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HOME AT FIRST

ADVENTURE OF THE MONTH — FEBRUARY, 2007

  Home At First Goes Back to School—

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— PART III —

        From the Turf Tavern tucked among the convoluted medieval alleyways of old Oxford, find your way back – if you can – to Catte Street to circumnavigate Radcliffe Square with its remarkable round Palladium Radcliffe Camera (map point N), the main reading room of the adjacent Bodleian Library, and not open to the public. One of Oxford’s best known spires, the Georgian era Radcliffe Camera (1737-49) is often pictured in Oxford literature. (It always looked vaguely familiar to me until while researching this article, I learned it was designed by architect James Gibb, also responsible for the wonderful St. Mary-le-Strand church on the Strand in front of London’s Somerset House.) Although the Radcliffe Camera appears large enough to house a fine library, the building is an iceberg tip. Cavernous underground rooms that connect it to the Bodleian Library across the square add enough total space for more than 600,000 volumes. The Radcliffe Camera is sometimes confused with another Oxford

RADCLIFFE CAMERA

landmark, the Sheldonian Theatre, a round tower just northwest of the Radcliffe Camera. The Sheldonian Theatre (1667) is a product of an even greater architect with many London churches (most importantly St. Paul’s Cathedral) to his credit: Christopher Wren, himself a product of nearby Wadham College and Fellow at All Souls College.

DRESSED FOR DINNER

        Scurrying among all this staid, formal, reverent academic glory are students, dashing from class to class, residence to class, class to eating hall, class to library, class to pub. Students at Oxford still dress in traditional college gowns (think of “Harry Potter”) for important academic events: exams, convocations, graduations, and for supper in the formal college dining halls. It’s still a common sight in Oxford to see students hurrying off to an important test, their robes flying behind them, or to see laughing, relaxed, enrobed students gathering together outside of their college dining hall awaiting the dinner bell.

        Occupying the southern flank of Radcliffe Square is the University Church of St. Mary the Virgin (map point O). Its 14^th century tower is the largest of all of Oxford’s dreaming spires and offers an unfettered look across the town for the modest sum of £2.50/adult, £2/seniors/students, and £1.50/kids-under-16. The church itself is open to visitors daily (except December 25-26) without an admission charge. When inside you might imagine some of the remarkable history that has occurred in its space. The founder of Methodism, John Wesley (alumnus of Christ Church College) preached here often during his tenure as Fellow of Lincoln College in the 1740s. The sainted John Henry (Cardinal) Newman preached here a century later and lead The Oxford Movement, and ecclesiastic return from Anglicanism to Roman Catholicism. Newman was an alumnus of Trinity College and a Fellow at Oriel College. Our friend Matthew Arnold reverently recounted seeing Newman preach when Arnold himself attended St.

UNIVERSITY CHURCH OF
ST. MARY THE VIRGIN

Mary’s services during his undergraduate years at Balliol College. Less peaceful history happened at the University Church. During the reign of Queen Elizabeth I’s Catholic half-sister Queen Mary, three Anglican bishops were tried in the chancel of the church, found guilty of heresy and burned at the stake in front of Balliol College on Broad Street diagonally across from the Oxford Tourist Information Centre.

VAULTS & GARDEN COFFEE SHOP—
WHERE DINING GOES MEDIEVAL

        If all this history and tower climbing makes you hungry, stop in the Vaults & Garden Coffee Shop at the base of St. Mary’s. The coffee shop serves delightful breakfasts, lunches, and snacks from 10AM-5PM daily in the incomparable 14^th century vaulted café and outdoors across from the imposing Radcliffe Camera. Prices are reasonable and service is good, but expect crowding between classes and at regular mealtimes.

        From Radcliffe Square leave the traffic-free university confines and emerge once again on

High Street. Turn right (west) and pass in front of medieval Brasenose College (1509) (map point P). I enjoy thinking of the diversity of its alumni: John Profumo, the British minister victimized in a government-shaking affair involving call-girl/spy Christine Keeler in the Swinging Sixties; West Point great Pete Dawkins who won the Heisman Trophy and then attended Brasenose as a Rhodes Scholar; and Michael Palin, who formed the English absurdist sketch comedy team Monty Python with four other alumni of Oxford (Terry Jones, alumnus of Oxford’s St. Edmund Hall) and Cambridge (John Cleese, Eric Idle, Terry Gilliam).

        Continuing east on High Street, cross Turl Street and watch for the entrance into Oxford’s Covered Market (map point Q). Except for a few pubs in town there isn’t a livelier or more convivial space in Oxford. Here are dozens of shops selling foodstuffs, clothing, jewelry, crafts, and hobbies, as well as a barbershop, two florists, an engraver, and several restaurants and delicatessens. Wander through the market’s 19^th century lanes any day of the week (open most days from at least 9AM-5:30PM) to experience shopping as the Victorians practiced.

        Exit the back of the Covered Market, turning right on Market Street. Where Market Street intersects Turl Street (map point R) are found three of Oxford’s oldest colleges: Jesus (1571) on the northwest corner, Lincoln (1427) on the southeast corner, and Exeter (1314) on the northeast

OXFORD'S LIVELY
COVERED MARKET

corner. These are the former haunts of noted Jesus College scholars T. E. Lawrence (“Lawrence of Arabia”) and British Prime Minister Harold Wilson, two famous writers from Lincoln College, John le Carré (adult suspense) and Dr. Seuss (childish nonsense, and Exeter’s Richard Burton (actor; once married to Elizabeth Taylor) and William Morris (social philosopher, artist, poet, and arts & crafts designer; never married to Elizabeth Taylor).

OXFORD'S LANDMARK
BLACKWELL'S BOOKSTORE

        At the top of Turl Street you emerge at Broad Street. The Oxford Tourist Centre is to your right on Broad Street. Across the street are two more important collections of dreaming spires: Balliol College (to the left) and Trinity (to the right). A relative newcomer at Oxford, Trinity College (1555) (map point S) offers a thankfully short list of notable graduates: the McWhirter twins who edited the Guinness Book of Records, William Pitt the Elder (British Prime Minister in the years leading to the American Revolution), sainted Catholic theologian John Henry Newman, and art historian and chronicler of the TV show “Civilisation” Kenneth Clark. Next to (and, as you learn if you enter the shop, beneath) Trinity College is
Oxford's famously unassuming Blackwell’s Bookstore

(map point T). With the largest single book salesroom in Europe Blackwell’s is almost as much an Oxford monument as the nearby Bodleian Library.

        Further west on Broad Street, you will pass the point where Bloody Mary had the Oxford Martyrs burned at the stake in the middle of the street in front of Balliol College (map point U) almost 500 years ago. The spot is marked with a cross. Balliol’s long history (dates from 1263) has produced a long list of alumni notables: John Wycliffe (14^th century theologian), Adam Smith (18^th century Scottish capitalist philosopher), Arnold Toynbee (English historian), Nicholas Katzenbach (U.S. Attorney General), English writers Graham Greene, Aldous Huxley, and Nevil Shute, Raymond Massey (Canadian actor best known for portraying Abraham Lincoln), English poets Matthew Arnold (author of our "dreaming spires"), Gerard Manley Hopkins, Robert Southey,

OXFORD'S BALLIOL COLLEGE HAS
BEEN PRODUCING NOTABLE ALUMNI
SINCE ITS FOUNDING IN 1263,
INCLUDING POET MATTHEW ARNOLD
WHO FIRST WROTE OF OXFORD'S 'DREAMING SPIRES'.

and Algernon Swinburne, and a legion of politicians and statesmen including British Prime Ministers Harold Macmillan and Edward Heath, two kings of Norway, and American political pundit George Stephanopoulos.

OXFORD'S BUSY PEDESTRIAN
MALL, CORNMARKET, FLANKS
WHAT HAD BEEN THE WALLED
LIMITS OF THE SAXON TOWN.
THE TOWER OF THE CHURCH OF
ST. MICHAEL STILL MARKS THE
LOCATION OF THE NORTHERN
GATE OF THE TOWN WALLS.

        Broad Street next intersects Cornmarket Street. Turn left (south) on Cornmarket (map point V), a pedestrian mall and Oxford’s major shopping street. Once voted Britain’s ugliest street, Cornmarket has been upgraded in recent decades. With all its chain stores and fast food restaurants, Cornmarket may now simply be the ugliest street in Oxford. It can certainly be the town’s testiest, as milling crowds of local yobs exercise their territorial imperative in the face of the ever-growing invasion of Oxford students and tourists from around the world. Stop at Burger King (or McDonald’s, or Starbucks, or KFC) if you must, but do watch for the Saxon tower of the Church of St. Michael at the North Gate on the east side of the street where Cornmarket is joined by Ship Street (map point W). The 11^th century tower is the oldest building in Oxford. The tower holds the door of the cell that held the Oxford Martyrs until their burning when the tower was already 500 years old. (Tower open Mo-Fr
10AM-5PM; Su 12N-5PM. Admission £1.50.)

        Quickly you are back at Carfax, and your walk among the dreaming spires of Oxford is essentially complete. The route from Carfax west to Oxford’s rail station along Queen Street and New Road add one more important Oxford tower to the itinerary, but this tower is hardly a dreaming spire. As Queen Street bends northwest into New Road you will see an earthworks capped with an ancient stone tower ahead on the left side of the road (map point X). St. George’s Tower was built on the mound by the Thames in 1071 shortly after the Norman Conquest of Britain. Oxford Castle was a royal castle—kings and queens stayed here when visiting the upper Thames region—until converted to Oxford’s jail and then a national prison. After its retirement the prison with a Norman tower has been converted into (what else?)

MEDIEVAL RENDERING OF
OXFORD'S NORMAN CASTLE.
WHAT'S LEFT OF THIS SITE IS
NOW THE FOCUS OF A MAJOR
COMMERCIAL DEVELOPMENT.

a complex with a luxury hotel, shopping, apartments, heritage site (sort of a theme park made out of a real historic site), ice rink, and chain restaurants (including a Krispy Kreme doughnut shop). Proof that not all Oxford spires are dreaming. Some are scheming.

OXFORD'S DREAMING ZIGGURAT

        And some are gleaming. The last spire you will see as you approach Oxford’s rail station (map point Y) is just east of the station forecourt and steps. It belongs to one of Oxford’s newest and most modern schools, Saïd Business School (map point Z), and its shiny copper stepped wedding cake form—a ziggurat—fits Oxford’s skyline about as well as a gothic cathedral would blend into Damascus. Saïd Business School demonstrates that Oxford is no longer just a collection of medieval ivory towers but of spires with dreams that extend throughout the world.

— END OF PART III —

— GO TO PART I  — GO TO PART II —