{"id":292831,"date":"2025-07-26T08:32:10","date_gmt":"2025-07-26T08:32:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/292831\/"},"modified":"2025-07-26T08:32:10","modified_gmt":"2025-07-26T08:32:10","slug":"six-great-reads-the-worlds-new-diplomatic-capital-the-londonisation-of-manchester-and-a-perfect-nightclub-qatar","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/292831\/","title":{"rendered":"Six great reads: the world\u2019s new diplomatic capital, the Londonisation of Manchester and a perfect nightclub | Qatar"},"content":{"rendered":"
  • 1. \u2018All those posh apartments. It\u2019s a playground for the rich\u2019: is Manchester turning into London?Is Manchester becoming less Mancunian? Composite: Derek Elliott\/The Guardian\n

    Helen Pidd was the Guardian\u2019s North of England editor, based in Manchester for 12 years. As she changes roles to become a presenter on the Guardian\u2019s Today in Focus podcast, she looked at the rapid transformation of her home city and complaints from its proud locals that it\u2019s being \u201cLondonised\u201d. Is it the case, she asked, that Manchester is becoming less Mancunian? Or are Mancunians just changing, along with their ever expanding, shape-shifting city?<\/p>\n

    Read more<\/a><\/p>\n<\/li>\n

  • 2. \u2018My parents got me out of Soviet Russia at the right time. Should my family now leave the US?\u2019Time to move again? Illustration: Carl Godfrey\/The Guardian\n

    \u201cI have written dystopian fiction before, and my latest novel, Vera, or Faith, is a continuation of the natural outcome of my birth in Leningrad and my removal, at age seven, to Reagan\u2019s America. I think I have predicted the future with fairly good aim in novels such as Super Sad True Love Story<\/a>, where social media helps to give rise to a fascist America, although my timeline when that book was published in 2010 was 30 years into the future, not a decade and change.\u201d<\/p>\n

    When Gary Shteyngart left the Soviet Union for a new life in the US, the novelist never imagined he would live under another authoritarian regime. Then Trump returned to power \u2026 Is it, he asked, time to move again?<\/p>\n

    Read more<\/a><\/p>\n<\/li>\n

  • 3. The go-between: how Qatar became the global capital of diplomacyQatar\u2019s emir, Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad al-Thani. Composite: Guardian Design\/Reuters\n

    \u201cThe power Qatar has come to wield has taken many observers by surprise,\u201d wrote Nesrine Malik in this fascinating long read. \u201cAs a conservative Muslim monarchy in the Middle East, Qatar is a new kind of location for the sort of high-stakes geopolitical deal-making transacted until recently in Geneva and Oslo. Yet since 7 October, the precarious nation\u2019s investment in becoming the world\u2019s go-between has come into its own.\u201d<\/p>\n

    She explained how, having long cultivated close relations with both the US and Hamas, Qatar has become the locus of ceasefire negotiations, as well as discussions over aid and evacuating the wounded. \u201cAs the conflict expanded into the wider Middle East and drew in the US, Qatar\u2019s mediation has grown from a strategy to enhance its own safety into a role that underpins the entire world\u2019s security.\u201d<\/p>\n

    Read more<\/a><\/p>\n<\/li>\n

  • 4. In Ukraine\u2019s bombed out reservoir a huge forest has grown \u2013 is it a return to life or a toxic timebomb?\u2018A big natural experiment\u2019 in Ukraine. Photograph: Vincent Mundy\n

    Two years after the Nova Kakhovka dam was destroyed in Ukraine, nature has returned in abundance to the drained land in a \u201cbig natural experiment\u201d \u2013 but could it be lost as quickly as it appeared? The journalist and photographer Vincent Mundy headed to Malokaterynivka to find out.<\/p>\n

    Read more<\/a><\/p>\n<\/li>\n

  • Paul Foot. Photograph: Alicia Canter\/The Guardian\n

    \u201cPaul Foot\u2019s life,\u201d wrote Paula Cocozza in this great interview, \u201ctook a hairpin turn in about three seconds of violent enlightenment one Sunday afternoon while he was driving in the suburbs of south Manchester. It was 4.59pm on 20 March 2022 \u2013 the occasion so momentous it\u2019s time-stamped in his memory \u2013 when, as he puts it, \u2018my consciousness exploded\u2019.\u201d<\/p>\n

    Read more<\/a><\/p>\n<\/li>\n

  • 6. \u2018It can bring you to tears\u2019: is this the world\u2019s most beautiful sounding nightclub?Going underground \u2026 Germany\u2019s best nightclub? Photograph: Jonas Mokosch\n

    \u201cOpen Ground is located in Wuppertal, just outside the Ruhr valley, a location known predominantly for its 125-year-old suspended monorail and as the home of the late Pina Bausch\u2019s famous dance theatre. It\u2019s a five-hour train ride from Berlin, a city that has often stolen the electronic music spotlight from the rest of Germany due to its mythologised hedonism and notoriously selective scene, credited to clubs such as Berghain. Yet since opening in December 2023, Open Ground has become a pilgrimage site for nightlife enthusiasts and DJs from all over the world. British musician Floating Points has called it \u2018probably the greatest-sounding club in the EU\u2019. Drum\u2019n\u2019bass DJ Mantra said: \u2018It can almost bring you to tears.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

    Whitney Wei headed to a former second world war bunker that is now Germany\u2019s buzziest dance venue. Could it live up to the hype?<\/p>\n

    Read more<\/a><\/p>\n<\/li>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"1. \u2018All those posh apartments. It\u2019s a playground for the rich\u2019: is Manchester turning into London?Is Manchester becoming…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":292832,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[12,26],"class_list":{"0":"post-292831","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-world","8":"tag-news","9":"tag-world"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/114918611258500826","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/292831","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=292831"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/292831\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/292832"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=292831"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=292831"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=292831"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}