Senegal’s founding president’s poetry heard in native language for first time

The late Léopold Sédar Senghor was a renowned poet but only recently has a significant volume of his work been translated from French to Serer

Alexander Litvinenko and the most radioactive towel in history

The Russian dissident was murdered in London with polonium, but only on the third attempt. In an extract from his book A Very Expensive Poison, Luke Harding traces the toxic trail the clueless assassins spread around the capital

Tony Blair excluded MoD head from Iraq invasion talks, biography claims

Senior figures in defence ministry were cut out of discussions in the run-up to the war, according to new book Broken Vows: Tony Blair – The Tragedy of Power

The Morning They Came for Us review – unsparing account of Syrians’ suffering

Janine di Giovanni’s reports of life under the Assad regime during the civil war are nightmarish, but unflinching

Brooklyn producers: ‘A lot of the untold stories are female’

Two-woman team discuss gender-skewed Hollywood and retelling Irish immigrant experience through female eyes

Final Umberto Eco book publication pushed forward after author’s death

Pape Satàn Aleppe: Chronicles of a Liquid Society is a collection of essays that was originally set to be published in May 2016

Don’t moles have a right to life too?

John Clare’s ‘little hermit’ may be a hero of children’s literature, but adults happily use the cruellest methods to wipe out them out

Lagos is set to double in size in 15 years. Will it ‘spoil’?

Booker prize nominee Chigozie Obioma loves Lagos, but shares the centuries-old fear that it may ‘spoil’. With 2,000 new people arriving every day, the city faces its toughest challenge yet

‘The Australian dream left us to rot’: exclusive extract from Stan Grant’s new book, Talking to My Country

Guardian Australia’s Indigenous affairs editor describes how he grew up ashamed of his background, in a land where his people were treated as a ‘prehistoric relic’ – and tells why inspiration from his ancestors has now driven him to stand up and speak out. ‘Everything we have won has come from dissent’

Gillian Slovo: ‘I think the 2011 riots sparked something in me’

The author and playwright on the 2011 riots, the lure of Isis and finally adjusting to her home in England

Umberto Eco: ‘People are tired of simple things’

Life, like fiction, was an endlessly absorbing game for an intellectual who wore his great learning lightly

Umberto Eco, Italian novelist and intellectual, dies aged 84

The revered literary critic, author and essayist – most famous for 1980 novel The Name of the Rose – had been suffering from cancer

Western writers out, Indian writers in for Rajasthan’s schools

Government-backed rewrite of school syllabuses divides teachers amid fears of a right-wing shift towards Hindu nationalism

Art against the odds: new book showcases Sudan’s isolated creatives

Prevented from exhibiting abroad by war and sanctions, project hopes to promote homegrown talent to the world

Emma Thompson: UK would be ‘mad not to’ stay in EU

Alone in Berlin actor says she ‘feels European’ and that she would definitely vote to remain in Europe in the referendum