? CLC Columnist Mila Edensor explores such intriguing questions in this excellent analysis of early modern Portuguese poetry. From the unrequited love of men in the late 1500s, to the ‘passport bro’ of today, Edensor skilfully explores what this obscure poetry can mean for us today.

Sam Rubinstein explores themes of displacement and Polish-Jewish searches for belonging in Maurycy Szymel’s inter-war poetry

In his column ‘Between Wars, Between Identities’, Sam Rubinstein explores key issues of early twentieth-century Ashkenazi Jewish poetry, including antisemitism in Eastern Europe prior to the Holocaust, literary debates over the use of local vernaculars in Jewish poetry and expression, and Jewish nationalism and the beginnings of the Zionist movement. In this first column, he takes a look at the divide in Polish Jewish literary circles over language choice, and how key actors reconciled language with their evolving identities.