OXFORD NOVELS | Favorites of Oxford Book Club

A book in the series by
Colin Dexter (1930-2017)

March 31, 2020 — The favorite six novels listed below, based on the number of mentions in the newly formed Oxford Book Club thread on this subject as of March 29, 2020 are the following (see https://oxford.pbc.guru/t/favourite-novel-set-in-oxford/831/26); included here are only books with at least two mentions:

5 mentions – Zuleika Dobson, Max Beerbohm (1911). This is the only novel Beerbohm wrote. He admitted it wasn't really a novel, more a collection of essays stitched together with an idea. Zuleika is a femme fatale with magical qualities (like Mary Poppins), granddaughter of the head of "Judas" College (Merton, where Beerbohm was resident when at Oxford).

5 Gaudy Night, Dorothy L. Sayers (1935). Mystery set at a gaudy of "Shrewsbury" (Somerville) College, based on Sayers's own years there; her father was chaplain of Christ Church Cathedral. One of a series (tenth book) of novels based on a gentleman detective, Lord Peter Wimsey, who solves mysteries for the fun of it. In the Gaudy Night story he comes to the aid of an alumna who receives a series of hostile letters at the gaudy. https://www.novelsuspects.com/series-list/the-lord-peter-wimsey-series-books-in-order/.

3 Inspector Morse series, Colin Dexter (1975-1999). I was surprised that the Inspector Morse murder-mystery series only had three mentions... Maybe because the open-ended survey was about books, not the ITV series. Colin Dexter died in 2017 at 86 years old. https://theoxbridgepursuivant.blogspot.com/2016/07/morse-lewis-endeavour.html

3 Doomsday Book, Connie Willis (1992). The Doomsday Book, by an American who lives in Colorado, won both the Hugo and Nebula sci-fi awards. Oxford is woven into her fantasy stories. She also wrote other time-traveling books that feature Oxford.

2 All Souls, Javier Marías. First-person narrative, reminiscences by a visiting Spanish literature scholar at an Oxford college who gets to know eccentric characters like the college lodge denizen who transports himself back to different years. He describes Oxford as preserved in syrup. He befriends a don's wife, who is indiscrete about their affair. Characters in an Oxford setting.

2 Brideshead Revisited (net of one downvote), Evelyn Waugh (1945). For those who took a relaxed attitude toward their Oxford education, this seems to have been a favorite, and the movie was gorgeous and critically acclaimed. One complaint about the book for purposes of the survey is that it was about two Oxonians but not about Oxford. What it does convey is an appreciation for an aristocratic (Catholic) lifestyle in England that was fading during and after World War II, a theme that was picked up in Downton Abbey.

I was surprised that Philip Pullman's trilogy, His Dark Materials, only had one mention, since it was made into an HBO movie in November 2019. Perhaps because the movie was targeted at an American audience?

More about fictional Oxford colleges here: https://theoxbridgepursuivant.blogspot.com/2016/07/morse-lewis-endeavour.html

PARLIAMENT WINS | Cromwell Captures Charles I

Oliver Cromwell (L) and King Charles I (R).

November 30, 2018–On this day in 1648, Oliver Cromwell's New Model Army, led by Yorkshireman Sir Thomas Lord Fairfax, captured Charles I in Oxford.

Two months later, the King was beheaded.

King Charles had retreated to loyalist Oxford University after the Parliamentarians defeated Royalist troops at Naseby three years earlier, and Marston Moor before that.

While all the Oxford University colleges except Merton were loyal to the King, and donated their silver plate to help pay for the King's troops, the Oxford townspeople were Parliamentarians.

Charles I was put on trial for high treason. He vociferously claimed the monarch's divine right to rule, which he had been coached to uphold by his father James I. Charles was sentenced to death and was beheaded on January 30.

Charles I was the last reigning English monarch to be executed. After him, Britain's royals have soft-pedaled their divine right to rule. More in Oxford College Arms (Boissevain Books, 2018), p 11.

OXFORD | Russian Heritage

Dr Nina Kruglikova at
Weston Library, Oxford.

What would the main themes be of a Russian Heritage tour of Oxford? 

I asked Nina Kruglikova, a fellow Trinity College, Oxford alum whom I met on a tour led by Felicity Tholstrup of WW2 Oxford earlier this month on the Oxford Weekend. 

Here are some topics for a Russian Heritage tour, which Nina has conducted in the past.

17th Century – Visit to Oxford from Peter the Great. Tsar Peter I ("the Great"), founder of St Petersburg, was born in 1672 and became emperor at ten years of age. He ruled for 43 years. 

He visited Oxford, incognito, staying at the Golden Cross and visiting the Chapel at Trinity College. Even though he was in disguise, he cut such a figure that he attracted attention.

19th Century – Visit from Alexander I. Emperor Alexander (1777-1825) went to Radcliffe Camera to celebrate the victory over Napoleon in 1814. He stayed in the Queen's Room in Merton (where the wife of Charles I lived during the period before Cromwell prevailed over the monarchy). He gave a big vase from Suberia and also a double-headed eagle in a stained-glass window, the arms of the Tsar. One legend is that Alexander caused damage during his visit and the vase and window were repayment.

Peter I ("The Great")

20th Century (A) – Prince Felix Felixovich Yusupov. Yusupov (1887-1967), who as a youth went under the title Count Sumarokov-Elston (Князь Фе́ликс Фе́ликсович Юсу́пов, Граф Сумаро́ков-Эльстон) was for three years, 1909-12, at University College, Oxford. He had lavish parties at Univ. For example, he brought in a famed Russian ballet dancer named Pavlova (a cake is named after her). His best friend from St. Petersburg, Oswald Raynor, was at Oriel.

At the end of his student years at Oxford he was reported to have visited Royal Albert Hall for a full-dress event and to have impressed many onlookers as the best-dressed person in the Hall. Five years later he went to the United States and was depicted in a thinly fictionalized film as having raped his wife. He sued the film company and won.

He is credited along with the Tsar's cousin Grand Duke Dmitri Pavlovich with killing Father Grigori Yefimovich (Gregory) 1869-1916, the "mad Monk" friend of the family of Tsar Nicholas II and his wife Alexandra. Rasputin died at Yusupov's home; he did not eat the cyanide-laced cookies so he was shot in the head.

Nicolas II – Nice man,
bad tsar.

Yusupov and his wife Irina migrated to England after the assassination of Tsar Nicholas with his wife and five children in 1918. 

There were two revolutions in 1917. The first was by the democratic Duma ruling committee, in February. The Duma forced Tsar Nicholas II to abdicate, ending three centuries of Romanov rule. 

It would be another half a year before the Bolshevik (October) Revolution.  government was formed, after the Socialist revolution in late autumn 1917.

Yusupov and his wife bought a house at 4 Marston Street, Oxford that is now called St Nicholas House. They were interviewed about his 1953 book, Lost Splendor. Prince Yusupov died at St Pancras Hospital in 1963 and is buried at Headington Cemetery outside of Oxford. 

The influence and origins of Rasputin continue to be a mystery, so that when Yusupov died there was interest in his personal papers; however, he apparently burned them.

20th Century (B) – Charles Sydney Gibbes. Son of John Gibbs (sic – he added the "e" later in life), he did the Moral Sciences Tripos at St John's College, Cambridge. He became the tutor to the children of Tsar Nicholas II. He was deeply distressed a perceived betrayal of the Tsar by his British relatives, but the Great War was going so badly that all of the countries were fearful of revolution. One view is that George V's wife Mary was hostile to the Tsar's family because they lorded over her at Osborne on the Isle of Wight when Victoria was still alive. After Nicholas II and his family were assassinated, Gibbes first became a monk and then became an Orthodox priest in Oxford, taking the name Nicholas out of respect for the Tsar and his family.

20th Century (C) – Leonid Pasternak. The father of Boris Pasternak, Leonid lived in Park Town, Oxford. He was an artist and his house is now a museum, full of his paintings.

21st Century – St Nicholas Church. The church that Nina and other Russian Orthodox faithful attend is at the previously mentioned #4 Marston Road (St Nicholas House), near the intersection with Ferry Road. It used to be the Anglican church of St Nicholas. They have Sunday services from 10:30 until 1:30 pm or later.

OXFORD | Historical Calendar

4th Annual NYC Area Oxford-Cambridge
Alumni Boat Race, 2008. Naugatuck Rowing
Club, Westport, Connecticut. Oxford mixed boat.

The following historical calendar of Oxford-college- related events is in formation.

Oxford college connections are noted.

February 
11 – Tolkien Heirs Sue New Line Cinema for $150 Million. 2008, settled 2009. Tolkien attended Exeter, Oxford. Fellow at Merton, Oxford.

April
23 – Baedeker Raids Start. 1942. Oxford was spared. Why, do you suppose?

May
1 – Joseph Heller. 1923. St Catz, Oxford.

July
1 – Hong Kong Returned to China. 1997. Chris Patten, Balliol, Oxford.

August
11 – Laurence Binyon, Poet, born.  1869.  Trinity, Oxford 1888.

September
3 – Stars and Stripes First Flown in Battle. Lawrence Washington, Brasenose, Oxford.

November
9 – Noel Godfrey Chavasse. 1884. Trinity, Oxford. Only person to receive the Victoria Cross with bar in World War I.
24 – St Catherine's Feast Day.  St Catz is named after her and her wheel is in the college arms.