From 1984 to 1987, Merryl Wyn Davies was a regular contributor to Afkar: Inquiry, the monthly ‘international magazine of events and ideas’. The three columns reproduced here provide a glimpse into her style and thought.   

Those fortunate enough to have met Merryl Wyn Davies instantly noticed certain features of her towering personality.

Let me tell you a woman’s story of how the sun of Sufism rose in the diasporic West, and how that was supposed to change something. 

I have long been very interested in my own family history, following in the footsteps of my father who was a keen amateur genealogist.

Late in 2018 we moved to a place in the countryside of Galloway, in south west Scotland. It was only fifteen miles from our previous residence but it was still an entirely different world.

Three poems by Ruth Padel.

For many people, folk rock is a genre unto itself, patronised by gnomish white men with mutton chop sideburns nursing tankards of ale, rollie cigarettes, and ambitions to warlockhood, typically found in grimy pubs themed around shamrocks or Stonehenge.