A theatrical sensation since the 1960s, whose dramas included Arcadia, The Real Thing and Leopoldstadt, Stoppard also had huge success as a screenwriter The playwright Tom Stoppard, whose playful erudition dazzled the theatregoing world for decades, has died aged 88. One of a select band of writers from any discipline to earn his own adjective – “Stoppardian” – in the Oxford English Dictionary, he delighted in the most improbable juxtapositions: philosophy and gymnastics in Jumpers (1972); early 19th-century landscape gardening and chaos theory in Arcadia (1993); rock music, dissident Czech academics and the love poetry of Sappho in Rock ’n’ Roll (2006). Continue reading...

Exclusive: Rail regulator pulls Avanti service from timetable from mid-December but it is needed for staff travel The good news for rail travel between Manchester and London is that a morning train will continue to link England’s biggest cities in under two hours. The bad news: passengers will no longer be able to get onboard. The rail regulator has axed one of Britain’s fastest and most lucrative intercity services, the 7am Avanti West Coast from Manchester Piccadilly to London Euston, as part of a timetable shake-up that will take effect in mid-December. Continue reading...