This Week’s Reading, 22.7.12

What the London 2012 Olympics have really cost us, Iain Sinclair in a swan-shaped pedalo, the Charles Bukowski musical and more.

• Leader image: Detail from artwork by Matt Furie. Full image here.

• A selection of photos by Homer Sykes of the Lea Valley immediately prior to its transformation into the 2012 Olympic zone, with accompanying poetry. Before the Blue Wall, Part 1, Part 2, Part 3 and Part 4.

• “…it is only when Britain confronts its past that we as a nation will be able to transcend it.” Author Andrea Stuart looks at the legacy of sugar production, the slave trade and racism in Britain, in her new book Sugar in the Blood.

• A California theatre company are to combine the words of Charles Bukowski with the music of composer, Stephen Sondheim, into a production to ‘reveal the sublime BS of life’.

• Author Iain Sinclair makes a staunch protest against the corporate invasion and physical destruction of Hackney by the Olympics, with a swan-shaped pedalo…

• The Costa Short Story Award 2012 is for a single, previously unpublished short story of up to 4,000 words. Entry closes at 4pm on Friday 7 September 2012.

• Check out Peter Markus’ We Make Mud. “…the most exciting and interesting book I’ve read in ages” – Bogdan Tiganov, author of The Wooden Tongue Speaks.

• The Summer 2012 edition of Gone Lawn Out – available here.

• The Brandalism project sees the largest reclamation of outdoor advertising space in UK history, as artists challenge the authority and legitimacy of the advertising industry – read the Brandalism blog here.

• The Fiction Uncovered Best of British titles 2012 for summer reading.

• Louder Than War reviews the new Batman film, The Dark Knight Rises, directed by Christopher Nolan.

• And finally, we’re back with Iain Sinclair for a little bit more about his beloved home town: At large in a ‘fictional’ Hackney.