Matthew Phillips

Review: Much Ado About Nothing @ Exeter Lemon Grove: ‘Deftly composed’

UoE Shakespeare Society’s staging of Much Ado About Nothing opens with verve: May Macleod, who plays Audrey, sings in the dim red-purplish light of what could be the club room or dining hall of Hotel Messina, where the action takes place. The stage is minimally set and the band is in view, a red ‘Messina’ sign hangs over them. The upscale hotel, run by Leonato, (a well-cast Sam Foster, comfortable in the role of the gracious host and flush social figure) is where a group of RAF soldiers, jubilant over the Second World War’s end, return to. These soldiers are Don Pedro — ‘the prince’, and the most socially powerful of all, Benedick, Claudio and Don Pedro’s socially envious brother, the classic Jacobean bastard-outcast figure: Don John.

The setting of Much Ado in ‘Hotel Messina’ in the spirit of post-war triumph, with the key male characters as returning members of the RAF — the branch of the army most commonly associated with the upper-class — is a shrewd and perfect fit for the emotional setting and expectations of the Bard’s famous comedy.

Perhaps the most memorable aspect of UoE Shakespeare Soc’s staging was how excellently cast the characters were. As already mentioned: Sam Foster is apt as Leonato; Will Jarvis carries the social well-to-do and manners of a prince — his hair Caeser-ish — while the potency of his military prestige is evident; Alex McKeon’s Benedick is on par with Jenni Lanes’ Beatrice (perhaps the strongest performances in the play) — as they should be in a well-balanced casting, equals in wit who cannot help but war with words — and his snide yet melancholic distaste for love quickly won me onside. Jacob Hutchings’ Claudio also marked one of the play’s most powerful performances as a young ambitious soldier and the lover of Hero (well-cast as Tamsin Keeley) — his initial rage and then soul-level remorse late in the play, after Don John’s plot to ruin his and Hero’s marriage is revealed, is inspired. George Fincher’s Don John meanwhile makes for the ideal moustache-twirling villain and his plot-hatching scene with the devoted Conrad (Patrick Swain) where he lies eating grapes reclined edges amusingly on the right side of cliché.

The plot is well incorporated with impressive and funny sequences and the use of space is sharp thanks to multiple timely and humorous stage-settings from Dogberry and his deputies, Verges and a watchman (Daniel Stanger-Cornwell, Ben Spring and Samuel Nicholls respectively). Some examples are Benedick’s eyebrow-raising tussle with one of Dogberry’s deputies behind a drinks cabinet, the well-choreographed and lively masquerade, multiple brilliant exchanges between Beatrice and Benedick and, most cunning in terms of composition, the deception of Claudio by Borachio and Margaret (Michael Hogg and Anna Blackburn respectively). Michael Hogg’s portrayal of Borachio, one of Don John’s followers and the key executor of his schemes, deserves mention as Hogg seamlessly inhabits the wily villain who is stooped, mischievous and likeable.

UoE Shakespeare Society should be proud of a staging of Much Ado that is deftly composed and beautifully cast.

Interview with Will Jarvis on ‘Sealed’

A new play produced by Katie Jenkins of Exeter’s own Theatre With Teeth, written and co-directed with Niamh Smith by Will Jarvis, Sealed is an original play that opened to animated reviews in Exeter about seven strangers who find themselves invited to a house under dubious circumstances, knowing nothing of each other or why exactly they have been brought together.

Following the play’s success at venues like Exeter’s Boston Tea Party last year, Theatre With Teeth are taking Sealed to the OSO Arts Centre in London this June with performances on Monday 12^th, Tuesday 13^th and Wednesday 14^th in Barnes.

I interviewed the play’s creator, Will Jarvis, about the play itself — his first serious project, and a successful one at that — his creative process, and more.

I began: ‘Have you been writing plays for a while now, with Theatre With Teeth or is this a new thing?’ ‘This is a relatively new thing,’ he said. ‘I’ve always been interested in writing and I’ve always written little short stories, and comic books and little screenplays, but just for fun. When I got to university I did a creative writing module which I really enjoyed but there was a definite emphasis on poetry.’ Will explained that while he loves reading poetry, he’s never been so good at writing it, and he was frustrated that there ‘wasn’t more of an emphasis on screenplays’, so he started writing experimental screenplays, scripts and shows. On Sealed’s conception, Will said ‘Sealed actually started as a sort of writing exercise — it started as having seven strangers interact in a room in a comedic way. I was never intending to put it on or develop it seriously; it was just a writing exercise for me, but it sort of transformed into something completely new. It is the first extended piece of theatre that I’ve written, yes.’

Being a new play and also Will’s first serious project and seemingly, created by way of something of a happy accident, I was particularly interested in Will’s creative process. ‘So there was no vision at first, this was simply a practice exercise in your own time?’ I asked. ‘Yeah, about last January, I was just doing it as a practice exercise in my own time and it was a bit like a snowball rolling down a hill. The more I started to write, the more characters started to come out of these experimental stereotypes and they evolved from one dimensional characters that would just say text trying to be funny to more fully fledged characters.’

Knowing relatively little of the work myself, I asked about Sealed now, about what it is trying to do. ‘So, there are seven characters who have all come together in this house. They know nothing about each other bar the fact that they have all been invited by somebody they don’t know and that they don’t know what their purpose in the house is. What’s it about, what’s it trying to do?’ Will replied: ‘It opens a mystery-led comedy really. It begins with six characters coming into a house an interacting as you’d expect them to interact — as six strangers — they all begin as stereotypes, sort of like The Breakfast Club … as the play evolves, we learn more about these characters, about their flaws, and how they contradict themselves as human beings. If I was to say the play was about one thing it would really be about human connection. At first, it looks at the small things.’

That the characters began as stereotypes interested me. I ventured: ‘So the play almost embodies the form, as it were, of the creative process itself? The characters develop before the audience as they did during the writing process as opposed to entering fully formed.’ ‘Yeah that’s the hope,’ Will said, ‘though it does start as a sort of character study, once the characters start questioning why they’re in the house in the first place — having been invited under such dubious circumstances — they begin to analyse themselves and those around them, and that gets really interesting.’

It’s an art form where people are put before everything else

I’m quite interested in writing myself but much more so in prose — screenplay and script seem to me quite daunting. I asked Will whether screenwriting and script were the forms he felt most comfortable with. ‘I suppose, when it comes to creating, writing scripts and screenplays is definitely where I am at my best,’ he said, ‘because I think it’s a very direct reflection of the real world. You might overhear two people having a conversation or you remember a conversation you had and you can very easily translate that into a script as it’s how we interact in the real world: one person says one thing, one person says another thing. I think in a lot of ways script is very close to the real world and I find it easiest to use that closeness and tweak it to create stories using this very direct form of communication between characters.’

While not a view I personally agree with (but then I have my own heavy prose-centric biases), I followed up asking: ‘So you think screenplay is the most unfiltered, as it were, transfer of human experience to form?’ ‘Yeah, yeah, definitely,’ Will replied, ‘which I think is why— with especially TV and Film [or the stage] — it’s so easy to become invested in characters. It’s an art form where people are put before everything else, I think, which, in terms of empathy, brings the audience on side very quickly.’ Will believes script and screenplay inspire the closest connection with character owing to their ascendancy on stage or screen relative to their environment and the directness of dialogue compared to, say, the focus on environmental description or internal monologue in prose.

Considering character, and the difficulties that must come with representing seven unique characters on stage, I asked: ‘Having seven distinct characters on stage who are properly different without overlapping qualities and having seven actors who are able to embody these unique identities must be challenging. How have you worked with the actors?’ Will explains that as director and writer, he was able to draw up two timelines for every character. One an immensely detailed general timeline of that character’s life, ‘from the minute they were born, until they enter the stage,’ which included ‘their upbringing, their education, their sort of social class’, in essence, all of their given circumstances, and another which tracks their actions throughout the play which ‘looks at their arcs, how they interact with other people, their various motives and what they think of everyone else there.’ Himself and Niamh, Will explains, would explain these timelines to each actor one-and-one, and they did this with the whole cast. ‘I think it’s important to have a one-on-one relationship with all the cast,’ he said. Will described his favourite aspect of the play as ‘the moment when the characters start noticing their similarities and differences, those moments when you start noticing “oh, Charlie just looked at Felicity in a way that he couldn’t look at Amy”,’ or “both of these characters would find that joke funny”.’

I was curious as to how the play progressed narratively, that is, what was the driving force? Was it simply the complexities of character? Will explained: ‘In Act I they try to find out who invited them together, and this is them interacting as people and we really start to see their characters flesh out. Without spoiling much, the seventh character arrives, and drops a hint about why they’re all there and suddenly that becomes the motive for a lot of the characters. Some of the characters become very focussed on this end goal, whereas other characters are more about having fun, and they don’t really care why they’re here.’ Sounds an apt reflection of life indeed.

With the view to informing and encouraging prospective writers, I asked Will for a summary of how Sealed went from ideas to the page to the stage. He recollected how he told his friend Simon Marshall, who is on the Theatre with Teeth committee, about how he was just writing a ‘little passion project’ and Simon encouraged him to polish it up and submit it. Sure enough, Theatre With Teeth accepted the proposal and Will asked for a co-director, Niamh, ‘because I knew that I had to have a co-director,’ Will said, as ‘having a second eye is very useful throughout the rehearsal process.’

Feeling genuinely curious, I asked: ‘What would be your advice to somebody that’s never done anything like this but would like to try? To somebody (like me) who’s not even sure where stage directions go on the page relative to dialogue or how any of this works?’ Will said: ‘I would literally just say, and it sounds so obvious, but just start. Because I didn’t have training. I’d read about writing and kind of watched tutorials and videos and only really learnt properly after I’d started. The first thing that I wrote — I barely knew how to write at all — I’d just written random things throughout my life. I think everyone should try and write. It doesn’t have to be a play; just creating something is so important so I’d say start. Another piece of advice I’d give is, say you’ve written something and want to propose it, distance yourself from that piece. If it gets rejected it can feel quite easy for you to feel rejected but remember, that’s not what’s happened at all. It’s very easy to become quite personally and passionately attached to project like that so I think it is healthy to distance yourself and think “my work is not me, I wrote it, but it doesn’t represent me”.’

Lastly, Will said that if you feel at all creative, that it’s very important to grasp those moments. You might be on a train journey late at night or tired of working on some dreary afternoon in a coffee shop, it doesn’t matter where or when. If you feel impelled to create — then do.

General Election roundup: Conservative disaster and deals with the DUP

In an extraordinary blow to the Conservatives, the election has ended in a hung parliament. Despite burgeoning pre-election confidence and a staggering 17-point lead when the Prime Minister called the snap election back in April, the Conservatives have failed to form a majority — securing just 318 seats of the required 326 in the House of Commons. Labour, meanwhile, has vastly exceeded expectations by securing 262 seats, 30 of them new acquisitions and 9 of which they took from the Conservatives.

While Theresa May has entered negotiations with the DUP (the Democratic Unionist Party, who performed well in Ireland to win 10 seats) to arrange some kind of deal to form a minority government, it as yet unclear what form this will take.

‘since the result there has been relative tory radio silence’.

These results have badly punctured May’s ‘strong and stable’ narrative. A snap-election allegedly called to acquire an indisputable majority mandate for an efficient Brexit process, the whole enterprise has become an embittered political gamble on the part of the Conservatives.

Questions about the Conservative party’s stability are being raised, with Tory sources during results night suggesting a 50/50 possibility of May’s resignation. Older accusations from leftist (and some conservative) quarters that this snap-election was a needless power-grab seem somewhat vindicated now that many Tories are asking why the election had to be called in the first place when they already had a strong majority.

Since the result, there has been relative Tory radio silence. May spoke briefly yesterday, apologising to colleagues who lost their seats and visiting Buckingham Palace to request to form a government almost immediately in an attempt to keep up a front of stability and direction. May yesterday also confirmed that all five of her cabinet ministers, including Home Secretary Amber Rudd who only retained her seat in Hastings and Rye by 300 votes, will be staying for the moment.

‘one tory mp outside westminster described the conservative manifesto as the “worst ever'”

One Tory MP, who lost his seat to Labour, spoke on the BBC this morning about the conservative campaign and how he thought it influenced the results. ‘We lost because we had a lack of positive vision about where we were going to take people’ — indeed, internal Tory critics are already pointing to the character-assassination-centred Tory campaign against Jeremy Corbyn and related lack of positive messaging as one reason for its issues — ‘the social care debacle’ contradicted claims of stability, he continued, and the focus on Brexit, he said, the ‘no deal is better than a bad deal’ narrative suggests to him that ‘there was only one segment that we were being listened to by and that was those hard-bent on taking Britain out of the EU for any price’. Asked about the Tory cabinet, he responded that ‘if I was the PM I’d have a thorough shake up of those in number ten. Anyone who had things to do with the manifesto really has to do a lot of thinking about where they are’. Another Tory MP outside Westminster described the Tory manifesto as the ‘worst ever’.

Theresa May’s closest advisors Nick Timothy and Fiona Hill have resigned following immense pressure from Tory MP’s pledging a leadership challenge on Monday unless they were sacked — such is the disquiet and unhappiness in the party. Many Tories wanted Timothy and Hill out because of their alleged influence, as Norman Smith suggests, ‘over the manifesto and their alleged hold over [May]. They are incredibly close, there is deep resentment among some ministers that these two individuals may adopt ‘arrogant’ attitudes towards them’, he said. Smith suggested that the ‘basic problem’ of the Tory campaign was that it was being ‘fought around the cult of May — that she was going to get the mandate. It was only in the dying days that figures like Johnson were brought back in. The thinking is that Hill and Timothy are to blame for this’.

‘nearly three-quarters of 18-24 year-olds voted and a record 207 female mps have been elected’.

What does this all mean for Brexit and why are many, including Scottish Conservative leader Ruth Davidson, wary of a Tory coalition with the DUP? Confidence at the DUP conference yesterday morning was high — this was the best election result the party had ever achieved and, owing to the Liberal Democrat’s steadfast opposition to making any deals, they are in the heady position of being May’s only hope to form a government. The DUP’s demands so far are relatively unclear as discussions are ongoing but one potential issue that is emerging is their clash with the Conservatives on the form of Brexit and how this impacts trade. The DUP are anxious to remain in the customs union in some form to retain free trade with the Republic of Ireland, their key trading partner, and inevitably contradicts May’s hard stance that ‘no deal is better than a bad deal’. Others, like Ruth Davidson, are sceptical of the DUP’s stance on myriad issues including their former environment ministers denial of climate change (he called it ‘mad’, and the Paris agreement ‘window dressing for Climate chancers’) and their anti-LGBT and women’s right’s stances with respect to equal marriage and abortion.

The voter turnout for this election stands at 69% — the highest since 1997. Nearly three-quarters of 18-24 year-olds voted and a record 207 female MPs have been elected. Labour has enjoyed big swings in pro-remain seats and the Conservatives swings in Brexit seats. The main factors at play in Labour’s resurgence appear to be the surge in younger voters, the anti-austerity campaign based on positive political messaging well handled by Jeremy Corbyn, the ‘remainer’s revenge’ effect and the disastrous Conservative campaign.

Manchester Arena suicide bombing: what we know & resisting the forces of hate

On Monday night at 22:30 BST Salman Abedi, aged twenty-two, detonated a home-made bomb in a suicide attack in the foyer of Manchester Arena following an Ariana Grande concert. Twenty-two people were killed in the explosion, including an eight-year-old girl. A further sixty-four people, twelve of them under sixteen, were injured and taken to hospital by some sixty ambulances that were deployed to the scene. Daesh appear to have claimed responsibility, but this has not been verified. The Guardian says that Abedi was known to police but was a ‘peripheral figure’ (despite recent US intelligence leaks by reporter Richard Engel, of NBC, that family members of the bomber, Abedi, had warned UK security officials about him and described him as dangerous).

Witnesses described metal shards, nails and other shrapnel debris as strewn over the scene in amongst the bodies of victims. Andy Holey, who had gone to the arena to pick up his wife and daughter, said: ‘An explosion went off and it threw me about 30ft from one set of doors to the other set of doors … When I got up I saw bodies lying on the ground. My first thought was to go into the arena to try and find my family’.

the bombing seems part of an emerging pattern of terrorist attacks on music venues.

The Home Secretary Amber Rudd spoke on BBC breakfast, saying that it ‘seems likely’ Abedi was not acting alone, owing to (among other factors) the difficulty of improvising a home-made bomb — a difficulty that deters most radical Jihadists from creating explosives without help. Per the recommendation of the Joint Terrorism Analysis Centre, which analyses and assesses all intelligence relating to international terrorism in Britain and overseas and is composed of counter-terrorism experts, the UK threat level has been raised to critical which means ‘further attacks may be imminent’, Rudd said. In accordance with the critical threat level soldiers are to be deployed to UK streets to aid police — approximately 1,000 have so-far been deployed — and ‘this is absolutely expected to be temporary’, Rudd said.

Following Khalid Masood’s attack on Westminster in March, police and security officials have been warning that further attacks were almost inevitable. The bombing seems part of an emerging pattern of terrorist attacks on music venues (the tragic and cowardly attacks at the Bataclan and Pulse nightclub come to mind) and Afshin Shai, a security and terrorism expert, told BBC breakfast he ‘very much doubts’ the attack was carried out by a lone wolf, saying it was ‘absolutely consistent’ with other terror atrocities carried out in Europe. Shai reported that social media accounts affiliated with Daesh have celebrated the news and warned there may be more attacks to come in other cities across Europe.

Arianna Grande, the twenty-three-year-old singer who had just left the stage before the explosion occurred, expressed her dismay on twitter: ‘broken. from the bottom of my heart, i am so so sorry. i don’t have words’. The Muslim Council, the UK’s largest Muslim umbrella body, have released a statement damning the attack as ‘horrific’, ‘criminal’; ‘may the perpetrators face the full weight of justice both in this life and the next’, it read. The Prime Minister thanked ‘the people who have opened their homes and hearts to embody the spirit of Manchester and Britain’ — ‘there will be difficult days ahead’, she said, ‘we offer our prayers and thoughts to those affected … we all, every single one of us, stand with the people of Manchester … the terrorists will never win, and our country, our way of life, will survive’. The Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn also spoke: ‘I would like to pay tribute to the emergency services for their bravery and professionalism in dealing with last night’s appalling events’.

Manchester’s new mayor Andy Burnham attended a vigil in Albert Square alongside Amber Rudd, the Liberal Democrat leader Tim Farron and the Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn. Exam boards have said that it’s up to schools whether GCSE and A-Level exams go ahead to help protect students’ well-being.

we must work to keep ourselves and others keenly aware of the aims of prejudice and hate.

The election campaigns of all the major political parties have been suspended. Abedi’s attack may have been deliberately timed to disrupt the political narrative for the worse in the run up to June 8^th. Just as May was beginning to flounder on policy with respect to the dementia tax and her subsequent U-turn, the likely narrative-shift does not bode well for Jeremy Corbyn, plagued by alleged sympathies with Hezbollah and currently under tabloid-siege over his alleged refusal to condemn the IRA, despite his office’s release of a statement to the contrary: they insisted ‘Mr Corbyn does believe the IRA were terrorists and their bombing claim during the Troubles was wrong’.

The attack seems already to have hardened the media narrative, with an appallingly unconscious headline from The Sun to which many Manchesterians have responded by pledging to boycott the paper. Reactions on certain right-wing media pages (though anecdotal) highlight the social damage the aftershocks of such an attack can cause: one commenter on a Daily Mail post called for ‘action’, ‘close Mosques immediately’, they wrote. Another claimed that ‘the country is on a one-way street to ruination because of (immigration)’.

The Daesh-sponsored terrorist attack aims to kindle precisely this kind of fear and loathing — division is their engine of evil. We must work where we can to keep ourselves and others keenly aware of the aims of prejudice and hate, so that we none of us should fall victim to the instruments of terror. #westandtogether.

An emergency number, 0168569400, has been set up.

Police are encouraging anyone with footage from the scene to upload it at ukpoliceimageappeal.co.uk or ukpoliceimageappeal.com.

Other information can be reported to the anti-terrorist hotline on 0800 789 321.

Feminist Friday: Responding to Kellyanne Conway’s rejection of feminism

At the recent Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC), one of the largest right-wing annual political conferences, Kellyanne Conway – currently serving as Counsellor to President Donald Trump, and formerly his campaign manager – rejected feminism to great applause, saying: “It’s difficult for me to call myself a feminist in the classic sense because it seems to be very anti-male . . . I look at myself as a product of my choices not a victim of my circumstances.” She went on to relate an anecdote of her mother’s self-directed success in the face of hardship: “My mother didn’t feel sorry for herself, she was left with no child support no alimony at a very young age, with a child to raise [with] a high-school education, and she just figured it out.” The nature of Conway’s disapproval of feminism outlined here is not dissimilar to the apprehension many (predominantly ideologically conservative) women feel towards the movement.

For instance, in response to events like the Women’s March on Washington in conservative social media circles recently, a popular ‘feminism-rejection manifesto’ of sorts had been doing the rounds. The principal part of it reads: “I am not a ‘disgrace to women’ because I don’t support the women’s march. I do not feel I am a ‘second class citizen’ because I am a woman. I do not feel my voice is ‘not heard’ because I am a woman. I do not feel I am not provided the opportunities in this life or in America because I am a woman… I AM a woman. I can make my own choices.”

“What women problem?” read a slogan on flyers at the Women Vote Trump fringe event at the Republican National Convention.

Evidently, many conservative women feel that feminism is redundant because, as far as they’re concerned, they have already achieved equality of opportunity on their own terms. Indeed, “What women problem?” read a slogan on flyers at the Women Vote Trump fringe event at the Republican National Convention. What’s more, they don’t wish to be associated with a movement that they identify as promoting victimhood amongst women and, considering the abortion debate in particular, most likely conflicts with their conservative social values.

And, some may argue, don’t women like Conway have the agency to reject feminism if they so please? Is there anything to be gained in responding to her comments at CPAC, any pragmatic value in engaging those women who feel like they don’t need feminism? Of course, we should not force anybody to join in with feminism against their own will. However, there is certainly utility in attempting to persuade women like Conway to reconsider their conception of feminism as the movement’s acceptance in wider society – and by extension it’s power to actualise the change that it wants – is at least partially dependant on co-opting the support of powerful privileged women like Conway.

This being the case, what is the appropriate response to Conway’s claim that feminism as she sees it is redundant? The typical response: “She’s misunderstood the definition of feminism. She says it’s anti-male and promotes female victimhood but somebody should tell her that it’s about equality” is, firstly, unlikely to be productive and, secondly, a damagingly reductive thesis. “If you believe that women are equal to men, then you’re a feminist” is an impotent statement. It implies a passive state that offers no proactive value to feminism when, in fact, being a feminist should go further and involve an active engagement with achieving gender equality for all women, everywhere. Contributing to campaigns, charity work, protests, writing and on the everyday level – engaging non-feminists in discussion and interrogating their belief that the movement is inconsequential – in other words working towards rights for women outside of your own comfortable sphere, is the operative definition of a feminist. The crux of this issue is the transfer of female identity from society to the individual, which enables women like Conway to criticise feminism because she perceives that she has achieved equality, whilst being ignorant of the predicament of women across the world.

what amounts to ‘pulling yourself up by your bootstraps’ is only a “timeless” lesson and opportunity for women who have the social privilege to do so in the first place.

Thus, the apt response to women like Conway, is to encourage them to question what privileges allowed them to attain equality to begin with. In her case, she said her mother “just figured it out”, and went on to say that “she didn’t complain, she didn’t rely upon government, she relied upon her… self-confidence, her own drive… her family… and I believe those are timeless lessons and timeless opportunities for all women.” But what of all those oppressed women who lack this self-confidence, who do not have a supportive family to fall back on, or, perhaps because of their ethnicity, face everyday discrimination and therefore do not have the support of their community?

The productive response, therefore, is arguing that what amounts to ‘pulling yourself up by your bootstraps’ is only a “timeless” lesson and opportunity for women who have the social privilege to do so in the first place. In other words, whilst we should be able to acknowledge that women like Conway and many other conservatives feel that feminism is worthless to them and, therefore, could be perceived as promoting a kind of ‘victimhood’, we must endorse the idea to such women (and men) that feminism aims to support the needs of the oppressed who need it most, and therefore there is, in many ways, a moral imperative in lending one’s proactive support to the movement for the good of all women across the world.

Punishment or rehabilitation: does Dylann Roof deserve to die?

n January 10th 2017, Dylann Roof, a white supremacist terrorist guilty of murdering nine parishioners in an historic Charleston Church, was sentenced to death. He showed no emotion as the sentence was passed. In a written manifesto and prison journal, Roof acknowledged the innocence of his victims and confessed to committing the shooting in the hope of beginning a race war. Radicalized online, he planned the attack for six months. He decided to target the Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in downtown Charleston, South Carolina, because of its historic significance as part of civil rights history and because he felt it was unlikely he would be met with dangerous resistance. Charged with 33 federal counts, including hate crimes, and to this day showing no remorse, many view capital punishment as the just response to Roof’s crimes. Does Roof ‘deserve’ to die for what he did? At first glance, ‘yes’ or even ‘definitely’ is to many the natural response. However, with public support to reintroduce the death penalty in the UK outweighing its resistance (YouGov polls show that 45% support it while 39% oppose it), it’s important that we reassess the idea of capital punishment to determine whether if offers any value to society.

Roof denied the human right to life of nine innocent people, and so it follows – many will reasonably argue – he should lose the right to his. An eye for an eye. He is, after all, utterly irredeemable. Found competent to stand trial, Roof wrote ‘I would like to make it crystal clear, I do not regret what I did. I am not sorry. I have not shed a tear for the innocent people I killed.’ In his manifesto he declared that he ‘would personally be content with reinstating segregation … although we would also need to put a forced sterilization program and deportation program in place at the same time.’ Roof carried eight magazines into the church which could hold thirteen rounds each. He loaded them with eleven each because he didn’t ‘want to it to like jam or anything like that’, and because eighty-eight rounds symbolises ‘Heil Hitler’ – the letter H being the eighth letter of the alphabet. Considering this unwavering devotion to the massacre, in all likelihood Roof will never be remorseful or rehabilitate – at least not to the degree where he is no longer a threat to society. While not impossible, the chances appear very low. Why then, as many have pointed out, should US taxpayer dollars sustain his life in prison until he dies of natural causes? Better that he ‘gets put to death’ because ‘why waste money to house him in prison for years?’ as one Charlestonian woman tweeted.

That said, among those directly related to the victims of the massacre and the wider Charleston community, the reaction to Roof’s death sentence has been diverse. At his hearing, five relatives of Roof’s victims spoke directly to him and forgave him, saying that they were ‘praying for his soul’. First to approach Roof was Nadine Collier, whose mother, Ethel Lance, died in the attack. In anguish she spoke: ‘I just want everyone to know, to you, I forgive you… I will never be able to hold her again. But I forgive you. And have mercy on your soul.’ Collier’s sister, the Rev. Sharon Risher, said ‘I don’t believe in the death penalty, but I’m my mother’s child and with everything that’s happened sometimes I want him to die.’ Alana Simmons, the granddaughter of Rev. Daniel Simmons, Sr., who was also killed, rose to face Roof. ‘Although my grandfather and the other victims died at the hands of hate, this is proof, everyone’s plea for your soul, is proof that they lived in love and their legacies will live in love,’ she said. Roof believed his actions would ignite a race war. Simmons said that she recognised that by forgiving Roof, the power he thought he had over his victim’s lives was silenced. ‘So hate won’t win. And I just want to thank the court for making sure that hate doesn’t win’, she continued. The Rev. Anthony Thompson, who’d lost his wife, Myra Thompson, said to Roof that he and his family forgave him. Felicia Sanders, a survivor who watched her son die during the attack asked God to show mercy on Roof’s soul.

An eye for an eye? Charleston’s black community is divided on what punishment Roof should receive. (Image: Wikipedia Commons)

On the other hand, Melvin Graham, whose sister Cynthia Hurd died in the attack, approved of Roof’s death penalty. ‘It’s a hard thing to know that someone is going to lose their life, but when you look at the totality of what happened, it’s hard to say that person deserves to live when nine others don’t’. Melvin’s brother, Malcolm Graham, wrote an article in The Charlotte Observer decrying those who were in favour of sparing Roof’s life, stating that: ‘Mr. Henderson, an African American civil rights attorney, believes Roof should be sentenced to life in prison, not death. I disagree … when our people are the victims – the ones innocently slaughtered – that we should seek some sort of moral high road rather than demand justice and a punishment befitting the crime.’

Millicent Brown, a significant civil rights activist in the Charleston community who, in 1963 at the age of fifteen, was one of ten students who desegregated Charleston’s public schools, criticised the forgiveness directed to Roof. ‘I think it’s disingenuous at best’, Brown said, ‘anger at this kind of mayhem is a normal and natural reaction. I am extremely resentful of what is going on in our community’. David Rivers, a Charlestonian and associate professor at the Medical University of South Carolina, says that the community’s leadership is partly responsible for the generally peaceful reaction. At the memorial service for Emanuel AME Rev. and State Senator Clementa Pinckney, black Charleston reaffirmed their support for the love that Roof sought to destroy. AME Bishop John Bryant’s words were met with passionate applause: ‘Someone should’ve told the young man. He wanted to start a race war, but he came to the wrong place!’ Senior Religion Reporter Jack Jenkins, alumni of HarvardDivinity, said polls show that the majority of black Charlestonians oppose giving Roof the death penalty. Moreover, the new pastor of Emanuel AME has said that the denomination’s official position opposes the death penalty as a form of punishment.

‘Someone should’ve told the young man. He wanted to start a race war, but he came to the wrong place!’

I have set aside much of my word count to describe people’s responses to Roof’s sentencing because I believe that the case from reason – which I will propose – must operate in congruence with empathy if we are to talk about the death penalty in any meaningful way. Every axiom of ‘just’ or moral action is simultaneously fragmented from and interwoven with situational emotional responses. Bearing this in mind, whilst the sentencing for a crime like Dylann Roof’s must be treated with an urgent sensitivity to the victims and those directly affected, I assert that there can be no exceptions; the death penalty should be opposed absolutely. Dylann Roof should survive. Although as Brown said, outrage is a perfectly acceptable response to his crime. Certainly I could not say with any authentic degree of certainty that if those I loved were similarly murdered there would not be a part of me that longed for ultimate retribution. However, the death penalty should be opposed because it represents the consummative policy of a prison system predicated on its power to punish rather than to rehabilitate.

The case to install a prison system predicated on rehabilitation rather than punishment is clear. First, the death penalty and the idea of punishing people in prison flows from a kind of criminal essentialism – the idea that people in prison are incapable of reform – that their inherent criminality precedes any effort that they might make at change. This essentialism’s flaw is its failure to take a holistic approach to these people’s minds; it singles out their criminality and ascribes it to the totality of their mental lives. Though this analysis may seem abstract or overtly philosophical, the issues with prison systems predicated on punishment it exposes are supported by the evidence. In the US, within three years of release, about two-thirds (67.8%) of released prisoners are rearrested. Within five years of release, the figure increases to 76.6%.

Though not as dire, the UK’s reoffending statistics highlight a similarly ineffective prison system: 46% of adults are reconvicted within one year of release. For those serving sentences of less than 12 months reconviction rates increase to 60%. By comparison, the reoffending rates in Norway, Finland and Denmark, which use ‘restorative justice’ – a rehabilitatory approach to prison in which prisoners are treated more like patients, provided with education, existential purpose and greater degrees of freedom – the reoffend rates are 20%, 21% and 27% respectively. Given that another major part of the philosophy behind retributive justice is that by incarcerating prisoners it keeps the public safe from further crimes, the high reconviction rates of the US and the UK, as Guardian journalist Erwin James puts it, amount to ‘a huge investment in failure’. The system of retributive justice underpinning the death penalty is thus demonstrably ineffective from the perspective of public safety.

“when you look at the totality of what happened, it’s hard to say that person deserves to live when nine others don’t”

The other key premise of capital punishment and prison systems designed for retributive rather than restorative justice is that they deter people from committing crimes. However, there is little conclusive evidence to entirely support or negate this. As to the public’s opinion on the death penalty’s ability to deter potential murderers, polls reveal different attitudes between the US and UK. When asked ‘Do you think that executing murderers deters others from committing murder?’ 37% of US respondents answered yes while 47% answered no. In the UK, poll responses to the same question answered 45% yes and 41% no. These responses are indicative of a wider trend; support for reintroducing the death penalty in the UK has been rising steadily ever since its complete abolition in 1973. Prison scholars believe that in cases like murder, the majority of instances are situational, and when you consider that the fight against crime is in many ways the fight against poverty and social inequality too, then the effectiveness of prison as a deterrent is questionable. The only criminals conclusively shown to take the deterrent of prison into serious consideration tend to be ‘white collar criminals’, that is, individuals involved in deeply premeditated crimes like corporate fraud that view potential sentencing as part of a cost-benefit analysis.

But what of criminals like Dylann Roof or the Norwegian mass murderer Andres Breivik – those who seem beyond any possibility of rehabilitation? With the particulars of Roof’s massacre in mind, though we cannot with any absolute certainty predict future consequences, it seems highly unlikely that he will ever be remorseful. Despite this, we should not execute such criminals, but rather – if they can never be deemed safe to release – keep them incarcerated for the rest of their natural lives. This, for instance, appears to be the fate of Breivik, who faces 21 years in prison with the possibility of more extensions for as long as he is deemed a threat to society. What’s more, on a strictly economic basis, prisoners without parole in the US cost an average of $740,000, whereas cases where the death penalty is sought cost $1.26 million. Maintaining each death row prisoner costs taxpayer $90,000 more per year than prisoners in the general population.

Perhaps most importantly of all, we must recognise that by enabling capital punishment the probability that an innocent person will eventually be killed is certain. A team of legal experts and statisticians from Michigan and Pennsylvania produced a peer-reviewed estimate that 4.1% of prisoners on death row between the 1970’s and today in America have been falsely convicted. The actual exoneration rate is 1.6%, leaving a gap suggesting the innocence of over 200 prisoners who are lost to the system and, as Samuel Gross (lead author of the research) has said, ‘If you look at the numbers in our study, at how many errors are made, then you cannot believe that we haven’t executed any innocent person – that would be wishful thinking’.

The system of retributive justice underpinning the death penalty is demonstrably ineffective from the perspective of public safety

When it comes to discussing issues like capital punishment, sensitivity to the particulars on a case-by-case basis is imperative. I would advise you to read Malcolm Graham’s article which explains why, as a brother of one of the victims of Roof’s massacre, he is strongly in favour of Roof’s execution. Nevertheless, to protest against capital punishment and the system of punishment on which it is borne is not to become an apologist for murderers like Roof, but to oppose a wider and more far-reaching evil.

Techno or no-go: does technology damage Shakespeare’s legacy?

Shakespeare’s 400^th anniversary was on the 23^rd of April this year, bringing with it a fresh wave of theatrical innovation. On this occasion The Royal Shakespeare Company has gone further than any before, partnering with Intel and The Imaginarium to render a fully digital 3D character – Ariel the sprite from The Tempest – on stage. Rather than pre-recording Ariel’s movements, the digitally rendered Ariel will interact with actors on stage in real time. How will this work? The actor’s full performance (performed backstage) will be captured using a motion-sensing suit and simultaneously projected onto the stage. Gregory Doran, the RSC’s artistic director, explains that “the technology works by capturing an actor’s facial expressions as well as their movements, which ensures that [their] full performance is translated into the animated character.” Doran claims that by “combining theatrical skills with cutting edge technology”, Shakespeare’s work will reach “a whole new generation.” Meanwhile, the iconic Globe theatre, historic home to Shakespeare’s productions and intended as an exact replica to preserve Elizabethan theatre, has attracted scorn from critics and donors following the installation of amplifiers and colourful lighting for a production of A Midsummer Night’s Dream. Professor Michael Dobson, director of the Shakespeare Institute at the University of Birmingham criticised the additions, saying “It’s pretty strange to have spent years fundraising to build a replica, so you can turn it into a sixth form disco.”

All this begs the question: does increased use of technology or conceptual innovation in Shakespeare’s plays credit his work or does it damage their authenticity? Certainly some think that tampering too much with the Bard’s work belittles his genius. In an interview for “Big Think”, Terry Teachout of the Wall Street Journal complained of concept-driven Shakespeare, arguing that Shakespeare doesn’t have to be “transgressive.” “It’s actually now more common to see conceptual productions… [in] which Hamlet is played as a Nazi, or a homosexual,” he said.

However, there are several immediate problems with wanting to keep modern productions of Shakespeare staunchly authentic. Whilst the Globe was built with the view to experiencing Shakespeare as 17^th century commoners did, in reality this level of authenticity is impossible. Modern pronunciation, evolved theatrical techniques and traditions, changed and lost meaning over time, and the presence of aeroplanes flying overhead are all unavoidable elements which destabilise the quest for authentic Shakespeare. For instance, now central to producing his plays, in Shakespeare’s time there were no directors. Actors were not given the whole script but only their their lines and their cues, which would be the last four or five words of the actor who would speak before. The actors directed their own movements, tweaking their gestures and expressions as they saw fit, and the text supplied cues of its own. For instance, Banquo’s “Good sir, why do you start, and seem to fear…?” dictates Macbeth’s reaction to the witches’ prophecy. In the world of modern theatre such acting procedures are untenable. There is immense focus on detail; every actor has studied their character deeply and has an awareness of the whole script, with months of rehearsal in advance before the plays. Another, perhaps most important, difference between historical Shakespeare and modern theatre is the audience. The way the theatre delivers meaning and the audience receives it is framed in a vastly different cultural context. For instance, in Shakespeare’s day female parts being played by boy actors would hardly be as jarring as it is to a modern audience. Typically, between the ages of 14 and 22, boy actors were seen as somewhere between male and female. There are even recorded instances of men in the audience falling in love with boy actors, believing they were women. Given all these inhibitions, stagings of Shakespeare that aim for total authenticity in themselves arguably fall under the sphere of conceptual productions. Stanislvaski’s 1903 production of Julius Caesar, for example, aimed for an exact reproduction of the Capital and streets of Rome as they would have been in 55BC. Christopher Innes, a professor of English at York University, Canada, says this approach can be seen as an “extension of 19^th century spectacular treatments of Shakespeare.” Modern productions of Shakespeare, therefore, constitute an endless cycle of interpretation. And isn’t this what Shakespeare would have wanted?

stagings of Shakespeare that aim for total authenticity arguably fall under the sphere of conceptual productions

Shakespeare was always deeply concerned that his plays be understood by the commoners who saw them at the time, and so it seems in the spirit of Shakespeare that stagings of his plays are adapted to deliver meaning to modern audiences. Moreover, one thing both 16^th century theatre and modern theatre share is a love of special effects. The first-ever storm on the early modern stage was in Julius Caesar, a rolling cannonball was used to sound thunder. Cannons and fireworks were also used. Above all else, in Shakespeare’s time the playhouse was the most significant prop. The Globe had a trapdoor in the roof – ‘heavens’ – from which celestial beings could descend, and a trapdoor on the stage – ‘hell’ – from which demons could enter. The RSC’s Tempest and its digital Ariel, therefore, does not sever the production from authenticity, but continues Shakespeare’s innovative legacy in using the most exciting special effects the playhouse has to offer.

Of course, there should be spaces for truly authentic productions of Shakespeare, since attempts at these represent modern appreciation and understanding of his work in a historic context. However, claiming that increased use of technology in stagings of Shakespeare’s plays damages their authenticity seems counter to the Bard’s playful and innovative spirit. Shakespeare’s literary legacy is invaluable, and finding new ways to deliver his meaning to future generations is integral. In order to maintain theatrical authenticity, all too often confused with historical authenticity, classic works like Shakespeare’s should be kept living as part of an evolving theatrical and literary culture.

Exeter students cause ‘eight years of hell’ for elderly residents

Residents of Kilbarren Rise, off New North Road, allege that they must sometimes sleep in night shifts to protect their property from student theft and record antisocial behaviour. Supported by evidence from a CCTV system they installed in 2014, Delia and John Blatchford claim to have suffered “eight years of hell” because of unruly Exeter students. “We pray for rain,” Mrs Blatchford said, “we can have a decent night’s sleep if it rains, as it keeps them indoors… we get no sleep when it is term time.”

“Why does it have to be our life that is destroyed?” she continued.

“eight years of hell”

The “years of hell” began in 2008, the Blatchfords say, after a hot-tub was installed in their garden and a student climbed over the fence to urinate in it, stealing alcohol from a shed in the process. The student responsible was later dismissed by the University. Between January and April that year, the Blatchfords registered twenty instances of antisocial student behaviour with Devon and Cornwall police. In response to the complaints, Devon police deployed undercover police and dogs to try and deal with the potential culprits, but to no avail. The Blatchfords took matters into their own hands, installing a £7,000 wall and iron rail with burglar proof spikes to try and stop students attempting to enter their garden.

The CCTV system was later destroyed by a student who tore down one of the cameras – it was later replaced by £2,200 of University funds. Since then, the cameras have captured a number of incidents, including a recent spout of issues during Freshers’ Week this year.

In October, one video shows construction work equipment being slammed against a lamppost, clanging loudly in the early hours outside the Blatchfords home, while another shows a ‘For Sale’ sign being stolen from a neighbour’s house and left outside the Blatchfords.

One commenter suggested criminal records for students who cause public nuisance

“This is supposed to be the future elite. What is going to happen to this country? I really, really worry,” Mrs Blatchford said. She went on to suggest that the University should breathalyse students before they enter the city centre, a practice she has heard of performed in “another University,” barring them from entry if their blood-alcohol level is too high.

One commenter on the Exeter Express and Echo website candidly suggested criminal records for students who cause public nuisance, while another suggested a “1:00am curfew on all students until they learn to grow up.” Although, Mark Phillips, an Exeter resident who lives ten minutes from the Streatham campus, said that he had “never had much trouble with students,” and “had no relevant examples” of unacceptable student behaviour.

Feminist Friday: The petition against Saudi Arabia’s male guardianship system

Saudi women are not free to make any major life decisions without assent from a male guardian. Under the guardianship system, it is impossible for women to enter employment, begin university, rent a flat, marry or travel abroad without consent from a male guardian, usually their father or husband. A petition to end guardianship, the first of its kind, has been signed by over 14,000 Saudi women, with over 2,000 telegrams expressing support for the petition sent directly to the Saudi King’s office. The petition, created by women’s health researcher Hala Aldosari, gained popularity in July following an Arabic Twitter hashtag which translates as “Saudi women want to abolish the guardianship system.” The hashtag went viral in part owing to a damning Human Rights Watch report which Aldosari also worked on. Activist Aziza Al-Yousef said she felt “very proud” of the campaign. However, it has met some resistance from Saudi women who spread a rival Twitter hashtag, #TheGuardianshipIsForHerNotAgainstHer.

The ‘Global Gender Gap Report’, published by The World Economic Forum in 2015, ranks Saudi Arabia as 134th out of 145 countries for gender equality. Male guardianship is a bastion of such inequality, and is grounded in the patriarchal tribal culture inherent to the Arabian Peninsula as well as, arguably less importantly, interpretations of Islamic Law. Beyond marriage, Saudi Arabia is the only Muslim-majority country in the world that has male guardianship. Within this historic socio-cultural framework, guardianship is justified on the grounds of women’s “lack of capacity” (adam al-kifaa’ah) which makes it necessary that they have male guardians (mahram). On guardianship’s basis, female Saudi journalist, Sabria Jawhar, said that “if all women were given the rights the Quran guarantees, and not be supplanted by tribal customs, then the issue of whether Saudi women have equal rights would be reduced.” Similarly, for five years Yousef and other key activists have hosted workshops and written studies debating the religious validity of guardianship.

The ‘Global Gender Gap Report’, published by The World Economic Forum in 2015, ranks Saudi Arabia as 134th out of 145 countries for gender equality.

How likely is the petition to succeed? Will the Saudi monarchy and clerics be persuaded to revoke guardianship? Realistically, the petition’s odds of success are low. While its support represents a significant step towards more progressive ideology and greater gender parity, historical precedent suggests it will not be enough. Aziza Al-Yousef and other activists protested against guardianship five years ago, “but the problem is there is no answer [from Saudi authority],” she said. Whilst a considerable number of Saudi royals have professed open-mindedness to reform, there is unlikely to be change until the clerics, who empower such laws, change their views. In fact, Saudi government has twice promised to abolish guardianship in the past, in 2009 and 2013, following a United Nations Human Rights Council review. But despite some reform such as allowing women to vote and run as candidates in municipal elections, these stopped short of promises to grant women autonomy. As yet, there has been no official government response to the petition.

Saudi Arabia faces little international pressure to end the system. Despite the UN Human Rights Council’s critical review, there remains a Saudi seat on the council. Ultimately, western nations rely too closely on Saudi Arabia for oil to risk souring relations – in this case commercial realpolitik will override human rights issues. Although in the near future, women, who currently represent only thirteen percent of the workforce, will be given more rights out of socio-economic necessity. Saudi government desires outlined in ‘Vision 2030’ to shift the economy away from oil will necessitate more women in the workforce, producing a new internal force for female empowerment. This should also help combat the system directly, as guardianship runs counter to the aim of employing more women because most employers require permission from their guardians. Engaging women in the Saudi workforce is vital to the development of new industries as they outnumber men in higher education, accounting for 58 per cent of Saudi university students. This trend is only predicted to increase as Norah Al Faiz, the Deputy Education Minister and first woman to hold Saudi cabinet-level office, seeks to extend women’s educational opportunities.

As to the potential threat facing Saudi women who signed the petition, Yousef, who in 2013 confronted police after breaking the country’s rule against women driving, seems confident in its legality, saying “I’m not worried, I’m not doing anything wrong.” There have been popular social media campaigns pushing for women’s rights before, with Women2Drive, a Facebook activist page, garnering over 18,000 likes. What’s more, in 2014 the King’s advisory council recommended that the ban on women driving be lifted, though with some limitations, including that women being over thirty years old, not applying makeup and stopping driving by 8pm. Evidently, pushing for better women’s rights in Saudi Arabia isn’t life-threatening or particularly dangerous on a state level, but it may be on a domestic one. It is generally a slow and limited process that, the majority of the time, will be met with little or no response from government. Meanwhile, women with restricted freedom, suffering domestic imprisonment or violence owing to guardianship will continue to suffer.

The existence of opposition to the petition amongst Saudi women raises an interesting cultural question. Namely, why would these women willingly remain legal minors for the rest of their lives? It’s because of “brainwashing”, chimes one Reddit user, but the picture is more complex than that. Male guardianship entails that women are completely reliant on their guardians for expenses, clothes, food and accommodation. For many women, this construct not only gives them security but is a sacred part of Islamic law.

Male guardianship entails that women are completely reliant on their guardians for expenses, clothes, food and accommodation.

The western perspective makes it all too easy to dismiss these women as brainwashed. A 2010 campaign founded by women with more conservative Islamic values which translated to “My Guardian Knows What’s Best For Me” gathered over 5,400 signatures. It aimed to reject women’s rights activism in favour of mild reforms to guardianship’s customs. Saudi journalist Sabria Jawhar argues that whilst guardianship requires reform, Saudi Arabia must “correctly apply guardianship to protect and support Saudi women” because “guardianship is part of Islam.” She also points out that “Saudi Arabia has many faces when viewed from the outside, and few of them are good… [it seems] criminally oppressive to Saudi women,” but “people don’t have the time to read… a university thesis to understand the complexity of women’s rights in Saudi Arabia.” The western “narrative completely ignores the reality on the ground,” continues Jawhar.

Evidently, for many Saudi women, not only is guardianship a centrally embedded custom, it also provides them security in a society that makes it difficult for women to provide for themselves. An unavoidable issue that remains is that whilst some guardians will want the best for their women, others may be abusive, rigid and controlling. Moreover, the system’s existence as a whole – be it exercised with cruelty or benevolence – is indicative of a wider systemic gender inequality in Saudi Arabia. True gender parity in Saudi Arabia, therefore, would require complete socio-economic and ideological overhaul. Obviously this will not be achieved in a single petition, but Vision 2030’s aims to drastically increase the number of women in the workforce will certainly help, and the petition still represents a significant step. It is valuable to keep in mind that socio-cultural change is produced by an innumerable number of events that eventually culminate in tangible difference, and 14,000 Saudi women’s signatures to end male guardianship is one such truly remarkable event.

Every minute counts: Maintaining a work-life balance

There’s a certain irony in the fact that I’m writing this article in my pyjamas, having never gotten properly dressed, and only a few hours before the deadline. But haven’t we all been in a similar position? Occasionally for some, perhaps all of the time for others and never for a blessed few, work gets a little too much and we have to throw life in the bin. From writing this article and, ironically, as a result of writing things generally, my life’s been in the bin for a good three days now.

But how can we avoid this misery? Is it even possible to obtain the Holy Grail of student life: the coveted ‘work-life balance’? In this day and age, spoken aloud, the words slip easily from the tongue and linger in the air – ‘work-life balance’ – with the authority of a biblical tenant. But enough of filling the word count, what to do?

If you’re a person who likes to get involved in a lot of things at once, learn a lot in a short space of time or do nothing for a lot of time, the key to maintaining a ‘life’ is to get the ‘work’ down to a fine art.

First and foremost, organisation of said work is crucial. Buy a student planner, or download one on your phone, and use it. Studies have repeatedly shown: spending the time to plan your time maximises the efficiency of how you spend your time. Anecdotally, Barack Obama, Elon Musk, Bill Gates, Steve Jobs and Mark Zuckerberg are all examples of extremely ‘busy’ and ‘successful’ people who plan their day to the hour. So, write down your official and personal deadlines, any times you’re required to be somewhere for something, and your activities like gym or sports training.

Buy a student planner, or download one on your phone, and use it.

Secondly, organise your environment. It makes for good cinema to picture geniuses surrounded by a mess of work, evidence of their mastery splattered about the desk, papers spilling out of every drawer and physics equations scribbled on the walls. Perhaps some truly successful people do live like this. But the reality is, an untidy working environment is a big hindrance to your productivity and life. Undoubtedly, an uncluttered environment produces an uncluttered mind.

But the reality is, an untidy working environment is a big hindrance to your productivity and life.

Once the organisation of your work and workspace is complete, it’s time to tackle the time spent working itself. How do we work with maximal productivity and, resultantly, the most remaining free-time possible?

Google has conducted numerous studies on this, and eventually implemented a rule in some of its offices that employees work fifty-two minutes followed by seventeen minute breaks. If you prefer to trust me over Google, I’ve found that working for one hour and fifteen minutes followed by fifteen minute breaks works well. Another working parameter I’ve tinkered with, though only when having to absorb information rather than produce work, is the Pomodoro technique.

Applying these methods according to the type of work you’re doing is also a helpful consideration.

Developed by Francesco Cirillo in the late 1980s, the technique has you working for twenty-five minute bursts interspersed with five-minute breaks. After four sessions of work, you take an extended break of fifteen to thirty minutes. Ultimately, open a timer on your phone or watch and find out what parameters work best for you. Applying these methods according to the type of work you’re doing is also a helpful consideration. If writing, I tend to write until my mental energy lapses and I’m forced to stop, and that could be hours. But, if learning, trying to memorise something new, for instance, using a work parameter will probably be useful.

Ultimately, whether you are producing work, gaining knowledge or both, awareness of time is very helpful. When you sit down to begin a task, take note of the time and consult your planner to frame that work session in an understanding of how much time you have.

The work-life balance should fundamentally be a feedback loop. Sleeping well (above all), seeing friends, reading books, watching television or mindlessly scrolling through the internet are all necessary to recuperate your mental energy and for most also constitute ‘life.’

MAKE SURE YOU ARE WORKING ON THINGS YOU WANT TO WORK ON, HELPING PRODUCE THINGS YOU WANT TO PRODUCE.

Unless you follow Elon Musk’s advice. He says, to be successful at whatever you’re doing, one should aim to work ‘every waking moment,’ which isn’t particularly encouraging. Where’s the life in that? Well, this introduces my final piece of unqualified advice. Make sure you are working on things you want to work on, helping produce things you want to produce. The best work-life balance is surely only achieved when ‘work’ and ‘life’ become at least a little synonymous.