Friday, May 2, 2025
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A continent divided: How COVID-19 will change the face of South America

Eve Bennett
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A continent divided: How COVID-19 will change the face of South America

A quickly mounting death toll, hospitals on the verge of collapse, industrial-scale burials in cardboard coffins, relatives unable to bid farewell to their loved ones… Descriptions like these, horrifying though they may be, will have no immediate resonance for the average Brit. In our minds, such images are reserved for TV coverage of war or catastrophic natural disaster. For Brazilians in São Paulo and Manaus, however, this has suddenly become a tragic and sobering reality.

Brazil, the largest country in South America, is rapidly emerging as the new global hotspot for the coronavirus pandemic. At the time of writing, only the United States is reporting more daily fatalities, and the total number of cases has soared to more than 190,000. Estimates suggest that the official number of deaths, which currently stands at just over 13,000, merely constitutes the tip of the iceberg, with data reviewed by Reuters suggesting that the death toll of the worst-hit area in the state of Amazonas could be three times the registered figure. They also allude to significant numbers of fatalities attributed to “pneumonia, severe acute respiratory syndrome and other respiratory failures” which are most likely related to COVID-19, raising fears that the true extent of the crisis is worse than meets the eye. Arthur Virgílio, the mayor of Amazonian city Manaus, has sent letters and video messages to 21 world leaders pleading for urgent assistance as its coffin supply runs short and its vulnerable health service becomes overwhelmed. “We aren’t in a state of emergency – we’re well beyond that. We are in a state of utter disaster,” he told Tom Phillips, Latin America correspondent for the Guardian.

Meanwhile, in the capital Brasilia, President Jair Bolsonaro announced his plans to invite thirty friends to his palace for a barbeque. “We will chat, perhaps play a little soccer,” he chimed to journalists, later joking that he may extend the invitation to thousands of his political supporters and members of the press. The retired military officer, a political outsider whose far-right policies saw him storm to victory in the 2018 general election, has incited worldwide outrage in the face of his response to the pandemic. Since dismissing the virus in a national public address as nothing more than a gripezinha (“a little flu”), his flagrant disregard of lockdown measures and underplaying of the crisis has only worsened along with the death toll.

“So what? What do you want me to do?” Many would struggle to distinguish Bolsonaro’s response to growing fatalities with that of a petulant teenager talking back to their parents. Aiming to bolster his chances of re-election, he presents himself as the champion for Brazil’s impoverished workers, insisting that the chokehold placed on the economy by social-distancing measures is more damaging than the virus itself. Despite eleven members of his political delegation testing positive for the virus after a trip to the US and reports that he himself may have fallen ill, he was pictured coughing and spluttering as he addressed crowds on the streets of the capital in March, shaking hands and taking selfies with protestors demanding the closure of Brazil’s Congress and Supreme Court. One Brazilian newspaper calculated that Bolsonaro had direct contact with 272 different people and handled 128 mobile phones given to him by members of the public during the event. It is little wonder, then, that The Lancet medical journal has branded him “perhaps the biggest threat” to Brazil’s ability to combat the spread of the virus.

Opposition to the president has not just come from abroad, however. Outcry from prominent figures across the Brazilian political spectrum has become deafening as a crisis of health is quickly becoming a crisis of faith in his leadership. Rodrigo Maia, president of Brazil’s Chamber of Deputies, described the president’s behaviour as “an attack on public health”, and his decision to fire his health minister Luis Henrique Mandetta for supporting social-distancing sparked widespread condemnation from all sides. The governors of Brazil’s 27 states have openly rebelled against him, implementing their own quarantine measures to compensate for the lack of federal response. The latest blow to Bolsonaro came on April 24th, when justice minister Sérgio Moro resigned in response to his sacking of the head of federal police, accusing the president of “political interference” on television and demanding an urgent investigation into his conduct. Discontent is rising as angry citizens bang furiously on pots and pans, with chants of Fora Bolsonaro! (“Bolsonaro out!”) filling the streets of cities across the nation. As calls for his impeachment begin to grow louder and the impact of the virus tightens its grip, Brazil finds itself hurtling headlong towards disaster.

Cross the border into any of Brazil’s ten neighbouring countries and the pandemic is presenting a similar threat to its citizens. A continent known for its vast political, economic and cultural divisions, the extent of variation in government response in Latin America to COVID-19 has been no different. #Quédatteencasa (“#stayathome”) illuminates motorway signs in Argentina, one of the multiple countries following European precedent in imposing a strict lockdown on its citizens early in the outbreak. Peru’s reaction is also a far cry from that seen in Brazil, with its government imposing a nightly curfew and controversially limiting movement by gender. Other countries, such as Chile, have turned to more flexible strategies, only implementing lockdowns in viral hotspots and temporarily nationalising their privatised health service to flatten the curve of infection. According to the Pan American Health Organisation, the continent is currently approaching 300,000 cases and is expected to enter the peak of the pandemic in May, six weeks behind Europe.

And yet, despite the growing number of infections, Peruvian president Martín Vizcarra announced plans to begin reopening the economy. Colombia’s leader Iván Duque has already given the green light to the construction and manufacturing sectors, as well as setting out stages for a controlled return to normality over the coming weeks. The idea of relaxing lockdown measures before receiving clear evidence that it was safe to do so was scarcely entertained by any European government, all of whom kept the overwhelming majority of their citizens indoors until well beyond the peak. Developed countries such as Italy, Spain and France saw the decision to prioritise lives over livelihoods as an obvious one, introducing generous rescue spending packages to keep their economies afloat. Whilst the decision to grind their countries to a halt will undoubtedly pose significant financial challenges for many years to come, the relative strength of their economies means that the strict measures that are needed to control the spread of the virus can be sustained for as long as is deemed necessary.

Across the Atlantic in the comparatively underdeveloped nations of Latin America, the matter is not so black and white. Despite the shocking disregard for life demonstrated by the nonchalant Bolsonaro, many will concede that his concern for his nation’s economy is in no respect unfounded. On a continent where over half of all workers are informal, living hand to mouth and reliant on daily cash takings for survival, long-term lockdowns are not merely a trying inconvenience, but rather a complete impossibility. For millions of poorer citizens, the luxury of being able to socially distance is nothing more than a pipe dream, with the threat of death by starvation ultimately looming larger than that of the virus. Although generous aid packages have been pledged by governments across the continent, the sheer scale of the region’s informal, often unregistered workforce has meant that emergency payments are often failing to reach those who need them most. In the poorest neighbourhoods of Colombia’s capital, Bogotá, residents have resorted to tying red rags to their windows to signal an urgent need for food, whilst tensions are boiling over on the streets of major cities such as Lima.

For the many millions of Latin Americans living in sprawling, overcrowded urban settlements such as the favelas in São Paulo and Rio de Janeiro, COVID-19 is a ticking time bomb set to explode at any moment. In these densely populated, heavily impoverished areas, where residents lack access to basic sanitation facilities and are more likely to suffer from chronic health problems, the spread of the virus has the potential to accelerate at a dizzying pace and lay waste to entire communities. As the first case clusters begin to show themselves on the urban fringes of the continent’s largest cities, there are fears that scenes in the Ecuadorian city of Guayaquil – where the hospital and mortuary systems have collapsed and infectious corpses are lying in the streets – may soon become a widespread reality across the continent. Given that the Inter-American Development Bank believes generalised lockdowns in Latin America cannot be sustained for more than two months, many of its political leaders find themselves faced with a catch-22: keep citizens under quarantine and risk potential economic collapse or move to restart the economy and risk devastating already unstable healthcare services. 

There is no doubt that the pandemic struck the continent at a very bad time. Even before the virus pushed the region into economic freefall, Latin America’s economy was growing at an annual average rate of less than 1% per year, making it the slowest growing region in the global south. The International Monetary Fund (IMF) predicts an economic contraction of 5.2% this year, warning that the continent looks set to plunge into a recession deeper than that seen during the financial crisis of 2009. With prospects of economic recovery weakened by rising public debt, the impact of the oil price crash and falling commodity prices, the number of people in poverty is set to rise from 185 million to 220 million this year alone. In a region marred by structural vulnerabilities that exacerbate severe economic inequality, the head of the UN Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean worries that COVID-19 will set the continent back more than a decade in its fight to overcome these obstacles. There are growing concerns that the dramatic scenes of social unrest in 2019, fuelled by anger at endemic inequality and stagnating growth, may soon become the new normal once more. For most nations on the continent, the immediate future looks to be one marred by both social and economic crisis.  

For some experts, however, the pandemic need not be the final nail in the coffin of Latin America’s economic prospects. Whilst the forecast for 2020 is undoubtedly bleak, many are looking to the possibility of significant rebound in 2021. The World Bank estimates growth on the continent to register at 2.6%, with the IMF forecasting an even more optimistic 3.4%. In particular, Peru, Chile and Colombia are all estimated to be in a stronger economic position by the end of next year than they are now. Although the short-term response of these nations lies very much in the spotlight, the continent’s journey to recovery from this crisis will ultimately be a marathon and not a sprint. Anna Grugel Smith from openDemocracy sees this pandemic as an opportunity to address some of the widespread structural failures that have given rise to unequal growth in the region, suggesting that the route out of this crisis should seek to heal the damage done whilst also “mov[ing] the region away from the economic ‘normal’ towards inclusive development.”

The worst of the crisis is yet to come, however, and the true extent of the pandemic’s impact on Latin America will remain unclear for quite some time. Regardless of how the situation unfolds in the months and years ahead, there is little doubt that this deeply divided and structurally vulnerable continent will shoulder an overwhelming part of the global burden. With suggestions that Latin America faces the prospect of another ‘lost decade’ of progress akin to that caused by the 1980s debt crisis, or perhaps even a full-scale humanitarian crisis, eyes across the globe will be turning to its political leaders and the steps they decide to take next. Will those who pursue tough lockdowns or those who prioritise the economy ultimately win the day? If global precedent is anything to go by, president Bolsonaro may come to regret his barbecues and jet-ski outings much more deeply than he anticipates.

Image credit: Ellie Wilkins

Now do I belong?: The effects of early-onset impostor syndrome

Freddie Feltham
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Now do I belong?: The effects of early-onset impostor syndrome

As Hilary Term drew to a close and we sat in my friend’s room, anticipating a final night out, we reflected on how we’d adjusted to Oxford life since arriving only six months ago. One said, in a tone somewhere between light-hearted and truthful, ‘I had such bad impostor syndrome when I arrived.’ I was surprised by the mixed reactions this comment was met with, yet there were some correlations in response to my friend’s compelling honesty: those from minority backgrounds agreed, whilst those from ‘status quo’ backgrounds either silently acknowledged or were blissfully unaware of what the term meant.

In case you fall into the latter category, impostor syndrome can be typified as wrongly feeling that you do not belong in your environment. Often used in relation to work settings, symptoms include anxiety and self-doubt about one’s intelligence and aptitude. Victims discount any achievements as either the result of luck or excessive effort, failing to recognise the extent of their own ability. These feelings culminate in the overarching fear that they are a fraud, an impostor, on the cusp of being exposed. The cycle is unforgiving, as the denial of one’s own value can be severely debilitating. Impostor syndrome often leads to low self-esteem, sustained anxiety and depression.

While the range of reactions surprised me, I was perhaps most taken with my own: I became aware of the distance I felt to those emotions, which had once drastically shaped my sense of self-worth. Admittedly, I’d had my moments of feeling like I didn’t belong. There was a particular low point in one of my first tutorials where the quality of my tute partner’s essay far exceeded mine, and another where my tutor laughed at my comparatively poor analysis. But the truth is, on the whole at Oxford, I hadn’t felt like an impostor. Despite being of mixed racial heritage, I had overcome any questions I had about deserving a place and whether I ‘belonged’ with relative ease. I knew that studying here would be challenging, but I had faith I was up to the task. Considering this, it disappointed me to realise that I hadn’t recognised how lucky I was to feel comfortable here, particularly given it hadn’t always been the case.

I initially grew up in Wembley and attended the state primary down my road. It was a typically diverse London school, which reflected the community we lived in, and I naturally meshed with the other children, most of whom hailed from complex ethnic and similar socio-economic backgrounds. My parents are both teachers, and while we don’t struggle financially, they would have never been able to afford a private education. However, my Dad, who worked at a private school, would receive a hefty discount if I passed the exams to enrol there – an informal access scheme that, in itself, was part of the attraction of his job. At seven years old, I began my private education, meaning my family had to relocate so I could be closer to school. I remember instantly thinking that I stood out – the way everyone spoke, dressed and acted in my new milieu was so foreign that it felt unattainable. Immediately, I shifted from being a high-achiever to a serial underperformer: I was bottom of all my sets and my behaviour was erratic. My shortcomings in academia felt matched by that in identity.

Through prep school I always felt that despite making close friends, I didn’t fit in. I didn’t believe I was intelligent, and my academic record seemed to prove it; on the rare occasions I did well, it was to the surprise of myself, my teachers and my parents. I remember feeling like a fraud because I couldn’t make sense of my identity: when I was at home in Wembley with my cousins and half-brothers I would drop my ts and use slang, then on the drive back to our school accommodation I could feel my consonants solidifying as my accent adapted again. I spent many flute lessons crying, admitting to my teacher that I didn’t feel good enough or that I really belonged. I felt alone in my confinement to a liminal identity. 

I couldn’t tell you what broke the impostor cycle. It wasn’t until the end of year 10 that I started to achieve results academically. This was in part a result of some amazing teachers, but I also wanted to make good on the sacrifices my parents had made for my education. I remember telling my Dad I was going to try for Oxford when I was 16. He told me I didn’t have to – a reaction of surprise, conditioned by my history of underachieving which did not manifest into overwhelming expectation (though one we look back fondly on now). I suppose what changed is that with time I came to accept that I wasn’t an impostor but that I was different, and slowly carved out a space between the lines for myself. 

Coming to Oxford wasn’t overwhelming like starting private school had been for seven-year-old me. There was familiarity in its stone walls, peculiar traditions, academic excellence, and the people who believe it is their birth-right to succeed, which nonetheless still seems at odds with me. Familiarity allows for stable footing and feeling like you belong, but cultivating still remains an exhausting task. It can be accelerated however, by seeing people similar to you. This is just one amongst myriad elements which make access schemes so important: beyond stating in no uncertain terms that your background doesn’t make you undeserving of your place, access schemes also provide an avenue for familiarity. It really is invaluable to see someone of similar heritage and identity to you at Oxford, a visual reminder that you have a right to study here, that you are not an impostor even if you constitute a minority. 

Unfortunately, access and representation are yet to reach an acceptable level at the University. Private school students still dominate the student body, many ethnicities remain underrepresented in our community, and we still have to deal with abuse of minority students as exemplified by the Oxford Union’s abhorrent treatment of Ebenezer Azamati in Michaelmas. Feeling at home amongst the ‘dreaming spires’ is one of many privileges that many public-school students have at Oxford; they shouldn’t feel guilt for their belonging here, but ought to recognise how fortunate their position is, and be sensitive to the fact that others might not. For those of us who feel imbalanced on cobbled streets, remember that you earned your place here – it wasn’t pot-luck. Whilst difference in identity may feel like a weakness, it is a strength to have a unique perspective that offers insight to your distinct and valuable experience, which others can learn from. Just your being here empowers people of similar heritage to push themselves in the realisation of excellence. Certainly, it is a challenge to establish your place, but we should remind ourselves that already getting to Oxford is a success, and one that ultimately, we deserve.

If you’re feeling anxiety and depression surrounding studying at Oxford, resources are available at Oxford Nightline (https://oxfordnightline.org) and SANE (http://www.sane.org.uk/what_we_do/about_sane).

More profit-interest than philanthropy in new Twilight prequel ‘Midnight Sun’

Abigail Howe
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More profit-interest than philanthropy in new Twilight prequel ‘Midnight Sun’

Confession time: I was a Twilight fan. It’s not as damning as the image that probably comes to mind – I honestly don’t remember much of what happened and I certainly never cried over Edward or Jacob. However, I did read all the books and watch all the films (more times than I’ll put in writing). When Stephenie Meyer’s website updated with a countdown, I checked out a few speculative articles but didn’t think much of it – it was probably nothing. Every few hours, though, I would refresh the page, just to see if anything changed. Any ex-fangirl (or fanboy) will know the intoxicating feeling of being part of something exclusive. It feels good to be the first to know.

The eventual announcement, Midnight Sun (a retelling of the saga from Edward’s perspective), was no surprise to long-time fans. Twelve chapters were leaked in 2008. Meyer described it as “a huge violation of my rights as an author, not to mention me as a human being”. Meyer’s roles as an “author”, creating work for profit, and “human being”, suggesting writing as a form of personal fulfilment despite its widespread reception, are equated. This replicates two understandings of such expansion within a fictional world – is Meyer exploiting nostalgia for profit or trying to bring joy to fans? Unless she’s had a change of heart, it doesn’t seem to be a passion project. Meyer told Variety in 2013 that Twillight was not a “happy place” for her. Repeatedly revisiting it, then, with The Short Second Life of Bree Tanner, Life and Death: Twilight Imagined (featuring Edythe Cullen and Beau Swan) and now Midnight Sun seems bizarre. Does a changed perspective add much from a literary perspective? The narrative is fixed and Meyer’s characters were criticised as superficial. However, E.L. James followed a similar route – leading to critical disdain but massive sales. This popular appeal highlights the contradictory relationship of prestige and pleasure within the reading experience.

The upcoming prequel to The Hunger Games trilogy, The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes, has sparked similar controversy. It will describe the events of the tenth Hunger Games, where the eighteen-year-old Coriolanus Snow must mentor a girl from District Twelve. Despite Scholastic ordering an unprecedented print run of 2.5 million copies, receptions have been varied. Part of this stems from its role as a prequel – it’s set over sixty years before the events of The Hunger Games, so we aren’t going to return to Katniss. However, we previously met Snow as the tyrannical President. According to The Guardian, one fan wrote that “you mean to tell me … I’ve waited years and preordered the Hunger Games sequel for it to be a President Snow origin story … about a rich white boy becoming an authoritarian who loves *checks notes* genocide?” It’s hyperbolic but a common sentiment.

While it might seem like an easy way to make money, previous expansion has backfired. After J.K. Rowling’s factoids went too far she lost scriptural authority. Adding to this the controversy surrounding The Cursed Child with back-dated diversity and her interactions with trans-exclusionary groups, Rowling found herself displaced. Instead, fans created their own canon with some of Rowling’s ideas firmly excluded. Her interjections were even mocked through a new meme format. As the Washington Post puts it, “she is no longer their distant, omniscient god”. There don’t seem to be many financial consequences for Rowling. She’s still profiting from Potter merchandise, attractions, films (even if their future is looking grim…), and probably much more. Instead, it’s cultural capital and a defined canon at stake. Rowling’s attempts to sue fanfiction writers show how much she values such authority and her ability to define the experience of reading Harry Potter.

Meyer, Rowling and Collins certainly aren’t benevolent gods, scattering down books as gifts to their worshiping fans. However, a depiction of them as money-hungry wolves, devouring naïve fans, is overly sceptical. For readers, it comes down to your level of investment in their respective fictional worlds – have you yearned to know Edward’s thoughts as he gazes at Bella? Do Rowling’s opinions have value to you – even if you disagree? Do you want to reminisce on the days you desperately attempted to learn how to do Katniss’ braid? Reading should bring joy, not shame through policed texts or exclusionary fandoms. Just as prequels or other extra texts can’t be divided easily into profit and philanthropy, neither can the reading experience.

SATIRE: Bully for You, Bully for Me

Sam Scruton
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SATIRE: Bully for You, Bully for Me

I awake to the sounds of Mall Grab blaring from my phone. I love Mall Grab. His music is sick. I roll over and turn off the alarm, checking the time as I do so. It is 11am. Man, last night was sick. Mafalda’s never sounded as good as she sounded last night and the vibes in Bully were just out of this world.

I get out of bed, shower, and then prepare for getting dressed. I hang three chain necklaces around my neck. One of them has a star on it, another has a cross, and the other one has a crescent moon. I do not know what these symbolise, but I know for sure that they go really well together. They look especially sick when they’re draped over my broad shoulders. Then I slip into some camo trousers, which I stole from a freak who did CCF back at school. I stand there in my dark room for a bit and stare into the mirror, taking in my naked torso, and what a lot to take in! Then I slip into eight T-shirts of varying sleeve lengths. Finally, I am ready to go out into the world.

Cecilia is waiting for me outside Pret. She is dressed exactly as I am. Cecilia is my best friend and our conversations are just absolutely nuts. As I approach, she says loudly, so the whole street can hear her: “How you feeling?”

I smile and say, also making my reply audible to the public: ‘Fucking rough, how about you?”

“Yeah, so rough mate.”

“Last night was so sick though.”

“Yeah, Mafalda was sick.” With that, the conversation has reached its dramatic conclusion.

We both head into Pret and buy our coffees. We have brunch on the street, so the general public won’t miss any more of our witticisms, and because Pret still doesn’t have a smoking area. Brunch was sick. It consisted of coffee and rollies. What more could a man want?

“You going to Musical Medicine tonight?” asks Cecilia.

“Can’t mate. Got an essay due in three weeks.”

And as I say this I put an imaginary gun to my head. This made Cecilia howl with laughter. I don’t blame her; I’m seriously jokes.

“That’s peak mate. It’s going to be such good vibes.”

She’s right of course, I bet it will be fantastic vibes. I sigh: “If I get a plan of this essay done by 6, I’ll come out.” What am I like? Absolute mess.

Cecilia looks at me, shocked, and laughs: “What are you like? You are such a sesh-head. Hahaha. You just don’t care about anything but the sesh, do you? But yeah, come tonight. It’ll be sick.”

“Yeah it will be sick,” I agree. If nothing else, that conversation alone is testament to just how close me and Cecilia are. I doubt we’ll ever have one quite like it again.

I sit in the library all day long. With the soothing beats of DJ Seinfeld the only thing to comfort me, and my time only broken up by a cig every 5 minutes. At 6:30pm, I have done a plan and I text Cecilia: “I’m coming out!”

She replies five minutes later: “Haha, what are you like?” She then tells me where pres are. Next, I text my dad: “Hey dad, really sorry, but I’m going to need some more money?” He replies five minutes later: “Haha, what are you like?” and then he transfers me some money.

Pres are absolutely sick. I have the aux and I play Folamour, so yeah, the vibes are pretty sweet. We talk for ten minutes about our essays. One guy tells me that he’s got an essay in for next term which he hasn’t even started yet, but he’s still coming out because he’s a sesh-hound and because musical medicine is going to be sick. I tell him that I’ve only done a plan for my essay which is in in three weeks, and he tells me that I also sound like a sesh-hound, and I tell him that’s exactly what I am. We talk about our friends from home and our friends from uni, and how jokes it is that they all know each other. Then for three hours and thirty minutes we talk about drugs. And then we just do a load of drugs and are ready to go out.

All I’ll say about musical medicine is that it was absolutely sick and that the next day I felt fucking rough.

Bare derrieres for bums on seats? Shock value on stage

Bella Stock
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Bare derrieres for bums on seats? Shock value on stage

By the time Iqbal Khan’s Anthony and Cleopatra reached its dénouement at the RSC, we were almost three hours in and, despite the production being an excellent one, I could feel my eyelids becoming heavy. Not under Khan’s watch. Before clasping a venomous asp to her breast, Cleopatra whipped off one of her many opulent costumes and appeared momentarily nude before slipping on an equally resplendent dressing gown. Needless to say, rows of slightly slouching torsos jolted bolt upright in waves across the auditorium in a domino effect. Cut to a few years later and I was working behind the theatre bar as Prasanna Puwanarajah revamped the 17th century Venice Preserved in 1980s punk style – complete with S&M PVC gimp suits and a trolley of sex toys. Members of the audience frequently left during the interval and registered their discomfort with staff.

This is nothing new, of course. From the sexual revolution of the 1960s, we’ve seen writers and directors un-corseting our strait-laced sentiments one controversial production at a time. The extensive nudity of the 1969 Oh! Calcutta!, an avant-garde theatre review (punning on “O quel cul t’as!“, French for “What an arse you have!”) shocked while Sarah Kane’s 1998 Cleansed caused much fainting with its graphic scenes of torture, mutilation and sex. I would argue that our generation has now become somewhat immune to the ‘shock value’ of sex and nudity. While my grandmother once spoke to me of being aghast at ITV’s The Durrell’s, we are the generation who barely (if you’ll pardon the pun) bat an eyelid at voyeuristic cameras goggling at the night-time activities of Love Island contestants or who watch as sliding doors reveal a selection of nude bodies for the perusal and preference of another in Naked Attraction. And it’s not just sex and nudity – from the films of Quentin Tarantino to Game of Thrones, violence on screen has fallen into unprecedented depths of blood, guts and gore in recent years.

Nevertheless, shocking displays in theatre does still tend to hit the headlines. Unlike film or TV, even for the most uninhibited amongst us, there is still something startling about actually experiencing such scenes; at seeing them so close at hand, in the flesh. I feel that it is valuable to be periodically shocked. We don’t, after all, go to the theatre to see the world through rose-tinted spectacles or to be delivered palatable entertainment on a mundane platter which fails to challenge us or penetrate the grey of ordinary life. Like the critic Michael Billington, however, I also feel that ‘there is a vital distinction to be made between the moral awakening that comes from shock and the visceral impact of unmitigated horror’.

I feel a kind of weariness every time I see theatre which capitalises on seriously graphic nudity, sex or violence. I’d like to turn to the director and say, ‘Don’t try and shock me. Don’t try and use my wincing and curling toes to make me out as some unenlightened prude.’ Through useless shock, I’m being played, unwittingly pounced on from the comfort of my seat, and it’s no surprise, therefore, to find that ‘shock’ has its etymology in military language.

At times, I can’t help but feel a frustration with and a resistance to the style of theatre coined by Aleks Sierz as ‘in-yer-face-theatre.’ Emerging in the 90s, it’s aggressive, provocative and brash, invading the audience’s personal space and grabbing them by the scruff of their neck for a good shaking. Leaving Anthony and Cleopatra, the nudity felt gratuitous and gimmicky: if having Cleopatra bare all to the audience was so crucial, then why was she so swiftly re-clad? Not only is there no nudity in the play but it seemed to encroach on the aura of untouchability which surrounds her sexuality. The Greek tragedians never showed extreme violence on stage but always related the information to the audience through a messenger and whilst this feels egregious today, I empathise with the Greek proclivity to ‘leave something to the imagination’.

If nudity, sex and violence are fundamental themes which the writer has explicitly and thoroughly explored through their writing, or the heightened staging of them truly adds to the audience’s understanding, then far be it from me to stand in the way of educational theatre. But, if you assume baring derrières is enough to get my bum on the seat, then you can think again.

Stage Adaptions: Midnight’s Children

Grace Spencer
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Stage Adaptions: Midnight’s Children

Iconic, encyclopaedic, and kaleidoscopic, Salman Rushdie’s Midnight’s Children has garnered a healthy sense of both wariness and respect from critics and readers alike over the course of its 39 years. It was, after all, dubbed the ‘Booker of all Bookers’, and its sprawling 446-page exploration of Indian politics spans nearly 7 decades, got Rushdie sued for libel by the Indian Prime Minister, and re-invented the post-Independence Indian English canon. It is nothing if not ground-breaking.

It’s no surprise, then, that Rushdie’s 2003 decision to adapt the novel for the RSC stage, alongside theatre-scene mainstays Tim Supple and Simon Reade, ruffled a few feathers. As critic Philip Fisher wrote, the venture seemed to sit “somewhere between brave and foolhardy”. The eventual outcome was tepid, earning smatterings of three and four-star reviews; the production failed spectacularly to rise to the heights of its literary predecessor. Its glory arrived, though, in its attention to that truth which seems so often neglected in adaptations – that the page and the stage are fundamentally different.

Rushdie’s works hinge around a nuanced understanding of colonial and postcolonial India, and a sense that, as he writes, “history has become debateable”. The (post)colonial ‘condition’, he believes, is far too complex to be lumped into one, empirical history with a capital H. As his protagonist, Saleem Sinai, quips, “reality is a question of perspective” – and whether that perspective is upper-class or lower-class, Western or Indian, matters. The magical realist approach to this subjectivity is what made Rushdie’s name; he lashes Saleem to Indian history from the get-go (“at the precise instant of India’s arrival at independence, I tumbled forth into the world”), and the eras of Partition and Independence are charted by a tumultuous personal history involving metaphorically potent growing pains, identity questioning, and debauchery.

Rushdie wasn’t content, though, to simply mirror a national and stringently political history through these personal goings-on – this seemed too much like a concession to its Imperial gaze. The genius of the novel is in Saleem’s complete unreliability as a narrator; he is hilariously egotistical and often “cannot say […] what the actual sequence of events might have been”. In a deft postmodernist stroke, Rushdie frees his characters from the compulsion to map out a comprehensive history, instead allowing their individual stories to take centre stage. History is not about large-scale, national events anymore – it is about the impact which it has on real people. Readers can view, finally, (post)colonial India not through distanced Western eyes, as has so often been the case, but through those of its own people.

The novel is intensely ideologically complex, then, and the interplay between its genres is vital to its power. Those who were sceptical of the stage adaptation seemed justified – would these subtle dynamics work under the probing light of the par cans? Could they even exist? Rushdie, Supple, and Reade were far too savvy to think so. Magical realism and postmodernism’s wildly different modes of expression would be difficult, near impossible, to translate faithfully from recorded word to live action; the adaptation needed to translate their clashes and confluences in some other way. This classic enigma is cracked in the Midnight’s Children stage play with a simple equation of genre and media, and the addition to the stage of a huge, technicolour screen. The play opens with “a film screen [which] dominates the stage and shows us the infinite crowd that is India today”, which then displays the “the atomic mushroom cloud” of Hiroshima. This is history in its least personal form -large-scale and absolute – and it seems as if it will remain separate from the emotional scenes depicted on-stage involving Saleem and his family members. This is Rushdie’s magical realist allegory as concocted for the theatre, with the personal on-stage divided from the national on-screen, and both irreconcilable.

Soon, though, worlds begin to collide. When Saleem first discovers his random telepathic abilities, which allow him to communicate with those who share his birthday, magic bleeds into the screen’s blunt reality – “film. The sound of the riot merges with the sound of the Midnight’s Children”. Postmodernism has intruded, as it does in the novel, in the graceful commingling of what the audience has come to take as two delineated halves of the performance, one live and one recorded. Through the second half of the play, the screen becomes increasingly bizarre and subjective, militantly un-linear in its display of “a calendar ruffled by a breeze, its pages flying off in rapid succession to denote the passing of the years”. Both stage and screen, then, become the locus of unreality, as the play dissolves the boundaries between its own media in a virtuosic recognition of Indian history’s complicated reality. It is not enough to project “[the] First World War, marching soldiers” and separate it from small-seeming lives which the actors depict – these are one and the same.

This media manipulation is a triumph, but the original decision to adapt Midnight’s Children for the stage lends itself equally importantly to Rushdie’s (post)colonial imaginings. The German theatre guru Hans-Thies Lehmann famously stated that theatre presents a completely fictitious world, which requires the “imagination and empathy of the spectator to follow and complete the illusion” – each audience member, then, perceives and reacts to a play completely differently. The idea of some sort of real ‘truth’ in drama becomes absurd, and this is a strikingly familiar concept for the Rushdie reader. It reminds us of the author’s refusal of an objective history – the intensely personal experience of watching a play becomes a perfect representation of the “one billion kinds of difference” which exist in postcolonial India.

The Midnight’s Children adaptation works because of its sensitive translation of the verbal to the visual, which produces intermingling poles and shifting perceptions of a power perhaps more movingly than in the original novel. It works, too, because the qualities of drama itself lend themselves so brilliantly to Rushdie’s worldview; not to stage the play would have been to stunt the artistic possibilities of the story. The show may well have ended up, as critic David Finkle deemed it, a “well-meaning shambles”– but it was an expertly designed one.

A ‘Clean Break’ from crime?

Ellie Harrington
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A ‘Clean Break’ from crime?

After mastering the downward facing dog-chaturanga-upward facing dog transition, my isolation development peaked and it was time to do some work. I watched the Donmar Trilogy’s production of Shakespeare’s Henry IV, directed by Phyllida Lloyd. The trilogy was created with Clean Break, a theatre company who work with women who have been in – or are at risk of entering – prison. All three plays were set in prisons with the all-female casts transforming Shakespeare’s classics into explorations of vulnerability, gang-violence, addiction and power.

Clean Break was set up in 1977 by two inmates in the high security wing of Durham prison: Jenny Hicks and Jackie Holborough. Later, they formed a troupe with 19 fellow prisoners, becoming the first British prisoners to perform outside prison. However, they were forced to perform under the condition that they wouldn’t advertise the fact that they were prisoners. Hicks and Holborough pursued the company after their release, offering a support group and skill development. They now proudly advertise themselves as a “a women’s theatre company changing lives and changing minds – on stage, in prison and in the community”.

Henry IV opened at the Donmar Warehouse in 2014 with Harriet Walter in the title role and Clare Dunne as Hal, who in this version is an inmate struggling with addiction. The cast are escorted into the chain link enclosure where the audience await. Audience and inmates are now locked up together: equals. The scene is set for Hal’s words to haunt the corridors of the prison. His promise to change when time demands it could just as easily be spoken by a prisoner as a prince. This promise to break ‘through the foul and ugly mists’ feels unsettlingly empty when confronted with the statistic that 48% of prisoners re-offend within a year of being released. When compared to the 5% of Clean Break members who re-offend, the value of their work can start to be appreciated.

Their work fits into a wider focus on the relationship between arts and rehabilitation which has grown recently, through social enterprises like Gareth Malone’s Aylesbury prison choir, asking age old questions about the purpose of prisons. Is our criminal justice system failing some of the most vulnerable in society? It’s easy (and often more comfortable) to judge those in the criminal justice system and discard them. Listen to just one of the songs written and sung by one of the Aylesbury inmates, or one of the monologues written by 40 members and associates of Clean Break, and condemnation becomes rightfully impossible.

Laura Bates’s Shakespeare in Shackles program provides yet another example of how we stereotype and categorise to protect ourselves with an illusion of order, because we feel threatened by disorder. The transformations of high security prisoners – often those who are serving life sentences in solitary confinement for crimes as severe as murder – demonstrate the power of theatre to provoke self-reflection and offer support in a way that little else can. Bates’s book Shakespeare Saved My Life focuses on Larry Newton, an inmate who had been serving a life sentence for murder in solitary confinement. Convicted at 19, he had served over a decade and needed to escape; he was prepared for suicide through homicide (committing murder to receive a death sentence). Bates began her work at the prison around this time, sharing Shakespeare with the prisoners to see if they could find personal connections with it. Having never heard of Shakespeare before the study, Newton now claims that Shakespeare saved his life – gave him purpose. He has since acted with fellow prisoners and aided in the development of educational programmes to help fellow prisoners and young people at risk of offending. Participants are forced to consider their own motives and choices. Using Macbeth’s speech where he lists reasons not to commit murder, Newton asks “are these reasons related to a sense of conscience—it’s wrong to kill this man—or is it more related to Macbeth’s own ego?” The power Bates has found in theatre just goes to show that its value doesn’t lie in fancy metre or archaic words, but in the vulnerability at its core.

I keep coming back to the fragility of the arts in our state education system when thinking about this. Schools are struggling increasingly to cover basic financial costs to the point where serious curriculum cuts have to be made – my school had stopped offering the drama GCSE by the time I was in year 11 and the lower school got a patchy stint of drama as one of the PHSCE rotations. When forced to choose one or the other, the formal, academic education wins time and time again. The situation is complex, but I wonder whether the enormity of what is lost is really realised. One of Clean Break’s members gives the stakes some perspective: “theatre education is about breaking down barriers, building self-confidence and giving women self-belief”. This is by no means exclusive to girls but countless women I know would benefit from breaking down barriers and having more self-confidence and self-belief. The influence of creativity seems drastically underestimated.

Theatre is hardly a magic wand that transforms lives with a wave, but it offers a lifeline. It offers a chance to explore the self in relation to the world and opens up a network of support that many haven’t ever experienced before. After all, if all the world’s a stage then no one should be denied their role.

Human nature: why we should all be getting outdoors

Charlotte Murphy
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Human nature: why we should all be getting outdoors

At the moment, I feel more grateful than ever to live where I do. My house backs on to fields meaning whichever direction I go in, I get to be surrounded by nature. These past few weeks, I have come across so many more people wandering across the fields for their daily exercise. While we all have more time on our hands, families are choosing to take time out of their day to get out of the house, and to slow down and reconnect with nature. 

Understandably, the increase in people coming to rural areas has caused a few practical issues. Some of the key issues involve people letting their dogs free around livestock without realising the damage it can cause, and the reduced ability for social distancing if people are walking down narrow country paths in close proximity to each other. However, in my opinion, any negatives of this increase use of outdoor space are outweighed by the positive impacts for physical and mental health. The increase in people wanting to be in nature shows that we all instinctively know how important nature is for our wellbeing as a species, and we rely on nature more than we might admit in a world where productivity and technology now control our lives. 

There is something so reassuring about being in nature. Having your feet firmly planted on ground which has been the same for thousands of years, seeing the seasons change as reliably as they do every year. Recently, I walked past a bomb shelter which appeared to be randomly placed in a field on the outskirts of a local village. That soil, if it could speak, would tell so many tales, both beautiful and tragic; the bomb shelter and the fields around it act as a reminder that we got through the atrocities of the world wars. 

The fact that so much time can be traced back through nature is incredibly comforting. Nature has been a constant through so much that may have felt like the end of the world. Feeling grounded and secure is somewhat of a luxury at the best of times, but in the midst of this pandemic it can feel unattainable. The sense that nature is everlasting does a lot to combat that feeling of floating without an anchor, and it reminds you that, from any situation – an essay crisis, an argument, any problem that seems insurmountable – there is a way out. It is easy to believe that the society and institutions we have constructed are the be all and end all of everything, yet nature reminds me that this isn’t the case. There are bigger things than all of this, and we should remember that our day-to-day worries, while obviously important to us, don’t have to mean everything. The constant presence of nature helps us to put things into perspective. 

As well as being comforted by the knowledge that nature has always been there, it is also lovely to see the sheep and cattle around in spring and summer every year. Not only do they remind us that summer is starting, but their presence is again reassuring; they don’t have any trivial worries, and simply live their lives. Animals, in general, allow you to take your mind away from the stresses of everyday life, and I find that they remind me to enjoy the world I live in. When I watch my dog having fun, sniffing around in curiosity and searching for new things each day, it makes me realise how interconnected all forms of life are. It is not just me who can appreciate the sights, scents and sounds of nature, but my dog can, and the livestock can too. The co-existence of animals with humans in nature shows us that all living things do belong together in some way. We are different beings and we all enjoy in nature in different ways, but the fundamental quality of nature brings happiness and adds a new dimension to life. Humans may differ from animals in terms of our higher cognitive abilities, but we too evolved out of nature and are, as a result, still intrinsically connected to it. 

The importance of our connection to nature may seem like a subjective, personal belief, but that is not the case. The University of Derby analysed over 50 studies and found that people who are more connected with nature have “greater eudaimonic well-being…and in particular have higher levels of self-reported personal growth.” Being stuck inside all day, it can feel like our lives are stagnant and that there is no way to better the situation. It can be so refreshing just to get outside and have a change of scenery. Just because we have to have our classes and tutorials in the same room all the time now, it doesn’t mean we have to be stuck in that room for the entire day. Having the ability to be so close to nature is a luxury that I really appreciate, but wherever you are, the importance of stepping away from concrete walls and into a bit of fresh air is obvious. Nature is not just pretty, but it provides a form of restoration, something which we all need from time to time.

The best podcasts to banish boredom

Abigail Howe
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The best podcasts to banish boredom

So, you’ve baked the perfect banana bread, binged Tiger King, considered giving yourself a fringe à la Normal People’s Marianne, or buying a chain like Normal People’s Connell – then talked yourself out of both – what next? Whether you’re getting your work done (despite nothing having changed in your environment, I promise term has started) and need something to listen to or you need another excuse to procrastinate, there’ll be a podcast for you.

If lockdown has ruined your plans, How to Fail with Elizabeth Day is the one for you. Elizabeth Day interviews celebrities about three failures of their choice. From Love Island stars to Phoebe Waller-Bridge to James O’Brien to Gina Miller to Jamie Laing, Day’s sensitivity as an interviewer encourages us to eventually reconsider our definitions of failure. Dylan Marron’s Conversations with People Who Hate Me, Grounded with Louis Theroux and David Tennant Does a Podcast With… all have similar discussion-based formats with nuance and wit. It’s like going for coffee with a very eclectic group of interesting people.

If you prefer the investigative leaning of Serial or Bear Brook, but with a bit less murder, then try The Dream. The first season explores the world of MLMs (#girlbosses, overpriced leggings, and dodgy diet drinks) while the second looks at the risks of aspirational wellness through the lens of capitalist commodification. It’s artfully produced – full of suspense and utterly bingeable, but with a quality of research that will make you want to return. Gangster Capitalism is currently looking at the NRA’s internal conflict. Stuff They Don’t Want You to Know also has an impressive range of subject areas – covering UFO sightings, mysterious unsolved cases (including, yes, a few murders), and 2016’s clown panic.

Do you fancy sounding incredibly well-informed about current events? Today in Focus, hosted by Anushka Asthana, combines a narrative of the news with insightful analysis. Released every weekday, it’s a quick listen with a great outcome: you get educated fast. The Economist has a whole host of podcasts that delve into the big questions of each day. BBC Radio 4’s Today in Parliament has a similar focus with a more overtly political flair. If you prefer interviews, then The Political Party, hosted by Matt Forde, is a look at politicians as you’ve never seen them before. With more expert input, The President’s Inbox is a dream for anyone interested in foreign relations and economics.

For pure enjoyment, Welcome to Night Vale is a cult classic. The premise is simple – it’s the radio station of a small desert town. The twist? This town is its own Lovecraftian, bizarre world with glow clouds raining meat, a multi-dimensional dog park, and invisible pie. Come for the mysterious hooded figures and Secret Police already listening at your window, stay for a faceless old woman (who secretly lives in your home), and Carlos the Scientist’s perfect hair. Welcome to Night Vale has become hugely popular, with sold-out world tours and best-selling books. If you’re already a fan, Kakos Industries has just as much weirdness with a whole lot more evil. While the podcasting stereotype of white men with glasses and plaid shirts can seem discouraging, Edison Research found that, out of all mediums, podcasts were, in fact, the most diverse and the one “that best represents the ethnic and gender make-up” of America due to its low set-up costs. And if you can’t find a podcast you like, then why not set up your own? – like Oxford’s own Maybe You Like It Podcast, where guests discuss staging unlikely media like Hot Fuzz, 50 First Dates, or Ex Machina. In a time with limited socialisation, new voices are always welcome, whether you’re listening or speaking up.

Why we should view the #foxeyes trend with narrowed eyes

Georgina Findlay
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Why we should view the #foxeyes trend with narrowed eyes

Bella Hadid. Kendall Jenner. Two of the most renowned names, and faces, in the fashion world. Despite their natural beauty, both supermodels are alleged to have undergone surgical blepharoplasty or lift procedures to raise the outer corners of their eyes, stretch the skin up towards their temples, and narrow their gaze to fashion a kind of slanted squint. This trend, referred to on Instagram and TikTok as #foxeyes, has inspired thousands of makeup fans to recreate the look by shaving off half their eyebrow, redrawing it at a steeper angle and using makeup to create the appearance of slanted eyes. There’s also the ‘strained eye’ or ‘migraine pose’, involving placing one’s hand by the temple and stretching the eye outwards. I’m sure that you, like me, hadn’t really thought anything of it. Indeed, I’m even partial to the old ‘migraine pose’ myself. It’s just a beauty trend, right? But there does seem to be something amiss. How is it that supermodels can make narrow, slanted ‘fox eyes’ fashionable and desirable in western culture, when for decades Asian people have suffered racial abuse for theirs?

Of course, the fox eyes trend is no direct attempt to emulate Asian eyes. Could it be that, by bringing a ‘look’ similar to that of Asian eyes to the forefront of western beauty standards, these high-profile figures are actually encouraging the western world to see the slanted, narrow eye shape of Asian people as appealing? This is certainly a nice prospect; one which could give a great deal of confidence to young Asians worried about looking different. I remember myself aged just nine or ten, being told by one of my primary school friends that she and her mum thought my ‘almond-shaped eyes’ were ‘beautiful’. It was the first time I’d ever been told anything like that, having got used to being taunted by other kids – and that tender comment has stuck with me to this day.

However, here’s where we start to run into problems. The physical acts behind the fox eyes trend and ‘strained eye’ pose, of drawing the corner of one’s eye outwards, recall to a concerning extent the racial abuse that Asian immigrants to the west have faced because of the shape of their eyes. My own family experience is just one example of an entire demographic that has been subjected to the racist mocking of Asian eyes. My mum, having grown up in Leeds in the 60s and 70s as the daughter of Mongolian immigrants, regularly encountered the old pulling of eyes into slits. Even me and my brother – decades later, and with 50% non-Asian DNA – have suffered the same treatment. In 2014 in Austria a group of boorish youths walked past my mum and brother, shouting abuse in German and pulling their eyes upwards. Last year my brother went to the Man United v Newcastle game at Old Trafford where he was jeered at by a group of Geordies, also finding the corners of their eyes in sudden need of a massage. But the point is: even today, in 2020, having slanted eyes is still the butt of racist jibes; yet it’s somehow become acceptable and even sexy in western culture to narrow, pull and elongate your eyes to create the same effect.

Like all beauty trends, #foxeyes will go out of fashion, and soon wide-open dinner-plate eyes will be the next big thing. But Asian eyes are not just a trend. And we, unlike billionaire supermodels, can’t just change the shape of our eyes with a surgical intervention, knowing that society will latch onto it as a beauty statement. Indeed, it’s a welcome change to see slanted eyes being spotlighted as beautiful, but I have serious doubts about whether Bella Hadid would be heckled by people pulling their eyes into slits if she walked into Old Trafford. While there’s nothing inherently wrong or bigoted about #foxeyes, it’s precisely our society’s narrow field of vision that leads us into obfuscating this real-life problem beneath the glossy façade of a popular beauty trend.

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