SwayBlog

William ShakespeareReviewSt Peter's Church, ManchesterThis is more like it. After a lightweight Macbeth at Shakespeare's Globe, we now get a production that gets closer to the heart of the play's mystery. Staged in a deconsecrated Victorian church for the Manchester International Festival, it is co-directed by Rob Ashford and Kenneth Branagh and boasts a performance by the latter that reminds us what an intemperately exciting Shakespearean actor he is. The production has many fine qualities as well as one or two dubious ones.

Nelson Mandela This article is more than 11 years oldMandela the movie: Idris Elba gives short shrift to South African actorsThis article is more than 11 years oldBritish-born star picked to play Nelson Mandela in biopic after casting agent says local actors lack stature for roleMorgan Freeman, Danny Glover, David Harewood, Dennis Haysbert, Terrence Howard, Clarke Peters, Sidney Poitier and now Idris Elba: all are actors who have been cast as Nelson Mandela – yet none is South African.

Taylor SwiftTaylor Swift fan died of heat exhaustion at Rio concert, forensics report findsAna Clara Benevides, 23, died hours after the singer’s 17 November show – a day when temperatures hit 40C Heat exhaustion caused the death of a Brazilian fan who attended a Taylor Swift concert in November, according to a forensics report obtained by the Associated Press on Wednesday. Ana Clara Benevides, 23, passed out during Swift’s second song at the show in Rio de Janeiro on 17 November and died hours later at a local hospital.

Children's booksGlobalTeen book club: Shadow and Bone quizThink you know your corporealki from your etherealki? Your volcra from your kefta? Take our dark and dangerous quiz and see if you can shed some light on the world of Shadow and BonencG1vNJzZmivp6x7tbTEoKyaqpSerq96wqikaJqfpLi0e9CuoLNnYmV%2BdHvJrqVoaWRkwaaxzWaZqKebYrCtwcFmqqGZlKTEbq3NnWSbp56aerLByLM%3D

I have mused before about the effects of importing foreign words into English sentences: French flair, German exactitude, the eternal verity of Latin. This week viewers of BBC's Match of the Day heard an example of what Scots can do to illuminate an otherwise standard sentence of standard English. Deeply expressive, foreign to most of us, even though it does not exactly come from a foreign language, the word was "

Reading American citiesBooksThe Pacific Northwestern city offers a range of reads, from jazz era tales to bleak portrayals of modern American life. Here are some of our readers’ favourites Jon Raymond introduces the literature of Portland The “idea” of Portland only entered the popular imagination in recent years, chiefly thanks to the comedy TV show Portlandia, as Jon Raymond wrote recently. But this city, known as a haven for vegans, iced latte lovers (yes, flat white fever hasn’t conquered America – yet), beards, fixed-gear bike worshippers and any other hipster stereotype you want to invoke, is more interesting and surprising than this suggests.

Christopher Nolan This article is more than 11 years oldThis article is more than 11 years oldChristopher Nolan chose villain with name viewers will link to Bain Capital, the private equity firm Republican nominee founded – or so says US commentator Rush LimbaughWhen Christopher Nolan announced two years ago that the character Bane would be Batman's nemesis in The Dark Knight Rises, more than a few eyebrows were raised. While the villain has played a prominent role in the caped crusader's comic book canon, he is not nearly so well known as traditional bad guys such as Joker, Penguin or the Riddler.

Gothic fantasies and high-wire emotions … Florence Welch. Photograph: Autumn De WildeAs Florence Welch prepares new album Dance Fever and heads out on tour, we appraise the best of her torrid, maximalist songwriting by Michael Cragg20 Moderation (2019)“Do I look moderate to you?” asks the never-knowingly subtle Florence Welch rhetorically on this James Ford-produced one-off single. Opening with bar-room piano stabs, it soon blossoms into a galloping rocker, Welch battling an inner voice suggesting she perhaps rein it in.

OpinionSocial media This article is more than 3 years oldMarxist memes for TikTok teens: can the internet radicalize teenagers for the left?This article is more than 3 years oldJoshua CitarellaI witness horror stories of social media algorithms turning young people into extremists. But why cede this space to the far right? I’ve been researching Gen Z’s online memetic subcultures since 2016 and, over the past few years, I have watched a generation of young people become politicized online.