We live, it is said, in a city of beautiful buildings and ugly people. We are continually portrayed as lacking passion and social skills, losing our virginities at about the same time our BAs metamorphose into Masters degrees. We are apparently less attractive, less sociable and less likely to get laid than students elsewhere, although the chances are good that we will end up marrying each other, if only because no one else will. In fact, it seems that no one other than JP Morgan lusts after an Oxford student.Keen to investigate this, I regarded the influx of a new generation of freshers with an eager eye. From the lengthy crocodiles of new students traversing the High Street will be drawn a new flock of hacks and upstarts, thesps and boaties, socialites and socialists. Our university will, sadly perhaps but probably inevitably, stratify itself as it does each year. Within a few short months, weeks even, the different tribes separated by subject and college, as well as class, wealth and faith, will have identified each other and introverted themselves.However, for a blink of an autumnal eye everyone is in the same boat of finding where things are and trying to remember names. The future ‘Bridge girl’, who by November will be far too cool for college, goes to buy her gown with the computer scientist who will be social secretary of the Dungeons & Dragons Society in Hilary. In my own college I saw several acres of pashmina founder on tough northern lads who clearly wondered why the womenfolk were wearing tents. Like the end of a war or the fall of a siege Oxford’s freshers’ week produces some strange meetings, and not just with the tutors. But does it throw up some unlikely bedfellows?Certainly the chivalrous second year tactic of plying a fresher with sambuca and then stealing her keys delivered some results, but as this newspaper wryly commentated it was not “all about getting pissed and getting laid”. Intrigued as to why it wasn’t just the chemists who couldn’t find much chemistry, I found myself in Blackwell’s on the Thursday of 0th week trying to pretend I was not reading a large blue volume. The author was an American journalist called Neil Strauss, the title was The Game. A subheading simply declared “undercover in the world of Pick Up Artists”.Strauss’ story is essentially a tale of transformation from rags to sexual riches. A self confessed geek, he fell in with a “community” of men who styled themselves as “Pick Up Artists”, or “PUAs”, and claimed to have discovered and codified routines that would allow them to seduce any woman. He was eventually hailed as the world’s greatest PUA after one of his students used his routines to secure Paris Hilton’s phone number in a Hollywood diner. Strauss’ narrative did not really interest me but I was intrigued by the techniques he espoused. Reading further it seemed that Strauss had essentially perfected the well-proven mantra of ‘treat them mean to keep them keen’.Cleverly and consistently he had devised techniques and eventually an entire lifestyle that was conceived to convince his targets of his active disinterest in them right up until the moment he had lured them into bed. He would dress deliberately eccentrically (a habit known as “peacocking”) and approach women with a “false time constraint”: a wholly fictitious lie that he had other business to attend to and could not, therefore, harass them all night. An innocuous opener deliberately void of sexual intent would be followed by a barrage of mind reading exercises and magic tricks, and then his most powerful tool, the “neg”. Realising that beautiful women are bored by compliments and men fawning over them, Strauss chose instead to clothe a subtle insult within an overt compliment. The “neg” was intended to shred the target’s self esteem, and kick her interest buttons. I was sceptical, particularly when I chanced upon the sample “neg” in the book: “Nice hair, is it real?”Even the proffered alternative of “You have nice teeth, they make you look just like Bugs Bunny” did not convince me. Surely voicing doubts about a maiden’s curls could not be the way to her heart, or her bedroom? But then again, the anecdotal evidence seemed stacked in Strauss’ favour. As I considered the matter it became more and more obvious that there was only one way to put The Game to the test – I would have to play my own game and take Strauss’ ideas into the field. And where better to give them the acid test than Oxford, bastion of celibacy and libraries?Taking on the mission required a measure of anxious self-examination. I was, to be honest with myself, using a self-help book to pick up girls. Was my subconscious trying to tell me something? Nervously scrutinising my past
interactions with the fairer sex I decided I was probably not, in Strauss’ terminology, an “AFC” (average frustrated chump), but then again I was certainly not a master “Pick Up Artist” either. Whilst I had once briefly topped my college’s “Fit Fresher” poll on Oxford Gossip, I had to concede that electoral apathy may have played a roll as I garnered only three votes. I had undoubtedly been lucky to escape the Oxford curse relatively unscathed; there are a few Akam exes scattered amongst the dreaming spires, even if a couple of them only hold day membership of the club. But then again I had to admit to myself that I had never asked a girl if her hair was real, or spent one night in Paris. It was clearly time to learn.Time was of the essence. It had taken Neil Strauss two years to learn his game, but I only had a few hours. After all, I had an essay to write. So, on an autumnal afternoon in Oxford I set out to become a “Pick Up Artist”. I considered several hunting
grounds. A club seemed most obvious, but my fellow features editor pointed out that using mind games to pull in Filth would be degrading to both myself and this newspaper.Therefore I decided to test the game in an Oxford situation: I would have to pick up a girl in a library. After all, the (Radcliffe) camera never lies. I chose the Rad Cam as the location for my Bodleian Romance, lured partly by its reputation as a social Mecca and in part by its undeniable resemblance to a gigantic nipple. I decided I would have to “peacock”: I was determined to dress to impress. Unfortunately I only possess one fancy dress costume, and there was no way I was going to the Rad Cam in a caveman suit. I donned instead a cavalry service dress jacket in khaki serge, emblazoned with steel imperial eagles on the lapels. I teamed this with a florid pink shirt with loose double cuffs, jeans, hooped blue and pink socks and highly polished brogues. I looked like I had just deserted from the Franco-Prussian war onto Carnaby Street, but I was confident I had the right look. Better men than I had fought and died in that uniform, and I knew it would do me justice. Aware too of the need for accessories, as well as the requirement to pretend to work so as not to blow my cover, I hid a calligraphic dip pen and a pot of Swiss green ink in a battered leather briefcase.Disguise complete, I left the daylight of Radcliffe Square behind me. I seized the strategic ground by the photocopiers and ostensibly checked the facebook whilst assessing the situation. The theology aisle was a disappointment, inhabited as usual by those who couldn’t find a space in the English section. Elsewhere, however, rich pickings were to be found, even among the few who held
the controversial view that the library is a place for serious scholarship. Having settled myself down opposite a promising brunette I opened my pot of ink and toyed with my pen. I glanced across – spoken openers clearly would not work, so my approach would have to be written. Fortunately the librarians had clearly considered this issue and thoughtfully left trays of pink shelving slips in the middle of each table, so I had a plentiful supply of billet-doux. I considered my opener. I did not have the heart to pass a clothed insult across the no man’s land between us, so instead merely wrote “You have nice hair” and cast it into the walnut ulu across the table. The response was not ideal, despite smiling she made no response and dashed for cover to the loos at the first available opportunity. My fragile self-confidence was shattered and I considered calling off the whole operation, before reasoning that I had been too soft and my “negging” skills had been lacking.There was, however, no way I was going to write “Is your hair real?” and offer the slip to a random individual; I had horrifying visions of being marched from the library in disgrace and falling under a permanent Bodleian ban. Instead I decided to take a safer option and reclaim the stereotypes for my own advantage: all the prettiest students are supposed to be at Brookes, and they are allowed into the Bodleian in their third year, once they have learned to read. Therefore there was a possibility, albeit a slim one, that an attractive Rad Cam denizen would in fact be a Brookes imposter. I carefully wrote “You have nice hair – are you at Brookes?” on yet another pink slip. It was the perfect Oxford “neg”, and this time the response was better. A bored looking blonde wrote back, “No, St Johns”, although she was less than impressed when I passed the reply “Close Enough” back inside the front cover of a volume entitled Sexual Deviance.By this point my antics were becoming increasingly obvious to the fifty-something DPhil veteran in the seat next to me. It could only be a matter of time before he betrayed me to the authorities on charges of illegal ink consumption and licentious pamphleteering. Therefore I had to make my last attempt the most worthwhile. I charged my remaining pink slip with another Brookes comment, sailed down the aisle that faces Brasenose and left it on another desk. I had noticed the desk’s owner a moment before as she manned the photocopier: she was blonde, and built like a racing schooner. Perhaps she actually was at Brookes.However my intuition turned out to be false: she was the genuine article. I made a return pass of her desk a minute later and picked up the reply in a feminine green hand “Thankyou, I’m at Oxford Uni.” I responded quickly, while ostensibly perusing volumes of Feuerbach; I toyed with “What’s a nice girl like you doing in a place like this?”, but chose instead “Do you come her often?” Once more the reply appeared, although I lingered before collecting it, not wanting to appear too eager. The pen had changed to black, which I took to be a good sign: “I’m a fresher so I haven’t really had much of a chance yet. Seems like a good place to study! What do you read? Where?” She was clearly interested: now was the time to close the deal.
Three simple headings on another pink slip: “English (Occasionally), Worcester, Number?”This was make or break time.Once more I lingered before collecting the reply, but I need not have. The same hand and same ink: “This is probably just the sort of thing a young lady is supposed not to do, but hey.” The magical digits followed. I had done it. With a simple combination of ridiculous clothing, subtle “negging” and green ink and eclectic stationary I had conjured the number of a girl I had never met, never talked to, and whose name I did not even know from the Bodleian ether. Perhaps the game had something to it.That night I headed out into the gloaming with a photographer in tow to get some images to complete this article. I felt exhausted by the days events, and in no mood for further attempts at seduction. However, I gathered enough courage for one more skirmish. We opened with the line “We’re journalists doing a feature, will you pose for some images with me?” Bizarrely this procured amazing results. Through some unforeseeable cosmic accident a bevy of Danish exchange students had wound up in Thirst, and were more than willing to drape themselves over me for such a serious journalistic purpose. As our photographer snapped away and we collected an embarrassing amount of e-mail addresses, the other men in the bar looked at us with a mixture of anger, suspicion and disbelief.Suddenly the real meaning of what Strauss had attempted became clear to me: it was never about dressing up, or veiled insults, or looking disinterested. Rather it was about projecting an image and appearing at the centre of attention. The idea was clearly to be the ringleader, whether through conversational sharpness or, as we were, by offering the tangible prize of media exposure.As we left shortly afterwards to pad off into the rainy night with a memory card full of Copenhagen’s finest, I pondered the day’s events. I was not a convert, but I had learnt a thing or two. The only decision left was
whether or not to call her.
Simon Akam would like to apologise to all the women he approached in the research for this article.
ARCHIVE: 2nd week MT 2005

Optimists for the future of British theatre have recently had little to
smile at owing to the plethora of articles by smug Fleet Street
journalists who prophesise the imminent downfall of British theatre.
However, they should seek solace in the unforeseen boom in West End
ticket sales, triggered by an influx of Hollywood A-List talent eager
to tread the boards of the London stage. Indeed statistics reveal that
2004 was the West End’s most successful year in terms of revenue since
records began, with smash hits such as Mel Brooks’ The Producers and
Cameron Mackintosh’s Mary Poppins playing to full houses nightly.
However, the West End is only a small part of a much wider picture in
which British theatre faces a lack of financial support and distinct audience apathy. Away from the glamour of London’s West
End, with its swarms of tourists and big-budget productions, what is
the true state of affairs for Britain’s everyday theatres in their
perpetual struggle just to stay open?The average local theatre is disadvantaged not only by a lack of funding but also by an unengaged public, which
remains oblivious to the often stimulating range of cultural events on
offer. This ignorance is based on the common misperception of theatre
as an archaic medium, obsessed with Shakespeare and rooted deeply in
elitist high culture. This impression creates an intimidating aura
surrounding the theatre, which prevents a wider understanding of both the value and the joy of the theatrical experience.Herein lies the responsibility of the theatre company to promote its
work in such a way that it will engage the attention of a distracted
potential audience; in particular the younger generation, whom one must
target to ensure the theatre’s survival as a popular art form. It is an unfortunate coincidence that the future of the theatre may
rest on the shoulders of this generation, the generation that has been
most resistant to its call. The reasons for this are many and varied,
but principally stem from those previously mentioned concepts: misconception and
ignorance. As Oxford students it is easy to remain unaware of this
crisis, as our intellectual student community takes advantage of a wide range of theatre. However this is far from
typical, as local theatres rarely receive this level of support from
the younger generation. Pre-conceived notions of the theatre as boring
or uncool form a barrier against its integration into youth culture, as
well as the idea that it is an expensive hobby requiring effort to
dress appropriately and engage in higher culture. These concerns are
often ungrounded, with student tickets generally being reasonably
priced, with a wide range of plays on offer. Perhaps what is missing is
the promotion of theatre as the exciting, engaging medium that it is.
The innovative, challenging work of experimental companies often
remains practically unadvertised or doesn’t reach the
smaller theatres. The quality of work presented at theatres such as the
National – fresh and stimulating pieces – must find their way to local
theatre, to reach younger people and expose the theatre’s potential as
a platform for artistic creation.One of the most overwhelming setbacks for the theatre must surely be
its competition in the form of cinema and television. Sixteenth and
seventeenth century theatre was a social event, well attended by a
broad spectrum of people whose only chance of escapism was to see a
play. Moreover the theatre itself was a meeting point, actors often
struggling to perform over the clamouring rabble of audience members getting drunk
and looking for prostitutes. Although the theatre has thankfully gained
more respect in recent years, it has lost its status as a pillar of
society, a major form of entertainment to be experienced by all.
Ironically, it has been theatre’s social rise that has prompted its
demise, the move from popular to high culture bringing with it notions
of elitism and the reputation for being expensive.It is a common argument that theatre is flagging because of its failure to compete with the technological
wizardry now prominent in film and television. However this is clearly
a flawed assertion, with blockbuster films being reliant on plot detail
and acting ability, as opposed to camera trickery. Even if this were to
be a fair criticism, those involved in theatre must surely strive to
preserve its artistic integrity, since to sacrifice this in favour of gimmicks to attract a
new audience would serve only to corrupt the theatre and to lose the
remaining audience that is has.It is telling of British culture that it has taken the arrival of
Hollywood stars to boost the West End theatre scene. As a society, our
obsession with the celebrity informs us that a production endorsed by a familiar name must be worth seeing, the glamour of
Hollywood blinding our critical eye. Many of these actors have little
experience of live acting and are less adept than most of London’s
drama school graduates, winning parts based on the director’s knowledge
of the relationship between celebrity and ticket sales. This is surely
a dangerous observation, to note the shift from an emphasis on talent
to reputation. Must the theatre degrade itself to survive?Controversially, it is perhaps necessary for the West End, in order to
truly progress, to reject some of the Hollywood help it is receiving.
The underlying reason for this is that it is rare to find a public
figure (such as Kevin Spacey, artistic director of The Old Vic since
2004), who aims to use their status to resurrect theatre, rather than
using theatre to resurrect their own career.Alongside the problems involved with attracting audiences is the lack
of sufficient funding for British theatres. Critics will always argue
that in the face of global warming and terrorist threat, money should
not be spent on frivolous pastimes such as the theatre. This, however,
is an obstinate and poorly constructed argument, based on a
narrow-minded outlook on life. Theatre is an integral part of our
society’s culture, something that is worth fighting for with the
potential to entertain, broaden horizons and even to educate.Despite the problems it faces, there is still hope for British theatre.
Enthusiasm for theatre still exists as does the desire to promote this
live, challenging and engaging medium. Lack of funding and dwindling
audience numbers mean that the theatre is facing an uphill struggle to
maintain itself as a popular art form, but despite problems there is
still time for a revival. However, it will take more than a few
American celebrities to breathe new life into the British stage.ARCHIVE: 2nd week MT 2005

What polystyrene is lacking aesthetically it usually makes up for in
functionality and low cost. More commonly known for its kebab-bearing virtues, the lightweight plastic is not the most obvious choice of material for great works of art. However, it is for the work of the Lithuanian
artist Zilvinas Landzbergas at the new Arrivals exhibition at Modern
Art Oxford. The gallery has specially commissioned the exhibition to
allow the foreign artist to display his work for the first time in the
UK.
There is a sense of being hoodwinked by appearances when one wanders around the single room that makes up
the exhibition: surfaces, painted in block opaque tones and given a
metallic sheen, confer the objects with a deceptive sense of weight. It
is hard to believe that the impressive statue, which takes centre stage
in the exhibition, is light enough to be picked up and hurled through
the air.
Landzbergas’ incorporation of mass produced materials into his work –
duct tape, scrap paper, polystyrene – confounds conventions of
classical sculpture. The man’s magnitude and muscular chest give him
the appearance of an Olympian hero, yet he is painted in brash blue colours and, to
all appearances, is wearing tracksuit bottoms. This classical sculpture
turned boy’s action figure throws hero-worship into a thoroughly cynical light.
Indeed, it is interesting how the impression of solidity or
magnificence is undercut by the artist’s novel uses of material and
shape. Most striking in his break from tradition is the arrangement of
the figure on the gallery floor with his legs suspended in the air. As the artist describes in
his introduction to the work, the figure is a “statue without a
pedestal, like a fallen hero”.
Overall the absent pedestal serves an apt metaphor for the atmosphere
of the exhibition. There is a certain amount of fragmented disorder
about the exhibition, which may divide viewers’ opinions of his work.
Objects are irreverently scattered around the room with little thematic
continuity. Out of the objects in the room other than the sculpture (a
square of duct tape, a doughnut-shaped ring under the statue, and a
cone fixed to the wall), it is literally holes and voids that
characterise the work most.
While I find the statue compelling, looking at the other objects that
are exhibited can feel similar to how admiring the emperor’s new
clothes might feel: there is nothing obviously meaningful or
aesthetically pleasing about the white pole leaning against the wall,
for instance. It is sometimes difficult to know where the gallery ends
and the work of art begins. Gazing at a white MDF board nailed around a
pillar I have to check that I am not just appreciating the gallery’s
maintenance work. The distinction between high and low culture, art and
non-art is blurred by the seemingly random collection of objects.
But then perhaps that is the point. Landzbergas is rejecting the
realism often associated with the sculpture of the Soviet Era.
Lithuania emerged from Communism in 1991, became a democratic republic
and joined the European Union in May of last year. Fifteen years on
from independence,
its fragmented quality may be interpreted as expressing a playful freedom which reflects how Lithuania has broken away from the ties of restricted self-expression.
It is quite possible for cynicism to get the better of you when viewing
the exhibition. Landzbergas’ work certainly yields more questions than
it does answers. Nevertheless the exhibition is thought-provoking and
his playful characterisation of sculpture is enjoyable. For a small exhibition, the work is strangely rich in interesting ambiguities.ARCHIVE: 2nd week MT 2005

Long-time childrens’ author Mark Haddon took the bestseller lists by surprise with the success of his last offering, Whitbread
winning novel The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time. He
returns this month with another taste of the unexpected: his first volume of
poetry, the copiously titled The Talking Horse and the Sad Girl and the
Village Under the Sea.
Haddon’s voice throughout the volume is at once authoritative and
self-depreciating. “Look at you. You’re reading poetry”, Haddon taunts
his reader in Trees, continuing the self-conscious dialogue established
in the opening poem Go, Litel Bok. He puts out an official warning from
his board of poetic censors with This poem is Certificate 18 and in
Poets, he takes a fond but far from sentimental look at the workers of
his own profession.Like the poet’s he describes, Haddon sees the striking in the ordinary: like them he is aware of “how the
poured creamer pleats and billows in their coffee”, and sees when
“cigarette smoke does its poisonous little ballet”. This poet finds his muse in
life, but also in art, and he draws the two together beautifully.
The poems are packed with references to and inspiration from other
works, from Horace, through Chaucer, to the modern poets and beyond.
Ben Nicholson’s painting Christmas Night, 1930 is vividly described in
a poem of the same name and John Buchan’s novel The House of the Four
Winds is condensed into an intriguing narrative poem.
Time is a conspicuous presence in the book. Modern and ancient
entwine
with ease. Haddon produces fresh, lucid translations of a selection of
odes from Horace, which charge the book with a sense of the impending
and ephemeral, yet in their tales of jealous lovers and torrid affairs,
remind us that some things never change.Sharp, human and at times surreal, this first output of verse by Haddon
showcases a bold imagination and a confident talent. Let us hope that
there are more such surprises in store.ARCHIVE: 2nd week MT 2005

Broken Flowersdir Jim Jarmusch4/5Director Jim Jarmusch won the Grand Prix at Cannes 2005 for Broken
Flowers, for which he also wrote the screenplay. Known as something of
a
recluse, his last film, Coffee and Cigarettes, epitomised his indie
brand of vignette-style observation and penetrative dialogue.Broken Flowers goes some way to replicate this approach and the eerie
nostalgic mood of his other well-known film, Ghost Dog: The Way of the
Samurai. Art-house, without being self-consciously so, the film hinges
on a superb performance by Bill Murray, who seems to have reinvented
himself as the character actor to fill Robert DeNiro’s place, left
empty after his descent into Meet the Fockers self-parody.An excellent script by Jarmusch serves up a highly original and amusing
premise. The resolutely single Don (Bill Murray) has just been dumped
by his latest lover and yet again resigns himself to being alone and
left to his own devices. Instead, he is compelled to reflect on his
past when a mysterious pink letter comes through his letterbox. It is
from an anonymous former lover and informs him that he has a nineteen
year old son who may now be looking for his father. Don wittles the
list down to four women and is urged by his neighbour Winston, an
amateur sleuth and handy man, to go on a cross-country trek in search
of clues from his old flames. It is clear from the start that he will
make this trip completely against his will, and his grumpiness, set
against the wonderfully effervescent Winston, makes him a character to
sympathise with right from the outset.Soft and slow-moving, the film then slips into something of a highbrow
road trip that reworks the genre’s standard conventions. Murray, with
his trademark deadpan that recalls previous outings in The Life Aquatic
and Lost in Translation, injects subtle humour into scenes that are
excruciatingly observed and infuriatingly implicit. Only Murray could
command a silent screen for two minutes with his understated mannerisms
and deeply lined face that creases softly as the accumulation of memories, painful and not, builds up.
The acting is a joy, and the four lovers (Stone, Conroy, Lange,
Swinton) intrigue with their different intensities and nuances. There
is the animal whisperer, the closet arranger, the realtor and the
hill-billy: all offer a different insight into the
common factor of Don. The film brought to mind Wes Anderson’s About
Schmidt, which is curiously ironic since Murray is a favourite of
Anderson’s. Both films are subtle explorations of the tiredness of an
existence too thoroughly lived-in, and the curious release when a
closure with the past is reached in old age. Broken Flowers is
touching, never sentimental, and eccentrically funny in its
observations, rather than relying on one-liners.That each scene fades out and each new scene fades in underlines
Jarmusch’s artistic leanings. So too does the abundance of symbolism.
Murray brings pink flowers to each of his lovers, in the hope of
raising some reaction to give the letter’s sender away. Even his
tracksuit bears some significance to the plot. Young men flit
hauntingly through his travels. Which one of them is his son? The
question is never stated by the unobtrusive direction. Yet the more you
try to analyse the clues on offer, the less obvious the solution
becomes. We are finally confronted by the essential principle of the
road movie, that it is the journey and not the destination that
matters. This is a beautifully shot film of clues: watch it closely.ARCHIVE: 2nd week MT 2005

Sky Highdir Mike Mitchell2/5Billed as the American answer to the Harry Potter series, Disney’s Sky
High has raised expectations in line with its title. It is hardly a
signal for JK Rowling’s loyal following to lay down their Quidditch
brooms, but director Mike Mitchell’s film pleasingly and predictably
adheres to Disney’s magic family formula. This consists of an ample
base of flashy special effects, a moral message of tolerance and
equality so blatant it feels like a truncheon-blow from the PC Police,
and a sharp dash of ironic humour to keep surly teens and weary parents alike from snoring into their popcorn.
That said, the screenwriters achieve nothing of the sophisticated
and cheeky humour which appreciative adult viewers have almost come to
expect since the celebrated animation
Shrek. With Sky High, Disney has sought to reinforce its status as the
providers and originators of reliable, old-fashioned family movies,
perhaps a wiser move than
attempting to answer the challenge of their inventive and irreverent
rivals at Dreamworks.
The film charts the arrival of Will Stronghold, son of the world’s
greatest superheroes, the Commander and Jetstream, at the super-kids’
high
school, located (as those who’ve figured out the devilishly clever
title pun will guess) in the sky. Initially, due to his apparent lack
of superpowers, dejected Will is lumped in with the class of sidekicks,
who, to avoid
causing offence, have been collectively re-dubbed ‘Hero Support’.ARCHIVE: 2nd week MT 2005

The story goes that when Queen Marie-Antoinette was told that the French people were starving through a lack of bread, she flippantly replied, “If they have no bread, then let them eat cake.” In the aftermath of the recent New Orleans tragedy, hundreds of American journalists compared the Bush administration’s slow response to the clueless indifference of this Marie-Antoinette. Alas, for journalists (and the authors of pub quizzes everywhere), this popular legend has not even the slightest vestige of truth to it. Rumour has it that the line has not been included in the new $40m biopic of the queen, directed by Sofia Coppola and starring Kirsten Dunst. Marie-Antoinette’s reputation for frivolity would have surprised her contemporaries.Republicans and royalists died disputing whether she was a she-wolf or a saint; even strong-minded English politicians, like Horace Walpole and Edmund Burke, gushingly described her as “the goddess of our age”. When the fiery young republican Antoine Barnave met her in 1790 he instantly became a royalist and went to the guillotine clutching a portrait of her in his pocket. It was only decades later that history stereotyped her as an 18th century bimbo with more money than sense: the Paris Hilton of her day.Marie-Antoinette-Josèphe- Joanne was born on 2 November 1755 in the Hofburg Palace, Vienna. She was the eleventh daughter of the Empress Maria-Theresa, who was so used to having children by this point that she didn’t even stop reading and signing state papers during labour. Antoinette’s childhood was idyllic, and she was very pretty.Legend has it that when the young Mozart performed in front of the Imperial Family, he was so smitten with Marie- Antoinette that he asked the Empress if he could marry her. The Empress laughed which, then as now, was the acknowledged way of decimating someone in a social situation. At the age of fourteen, Marie-Antoinette was sent to Paris to marry the heir to the French throne.Rotund, awkward, shy and socially-retarded, Louis preferred reading atlases and mending locks to engaging in court life; if he had hoped for a plump hausfrau for a bride then he was sorely disappointed when he laid eyes on the vivacious Marie-Antoinette. “How does she do everything so gracefully?” he lamented, before tucking in to his gargantuan dinner.The marriage, needless to say, did not get off to a great start. Aside from the obvious clash of personalities, there was also an element of sexual discord. When someone jovially advised him not to eat so much before his wedding night, Louis declared between mouthfuls that he always slept better on a full stomach. In this pre-Cosmo, Sex and the City and FHM era, no-one had ever told Louis or Antoinette what sex was exactly.So this royal marriage was not fully consummated for its first seven years, even though a genuine fondness did grow between the couple. Most pinned the blame on Marie-Antoinette, asserting that she must be frigid. She escaped humiliation the way countless people have before and since: shopping. Once her husband became King Louis XVI in 1774, Marie-Antoinette and her friends indulged themselves spectacularly.She owned thousands of dresses, hundreds of shoes, gloves and hats, and a mountain of exquisite jewellery – pearls and diamonds were her favourites. Her perfumers, milliners, tailors and hairdressers were the best in Europe, and she had a strict beauty regime which included abstinence from drinking anything but water in order to maintain her famous alabaster complexion.A never-ending series of balls, banquets, dinner parties, opera visits, dances at the queen’s own private village and farm, performances in her new personal theatre and midnight dances in the illuminated grottos at Versailles were the stages on which Marie-Antoinette, bejewelled and bedazzling, earned her place as ‘the Queen of the Rococo’. Economists and liberals had toreach for their smelling salts when the queen’s expenses were calculated, and they never forgave her for any of it.Royalists, outraged at liberals’ having the gall to express an opinion of any kind, retaliated by loudly declaring that all liberals were stupid or bitter and that Marie-Antoinette was both beautiful and fabulous. Royalists couldn’t (and still can’t) see what all the fuss was about, especially when they pointed out how generous Marie-Antoinette was to charity.They were right to argue that she was being made a scapegoat for over one hundred years of financial mismanagement, but what they failed to grasp was that the queen’s spending was a PR disaster. In 1778, after Louis had finally achieved sexual maturity, Marie-Antoinette was forced to give birth to their first child in front of a crowd of two hundred courtiers, as precedent demanded.This humiliatingly public birth for her daughter, Marie- Thérèse, marked the end of Marie-Antoinette’s patience with Versailles’ infamous etiquette. Her three other children, Louis-Joséph, Louis-Charles and Sophie-Béatrix, were all born in private. Marie-Antoinette’s last ten years at Versailles were spent as a devoted mother, loyal friend, charming hostess, compassionate wife, good Catholic and generous patroness of charity – in short, the perfect Queen Consort.She was particularly generous to children, who she adored; she burst into tears if she heard of the slightest pain inflicted on any infant. Events now overtook the Royal Family, and indeed the entire world, when France finally admitted bankruptcy in 1789. The problems stemmed from the ineffi ciency of the tax system and the astronomical cost of providing aid to George Washington and his rebel army in America.Louis XVI was forced to call a national assembly, known as the Estates- General, to tackle the problem, but conservatives were worried that the liberals would use this as a platform to attack the entire monarchy. Just at that moment, Louis suffered a complete nervous breakdown when hiseldest son died an agonising death from tuberculosis. Marie-Antoinette, equally devastated, tried valiantly to revive her husband’s spirits, but for the last three years of his life Louis XVI suffered from intermittent clinical depression. Anti-monarchists played shamelessly upon the people’s xenophobia against l’Autrichienne, and a torrent of pornographic journals accused Marie-Antoinette of every imagined sexual and political perversion. Mob violence now became the real currency of politics in France and, in Marie-Antoinette’s own words, everything around them was “hatred and violence”.Versailles was besieged and the royal family were taken to the capital to be placed under virtual house arrest. Marie-Antoinette made several attempts to escape and tried to convince foreign armies to intervene and save her family, but events spiralled out of her control. On a hot August day in 1792 the mob attacked again, and the National Assembly voted to make France a republic.The royals were instantly incarcerated in the grim prison-fortress of La Temple. Two weeks later, over a thousand royalists were butchered on the streets of Paris, including the queen’s best friend, Princesse Thérese de Lamballe, who was tortured and mutilated. Her head was placed on a pike and carried through the streets to be displayed outside Marie- Antoinette’s prison window.Over the next few months, the rest of the royals spoke occasionally to their gaolers, but Marie-Antoinette would look through them as if they were glass. Later, King Louis was separated from his family, condemned as a traitor and sent to the guillotine on 21 January 1793. His widow never recovered from his death: somehow she had grown to love him and recognise him for the good-natured gentleman he truly was.The final horror took place when her beloved eight year old son was taken from her. He was placed in the room beneath his mother’s cell where she could hear him crying out for her. “Why is he crying?” she sobbed, “What are you doing to him? Why won’t you let me go to him?” Later her tears stopped, and when she suffered any physical pain she would respond in a dead tone of voice, “Nothing can hurt me now.”In the middle of October she was finally placed on trial on a series of charges so viciously absurd (treason, debauchery and incest) that they actually had the effect of provoking sympathy for the queen. Still, the republicans wanted her head, and on 16 October 1793 they got it. “It gave me great joy”, crowed the journalist Hébert, “to see that fucking tart’s head separated from her body.” Haggard and prematurely-aged, the thirty-seven year old Marie-Antoinette went to the guillotine without any sign of fear. Her body was later recovered by royalists and lovingly interred in a beautiful crypt, where it remains to this day.The Marie-Antoinette that legend has built has almost nothing to do with the real woman. Marie-Antoinette deserves our sympathy and, personally, I admire her enormously, though I can see why others would be hesitant. She died defending a system of government which now seems antiquated, and her mistakes were numerous. But she was not stupid, nor was she cruel or indifferent to people’s suffering, and that, in the age of the French Revolution, is surely to her eternal credit.ARCHIVE: 2nd week MT 2005

Police are appealing for witnesses after an Oxford student was sexually assaulted in the early hours of last Thursday. The incident occurred at around 1.40am as the woman was returning home from a night out in Cowley. The 19 year old was followed as she walked alone along Cowley Road. The man approached the student outside a derelict bingo hall, speaking with a foreign accent. He then continued to follow her into Cumberland Road, where the assault took place.PC Rebecca Burley, based at Cowley Police station, said that, “The woman [then] managed to run away from the man" as she "saw [her attacker] run in the direction of Cowley Road.” The man is described as Asian, with a shaved head and wearing a dark top. He is thought to be about 5ft 6 and in his late twentie or early thirties. Holly Ware, JCR Welfare Officer at the nearby St Hilda’s College, described the attack as a “reminder of the need to be cautious and to take sensible precautions”. She added, “I’m not going to allow this incident to prevent me from leaving my house at night.”The spokesperson for Thames Valley Police advised students not to walk home on their own. She also suggested that students make themselves aware of Thames Valley Police’s ‘Safer Streets’ campaign. This new campaign hopes to make young people “safe and secure while out and about”. The attack comes close to a report made to the police this week of a “serious” sexual assault at the Turf Tavern at the beginning of the month. On 1 October, while former students were celebrating their graduation, a middle-aged woman was sexually assaulted in the public house. Detective Constable Stuart Teasdale, of Oxford CID, said that “the pub would have been very busy at the time as there were lots of graduation ceremonies being held on that day.”OUSU advises students, particularly females, to carry an attack alarm, and urges first years to be particulary vigilant and aware of street safety. They also remind males that although 96% of rape is female, men should not take undue risks eitherARCHIVE: 2nd week MT 2005