Oxford High Table and Imps

You can pay a few quid for a tour of lovely Magdalen College, but please be my virtual guest at high table. I promise a new perspective.

My old friend, Stewart Wood (at right with my husband, Henry) is both a Magdalen fellow and Prime Minister Gordon Brown’s advisor. His boss keeps him busy, but Stewart took a night off before President Bush’s visit to take us to dinner at high table. It was a special night, Magdalen College’s 550th. Happy Birthday!

After admiring the Magdalen gardens and deer park,

. . . we had a champagne reception in the Senior Common Room. The oak-paneled chamber was out of another century and not a recent one with its deep-set windows overlooking the quads. The dark wood furniture was antique; the art was museum quality and the arm chairs were red leather before a fireplace.

There were the dons in black academic gowns, their guests and the college president. It was very social, and people were curious about what an American novelist was doing at Oxford. I was struggling to describe my genre of women’s fiction, when one fellow figured it out: “an Orange Prize book!” I wish. Magdalen has quite a literary history: Oscar Wilde and C.S. Lewis.

When it was time to dine, we filed out a tiny door onto the roof. The roof? Yes! Philip Pullman did not invent his heroine’s rooftop rambling. Before Lyra, dons have been walking the Magdalen roofs every evening, and now I follow in their footsteps. I did promise you a new perspective!

There was a wooden walkway, covered in chicken wire for better footing. I was relieved my heels weren’t too pointy. Way down below was the cloistered quad. Even in the highest echelons of English learning and antiquity resides the silly sign:

We entered the dining hall through another Hobbit sized door. The main entrance for the students, who ate earlier, was at the other end. That entrance is approached by a grand stairway. The high table is literally a long table placed at 90 degrees to the others on a raised platform below the oak-paneled end wall. Do the students wonder how the dons mysteriously apparate at high table?

Before we dined, the Magdalen Boys Choir sang hymns from the balcony, and we stood for a Latin grace. Seating was open except for those at high table. By silver clad candlelight, we enjoyed a fine 4 course meal: soup, fish, meat and pudding. Then, as is English upper class custom, we changed seats for dessert wines, fruit and chocolates. You hold onto your napkins but nothing else.

This time we were seated at high table, but first I admired the 550 year old royal charter displayed under glass. There were plenty at hand to translate the Latin. The delicate writing was perfectly preserved except for one smudge.

I slipped out to the loo (English for toilet) which was in an annex from the courtyard, built into the fort-like walls. There was even a moat. Henry gave me directions: “down the hall, take a left, down the stairs and a sharp right, pass the 3-headed dog….”

Thankfully there was no vicious dog, but there was a phantom call box. I half expected to find Dr. Who. I was certainly a time traveler.

It was good to walk and test my balance. After the champagne, white and red wines, I decided to pass on the sauterne and only took a thimble full of port, which is always passed to the left. The rooftop footing on the way back to the SCR was more treacherous in the dark.

Someone must have refilled my glass during dinner without my noticing, or why else would I consent to be weighed after eating so much? That leather bound stool is a scale, and my weight is now preserved for posterity in the Magdalen SCR record book. It was in stones so I have no clue. It’s hard enough to multiply by 14 when totally sober.

Stewart and I became close friends in our early 20’s. I was finishing college, and he and Henry were starting graduate school at Harvard. Being around Stewart makes me revert. Instead of staggering home to bed, I accepted his invitation to visit the Magdalen student bar.

Henry chimed in that it would be “research” for my novel. He was right. My protagonist is 20, she wouldn’t decline a pint (or a half pint in my case.) The bar was hopping with students celebrating the end of term and exams.

It was all good fun until I woke up the next morning. Hmm, now I remember what being 20 really felt like. On top of that, I’d agreed to meet an Oxford student for a pint the next evening. If I’m looking a bit worse for wear in the photo, you know why. Marisa Benoit was great company and perked me up.

Marisa first came to Oxford on her junior year abroad, and now she’s come back for an MSC. She’s from a really small town in Maine. I was thrilled to meet her because she has given me insight into my character who comes from a similar background.

Only Marisa’s back story was better than fiction. Her father is a tugboat captain in NYC, my hometown. He works 2 weeks on and off and decided to raise his family in Maine. On board he reads my blog (hello, Captain Benoit!)

Marisa gave me a tour around Lincoln College. The time to see it is in the fall when all the ivy turns bright red. I peeked my head in back then but had longed to see more.


Lincoln is a small college, but has a large graduate student population, making it a good choice for further degrees. It’s a warm, cozy place unless you're an imp.

An imp? That’s a daemon they keep locked in a cell by the student bar. No, I hadn’t even started drinking when I heard this tale. That’s him in the photo. I’ll zoom in closer for a better look. Do you sort of wish that I hadn't? He makes gargoyles handsome.

The Lincoln Imp used to grace a corner of the front quad, but now he’s been locked up for safe keeping, and a modern imp has taken his place. Are you thinking what I’m thinking? This imp could be the inspiration for Pullman’s daemons and the deathly tunnels below Oxford. It gave me the chills.

The library at Lincoln gave me good chills. It was once a chapel (they have another) but is now devoted to worshiping books. Wouldn’t you want to study in this glorious space? Thanks, Marisa, for the tour and the pint.

Another new friend this year is Bee. She writes a similar blog, Bee Drunken, about life as an American married to an Englishman here. We also share a love of reading. You have to check out her funny post on the 9 signs of going native (English.) For #10 I'd add putting the wash out on the line as soon as the sun shines. Bee and I met for a Port Meadow walk, but of course it was pouring. We had lunch at The Trout instead.

When people ask what I enjoy about blogging, it’s the 2-way street. I’ve “met” so many interesting people though comments and blog links. It has made this year living abroad feel much less lonely. I love hearing your responses. I also appreciate writing and publishing in an instant click.

A bunch of you have asked me about buying my novels. It will be a wait. My agent is looking for a publisher for my first novel, Moose Crossing, now. S.A.D. is still in revision. I’ll be writing NOT CRICKET when I return to the USA based on material collected in this blog. It takes a long time for a manuscript to become a published book. Read my post, Shaping a Novel, if you want to learn more about the process.

I will announce the good news on my blog and add links when (if?) the books are available for purchase. It’s conceivable they will end up with different titles. In the meantime, I’ll definitely keep blogging when I go back to Maine, and I’ll revisit England from time to time. I still have a few more weeks left. So much to do!

Merton College Stories

Don’t you just love gargoyles? Actually this Merton one must be a “grotesque” as it doesn’t spit water. These little monsters crawl over many an Oxbridge façade, favoring high perches, drain spouts, hidden nooks and John Kelly’s Voxford blog. I’m so honored to be featured as Kelly’s gargoyle of the week. Look up when exploring the old colleges if you feel googlie eyes.

Merton is “the oldest college” at Oxford, a title it shares with two others: Balliol and Univ. They were all established between 1249-1264. The dispute centers around which started teaching first. Merton’s claim of antiquity rests upon being the first college in England to receive a royal charter. Its oldest quad has buildings without chimneys because the technology hadn’t made it to England from the Continent. College treasures are still stored in the stone buildings to protect them from fire.

Merton also houses the oldest continuously functioning English library (built 1278 -1378) in the world. Merton cleverly built up its library by requiring academics to bring and bestow their personal book collections to the college. They also had three ancient astrolabes and a couple of multi-locked chests that used to house books before the advent of bookcases.

Photo of Merton Library from Wikipedia

I wish I could have taken photos of the Merton Library myself. It was like walking into a wooden crypt or a sacred mausoleum of literary antiquity. The walls and stalls were oak paneled and the ceiling open to the roof beams like an attic. The tiny stained glass windows let in little light.

The best lit stalls housed the most learned texts in the hierarchy of knowledge: theology and philosophy, followed by law and medicine. The lower humanities were in the least favorable northern corners. The progression of subjects lead to enlightenment as in those days colleges were formed first and foremost as religious institutions.

In the darkest recesses the first year students of past centuries might be reading lowly literature. And what literature! There’s one of the first printed versions of Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales, and it’s in the best shape of the 8 existing copies. Priceless! Merton also has a second volume of Shakespeare. I had to take out a tissue to avoid drooling over all the leather-bound, chained books.

Perhaps I should have been trembling with fear. The Merton Library is haunted! John Duns Scotus supposedly walks shin deep, wading through the new raised floor. Students sneak into the library to see him at night. I heard this tale and others from our student guide, Krishna Omkar.

Merton is as rich in stories as it is in history. J.R.R. Tolkien had an office in Fellows Quad. He met with his buddy C.S. Lewis in the Merton gardens which are lovely on a warm spring day. They sat around a stone table, that was to feature in the Narnia series, and discussed their writing when they weren’t meeting at the Eagle and Child pub.

This is The Stone Table? It wasn’t large enough to kill a cat let alone a mighty lion, Aslan. As for the name Aslan, my son told me that it is Islamic. He has a friend from Iran who is teased mercilessly for that name at their English boys school. Kids can be so cruel, but I like that there is more to the Narnia books beyond a Christian allegory. It feels like a treasure hunt living in Oxford and uncovering the inspiration for classic literature.

Merton also has tales from more recent times. On the day that the clocks fall back an hour, old Mertonians gather in Fellows Quad by the sundial. At 1:57 am they drink a toast. Linking arms, they walk backwards drinking port for an hour! Don’t mock it. This ritual is the only hope we have of maintaining the space-time continuum. Needless to say, it is a modern practice dating back to the 1970’s. Yes, I know that for some of you that is ancient history. My daughter’s eleven year old friend referred to the Bee Gees as “this really old band from long ago.” She then added, “They were guys but sounded just like girls.”

Back when Oxford students were still dancing to those “oldies,” my husband was at Oriel. The Crown Prince Naruhito of Japan was at Merton. Naruhito was invited to a formal ball and was provided a suitable date but didn’t know how to boogie. Henry came to the rescue and taught the crown prince how to disco dance. Not to the Bee Gees, that would be cruel and unusual punishment, but to Soft Cell. An international crisis was thus narrowly averted.

Despite the demonic gargoyles, Merton is a spiritual place with a huge 13th century chapel that was originally built as a parish church. It supposedly has the second best acoustics in all of Europe. A microphone is never necessary. The screen to the chapel was Sir Christopher Wren’s first commission.

At the end of our Oxford Newcomers' Club tour, we had tea in the grand hall, quite typical of the old colleges. On the way home down the cobblestone road, I had a good laugh. This is where you can find the Philosophy Department at Oxford:

For those of you hungering for more Oxford tales from my husband, next week Henry will be guest blogging about Eight’s Week – an Oxford rowing race. He’s out there on the Thames/Isis today with an old Oriel buddy. They’ll probably do some “research” down the boozer too. Time to push off.

Oxford Literary Festival 2008

It was not without irony that Lionel Shriver announced that she would be the first to read “smut” aloud in Christ Church Library. At The Oxford Literary Festival Shriver read two sexually explicit but intellectually charged passages from her latest novel, The Post-Birthday World. Shriver takes a bold stab at what people really think about when making love. As she said, there is a limit to the number of physical combinations of which part goes where. Lionel didn’t blush once, her enunciation was as faultless and subtly nuanced as the most seasoned actress. The stage was set with leather-bound books housed in oak below ornate moldings, an ivory tower out the window.


It made me want to go back and reread her book; I blogged about PBW last May. A review in the Guardian (spoiler alert) claimed this work was her most autobiographical. Shriver left a long term relationship for the love of a jazz musician. Like her heroine and like me, Shriver is an expat American living in England. We were both dressed in black t-shirts and jeans, unlike anyone else in the silver-haired, tweedy audience. I confess to feeling comfort at hearing an American accent again, like finding an old friend.

The PBW has been called chick lit although it tackles deep issues such as the inspiration for creativity and even the conflict in Northern Ireland. It is still quite a change from the disturbing We Need to Talk About Kevin. Her Orange Prize winner was about a school shooter. A hand count showed that I was one of the few that had read her latest; most were Kevin fans and women.

I asked how she managed to defy genre typing and what her next project would be. Shriver was wary of “the women’s fiction pigeon hole” as she cherishes her male readers too. Her claim was that women read more books then men and are just as happy to read broadly. She did admit that her agent was nervous about her next novel: a reflection on the American healthcare system written in a male voice. As long as Shriver continues to write beautifully and honestly about controversial subjects, I believe her audience will only grow.

The Oxford Literary Festival lasts an entire week and is housed in Christ Church which many may recognize from Brideshead Revisited. The events were well worth the £7.50 admission just for the venue alone. I attended one where I sat at high table in Hall. If the space looks familiar, it was the model for the Hogwart’s dining hall in Harry Potter.

Even the entrance to the Hall and other conference rooms was beyond grand.

Of course nothing at the venerable college was accessible, so the panel I attended on "Disability in Writing" was housed across the street. The chair was the academic Tom Shakespeare. Susan Clow, manager of In the Picture spoke first about the importance of including disabled children in mainstream children’s picture books. It’s a more representational vision of reality, and inclusion sends the important message that the disabled are not invisible. Her website has many good tips for illustrators.

Susan Clow, Tom Shakespeare, Mark Haddon and Lois Keith

Novelist Lois Keith listed 3 approaches to avoid when writing about the disabled:

1. “I wouldn’t wish disability on my worst enemy.”
2. “He threw his wheelchair out the window to walk again.” (eg Colin in The Secret Garden)
3. "Show the disabled character watching passively in the corner." (eg sweet Beth in Little Women)

The main draw of the panel was author Mark Haddon. A sharp-eyed reader will note that the chapters in The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time are all in prime numbers. Not once in the narrative is it spelled out that the engaging narrator with a number fixation has Asperger’s Syndrome. Haddon’s only regret was that the publisher added that information to the jacket blurb. His novel invites you to see the world through autistic eyes, but it is not a book about disability per se.

The Curious Incident is one of the best young adult books I’ve read; my son at age twelve loved it too. Encouraged by Haddon, I have included a disabled character in my novel S.A.D..

I attended the panel on Japanese Historical Fiction just for fun. I’ve always enjoyed reading novels about Japan. One of my favorite authors is Haruki Murakami. My husband teaches Japanese Politics, and my sister-in-law is Japanese.

Ellis Avery was worried that a 21st century American couldn’t understand what it felt like to be a 19th century Japanese girl. I applaud her choice of narrator: an American orphan, adopted by a Japanese family as a servant. The Teahouse Fire is as beautifully choreographed and unrushed as a tea ceremony. What drives the narrative is the complex relationship between the fictional maid, Aurelia, and a real historical figure, her mistress. Shin Yukako rescued the tea ceremony from obscurity in a rapidly modernizing Meiji Japan, just opening to the west.

What is striking about Avery’s story is that it reads like a Japanese novel. It reminds me of Mori Ogai’s The Wild Geese which is set in the same time period and is one my favorite novels. In both we see the attention to detail, the importance of family tradition, the theme of unrequited love and even the slow pace. What enlivens the narrative in Teahouse is a distinctly American feminist perspective, including a lesbian romance. It’s an unusual mix, but it works. I’m missing her voice since finishing the book.

I don’t have as much to say about Lesley Downer’s The Last Concubine because I haven’t read it. Like Avery's novel, it is set in 19th century Japan. Although Downer lived in Japan for 15 years, the only Japanese women she said she could relate to were geisha. She characterized the rest as married at 24, had kids, were gossipy, didn’t know men (even their husbands) and didn’t work. That isn’t the Japan that I know.

At the end of the readings, Avery delighted the audience by passing out Japanese sweets and conducting a tea ceremony. Avery has studied the art of Japanese tea for years. She held her arms as if wearing a kimono and moved with measured grace. Downer was an obliging guest, her role as ritualized.

On Avery’s website I discovered that we share the same literary agent, Jean Naggar. I introduced myself to Avery and her partner, Sharon Marcus; both teach at Columbia University. Oddly enough, they already knew me. They had googled “best tea in Oxford,” found my blog and enjoyed a decent cup of tea and lunch at The Rose. Professor Marcus studies 19th century women journals and said my blog reminded her of the travel journals from that time. Isn’t cyberspace a small world?

Another panel I attended was “Blogging the Classics” which debated book review blogging vs. newspaper literary criticism.

John Carey, John Mullan, Lynne Hatwell and Mark Thwaite

Mark Thwaite, founder of ReadySteadyBook.com and a librarian by profession, spoke on the value of book blogging as giving recognition to good but unusual titles. He listed 7 words that should be avoided when reviewing:

1. poignant
2. compelling
3. intriguing
4. astute
5. craft
6. muse
7. lyrical

Uh oh, have I used them all? Thwaite posts a list of about 80 English book bloggers on his website at BritLitBlogs. Too bad there isn’t an American equivalent of this directory. Thwaite pointed out that there are a lot of blogs out there - well over 100 million tracked by Technorati alone. Diversity is a given.

Lynne Hatwell from dovegreyreader was an engaging speaker: modest, funny and forthright. Blogging about books is the way to share her passion. Her blog is a bit like mine, a mixture of reading and personal narrative. It’s more about how she feels about the books than a critical review. She lives in Devon and is a healthcare visitor who did a literature degree in her free time.

The panel’s literary critic was Professor John Mullan. Mullan said his academic training allows him to understand literature better than a layperson. He may know books, but it didn’t sound like the professor was that familiar with blogs. He spoke of people raving, hostility and chaos in cyberspace. The moderator and Sunday Times chief reviewer, John Carey praised the diversity in blogging, but Mullan didn’t recognize its value beyond entertainment.

Near the close of the festival, came the biggest surprise: 3 inches of snow! My kids made a snowman with grape hyacinth hair. Port Meadow looked like a holiday card complete with swans. I felt like I had conjured the storm as I was writing a new cross-country skiing scene for S.A.D. and was having a hard time remembering a Maine winter. I actually got the idea under a flurry of cherry blossoms. My revisions are well inspired thanks to the literary festival and the April snow.

Bodleian Library Rules

Enter the chambers below the Bodleian Library, and you will understand why kings chose to rule from Oxford. The oak-paneled room (above), called the Convocation/Congregation House, housed the governing bodies of Oxford University for centuries. The university chancellor sat upon the throne like a king.

During the 17th century, King Charles I and then King Charles II sat upon the thrown like a chancellor and convened parliament in this miniature Westminster. The proportions between the benches are the exact same ratio in both: the length of an arm with a sword and six inches spare.

Before modern plumbing, the building was not heated because of the books that reside in the library above it. Due to the damp and to periodic flooding of the Thames/Isis, libraries were never on the ground floor. The Convocation House and the Bodleian Library were additions to the Divinity School. The earliest colleges were founded for mostly religious studies.

The Divinity School was built in the 15th century to house university lectures and examinations. Prior to that, the university had used St. Mary’s, a church. Observe the intricate masonry and you will understand why it took sixty years to complete the task.

Does this glorious space looks familiar? The Divinity School was the infirmary in a Harry Potter movie, and the Bodleian Library was the Hogwarts Library. I suppose they waived the no photography in the library rule for J.K. Rowling.

The first 3 walls of the Divinity School were beautifully executed, but then the master builder died. The new builder cut some corners, or rather he didn’t cut them with much finesse. The second master builder was on a tighter budget and schedule.

The Bishop of Kemp was not pleased and raised funds so that the ceiling could be constructed in lavish detail. The initials and the coats of arms of the many benefactors were carved into the ceiling. There are 450 carvings but some are decorative, even humorous, including a naked jester scaling an arch.

Kemp was such a good fund raiser that a second floor was added to the Divinity School to house the university library (it had been in St. Mary’s). Sadly the entire library collection was destroyed during the English Reformation.

The University library collection was restored by Sir Thomas Bodley who had been a fellow at Merton College before becoming a diplomat. In his travels, Bodley collected 3-4 thousand books. He donated his collection to the library and urged friends to do the same. Bodley refurbished the space, and the Bodleian Library was opened in 1602 as a reference library. Even kings weren’t allowed to take out books. The old books were large, leather bound and wood-backed. Not light reads.

An architect could tell you that there would be trouble adding such a heavy addition, but Oxford has never (even today) offered a degree in architecture. That field was considered a trade. The airy Divinity School was not originally designed for a second floor let alone wood-backed books inside solid oak bookcases.

Christopher Wren was an Oxford graduate and former professor of Astronomy. He had trained to become an architect after university. Wren came to his alma mater’s rescue and saved the building. He also added a door so that the growing student body could proceed from the Divinity School to the Sheldonian Theatre for degree ceremonies.

You can see, but not touch, the 16th century books in the Arts End of the Bodleian. The most valuable tombs are chained to the oak bookcases. The wood beamed ceiling is carved with Latin mottos. Gold-framed oil paintings of the college founders hang on the walls. It is dark despite the large windows and the addition of electricity. The space smells appealingly of ancient paper and history.

Over time the Bodleian has expanded into a quad with a wrap-around second floor reading room. Most of the books are now stored in the basement levels in closed stacks with climate control. Readers used to drop book requests down tubes to librarians, but now it’s computerized. A mid 20th century pneumatic system, like a scene from Wallace and Gromit , brings the books up from the lower levels to the readers. The gears grind and books are raised and lowered in metal cases. It was fun to watch. In the reading room a huge bell rings at closing time. In the past, closing time was at the whim of the harassed librarian.

Today there are 8 million books in the Bodleian. “The Bod” is a copyright library (like the American Library of Congress) for all British publications after 1900. There are another 5-6 million books in the other 100 libraries at Oxford. Most of those are at the colleges or the departments and are lending libraries.

To ensure the safety of the priceless Bodleian collection, a reader must take an oath in his or her native tongue:

I hereby undertake not to remove from the Library, nor to mark, deface, or injure in any way, any volume, document or other object belonging to it or in its custody; not to bring into the Library, or kindle therein, any fire or flame, and not to smoke in the Library; and I promise to obey all rules of the Library.

My tour was courtesy of the Oxford Newcomers Club led by the knowledgeable Marie Ruiz.

For a laugh, read the Onion's "Area Eccentric Reads Entire Book."