Unlock the White House Watch newsletter for free
Your guide to what Trump’s second term means for Washington, business and the world
In an unusual turn at the UK premiere of Hamnet last weekend, the audience were invited to take part in a “little ritual” by the film’s director Chloé Zhao. For a short, quite uncomfortable few minutes, I took part in a breathing exercise “to honour the presence that you graciously chose to share with us”.
I found myself “meditating” with around 2,700 others in the Royal Festival Hall. These included Steven Spielberg and Sam Mendes (two of the film’s producers) and the film’s lead actors Jessie Buckley and Paul Mescal. They were seasoned practitioners of the daily rituals that Zhao established to “acknowledge the community” on set. All part of the singing, dancing, dreamscaping and communal activities that help shape, said Spielberg, the “miraculous vibrations” of the film.
So far, so woo-woo. And the film explores the same ideals. Hamnet, an adaptation of the novel by Maggie O’Farrell, imagines the lives of William Shakespeare and his wife Agnes, a fiercely independent woman who lives close to nature near the woods. Described as a witch by locals, she “reads” a person by pressing on their palms. Agnes’s lifestyle, as well as the couple’s shared personal griefs, inspire the writer’s greatest work: Shakespeare’s woods are also places of mystery, fairy folklore and magic. Their garden herbarium provides the famous recitation that underscores Ophelia’s grief.
The untameable woman has once again become a popular motif in the cultural world: Zhao could have had us all dance to Taylor Swift’s “The Fate of Ophelia”, now trending, but chose something more spiritual instead. Meanwhile, filmmaker Lynne Ramsay’s Die, My Love (at the London Film Festival) is also based on a female lead whose wild nature has a raw ferality. In H is for Hawk, by film director Philippa Lowthorpe, another adaptation, the female protagonist deals with her grief by retreating into nature and the care of a goshawk.
Hawks are trending at the moment. There’s one swirling around in Hamnet, too. And, as we approach the dark season after Samhain, such witchy peculiars match the mood. They also fit within a broader interest in paganism that takes in all sorts, including heathens, wiccans and druids. The UK census revealed 74,000 people identified as pagan in 2022 (up from 57,000 in 2011). The FT’s own woo-woo correspondent Jemima Kelly has noted that witching has become more popular thanks to social media, Sandra Bullock and the fact that covens are the rare space in which women still feel empowered.
I wonder if Giorgia Meloni considered “honouring her presence” among the other members of the delegates at the peace summit at Sharm el-Sheikh? The testosteroidal convention gathered 30 of the world’s finest led by Donald Trump and Egypt’s Abdel Fattah al-Sisi this week. Photos of the delegates showed Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad al-Thani of Qatar, the UK’s Keir Starmer, Jordan’s King Abdullah II and Hungary’s Viktor Orbán among many others gathered on the stage. They offer a timeless portrait of masculine power-mongering, with Meloni, the lone female attendee, barely visible among the bros.
Meloni is a hard-right leader who has come to express the more conservative times in which we live. She opposes same-sex marriage and same-sex parenting, and is technically a Trump ally. Yet her presence ignited the kind of language reserved for beauty pageants from the leader of the free world. “You won’t be offended if I say you’re beautiful, right?” the 79-year-old lothario leered at the 48-year-old. “Because you are.”
The humiliations continued. She was then rebuked by Turkey’s Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, aged 71: “You look great. But I have to make you stop smoking,” he joshed in front of peace comrades Starmer and Emmanuel Macron. “I know,” conceded Meloni, who has lately picked up the habit again after having quit for 13 years. Before explaining, I like to think quite witchily: “I don’t want to kill somebody.”
Smoking is quite a good expression of rebellion in this climate — a tiny act that offers some agency. Meloni has suggested smoking, now regarded as a toxic hobby, has been a useful way to bond with foreign leaders, including Kais Saied, the president of Tunisia. Her vile smoker’s breath meanwhile, presumably, helps keep older male lechers well away.
I’m no fan of Meloni’s politics, but when a global peace summit becomes a platform for such egregious sexism, I too feel a pricking in my thumbs. In a political environment in which women’s intellectual contributions are near to being extinguished, it’s appalling to see how retrograde things are. Meloni’s treatment recalled the kind of behaviour you would expect of a randy older uncle at some awkward family gathering. Thankfully, she understood the assignment by responding with the greatest eye roll I’ve seen in years.
“Out of this wood do not desire to go: Thou shalt remain here, whether thou wilt or no,” wrote Shakespeare in A Midsummer Night’s Dream. And I would happily take his advice. The woods are once again a safe place: a haven from which to escape this patriarchal gloom. That female filmmakers are building on the narrative makes for a nice diversion, but we’ll need more than deep breathing to spur the cause. It’s time to light another cigarette (metaphorical of course, I’m still a quitter) and reach for the big book of evil spells.
Find out about our latest stories first — follow FT Weekend on Instagram, Bluesky and X, and sign up to receive the FT Weekend newsletter every Saturday morning
Read the full article here