Issue 1321

Valleys and moors
Better known as an actor, Keeley Forsyth is now making sparse, atmospheric music. She tells Saskia Murphy that it was a return to her northern roots that allowed her to make her debut album – and shaped its sound. Cover and photo by Maria Alzamora.

Orwell takes the bench
Nearly a century after George Orwell wrote about how the authorities sought to persecute the homeless, what would the great author would have made about modern attitudes to people on the edges of society, asks Richard Bradford.

‘We had everything ready to evacuate’
Rain may have brought some respite from the fires burning through the Australian bush but the impact on lives, homes and displaced communities remains immense. Two Big Issue Australia vendors give first-hand accounts of the devastation.

Plus
News of the Keighley Indian restaurant where staff are trained to look after diners with dementia, former Monty Python Terry Gilliam’s letter to his younger self, an interview with celebrated Chilean author Isabel Allende, columnist Saskia Murphy on Meghan Markle and racism – and much more.