In September 2001, President George W Bush declared that ‘This crusade, this war on terrorism, is going to take a while.’ Since then it has become common to refer to the conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan as crusades and to frame the war on terror in religious terms.
Crusading rhetoric permeates political discourse and lends a veneer of historicism to discussions of the ongoing conflicts in the middle East. But are these parallels justified on historical grounds?
Christopher Tyerman, Professor of the History of the Crusades at Oxford, argues that the parallels drawn between the war on terror and the crusades are largely spurious and indicative of intellectual laziness.
His speech consisted of a non-stop barrage of defense of the war on terror with little moderation. Tyerman’s speech came from a one sided perspective with little time given to the other side.
While many would have qualms with such onesidedness, the fact is that such attacks on interventionism are the norm. Allowing Tyerman to make his case may be the only way to hear the case at all.
According to him, the Crusades have little “relevance, comfort, insight or instruction” for historians, commentators or policy-makers studying the web of conflicts that have emerged since 9/11.
For a start, the war on terror was not justified to the public on religious grounds. Nor were American citizens encouraged to sign up to the military in return for indulgences that absolved them of their sins.
Admittedly, the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq did have a religious inflection. Memos sent to George Bush by Donald Rumsfeld were titled with verses from the Bible, Osama bin Laden referred to the Americans as ‘crusaders’, and addresses to US troops were often framed in biblical terms. But, for Tyerman, they were not holy wars in any substantive sense. Even the physical parallels between the war on terror and the crusades are shaky – the crusaders never even came close to Iraq or Afghanistan.
David Hume described the crusades as as ‘the most signal and most durable monument of human folly that has yet appeared in any age or nation.’ The same, too, might be said of the war in Iraq. But there is no reason to regard the war on terror as anything more than superficially similar to the crusades.
The crusading ideal did linger on after the ninth crusade. As late as 1481, Pope Sixtus IV called for a crusade against the Turks and Leibniz urged Louis XIV to launch a crusade in Egypt in 1672. However, the aftershocks of the crusading idea had petered out by the nineteenthcentury and modern-day conflicts are little more than distant echoes.
According to Tyerman, the false parallels drawn between the crusades and modern conflicts are partly a result of taking intellectual short cuts. By framing the war on terror as a modern crusade, one can reduce it to a simple us-and-them narrative, a modern-day clash of civilizations.
However, this sort of simplification risks caricaturing all those fighting the US and US-backed forces as alien extremists driven only by religion, obscuring the political dimensions of the ongoing conflicts in the middle East and the complexity of the situation on the ground.
As such, those who draw parallels with the crusades only make the situation in the middle East harder to understand. Indeed, Tyerman goes so far as to accuse them of perpetrating a “meretricious confidence trick” – strong words, perhaps, but with the ring of truth.
Iraq is not a twentieth century Crusade
The Shape of Water – an odd romance makes perfect sense
The opening narration of The Shape of Water, voiced by Richard Jenkins over ethereal shots of a submerged 1960s inner-city apartment, paints the ensuing story as a fairy tale of a reigning prince, a “princess without voice”, and “the monster who tried to destroy it all”. The line seems to be written solely to raise a wry smile from long-time viewers of Guillermo Del Toro’s films; after films such as The Devil’s Backbone, Pan’s Labyrinth, and Crimson Peak, it’s a well-established Del Toro trope that human antagonists tend to be far more monstrous than the bizarre creatures that, in the hands of any other filmmaker, would be the automatic villains of the piece.
But what bizarre creatures could possibly await in a film so beloved that it’s already garnered a leading 13 Oscar nominations?
When Guillermo told his regular collaborator Doug Jones (the insanely talented actor behind Abe Sapien in Hellboy, and basically anything weird in Pan’s Labyrinth) that he’d be playing the romantic lead in his latest film, he must have wondered how on earth would that end up looking?
The answer is: far more sweet and romantic than it may appear on paper. Amidst the Cold War paranoia and the Space Race of the early 1960s, Sally Hawkins plays Eliza, a mute cleaning lady in a government-run laboratory. When the scientists capture a truly extraordinary amphibious creature (Jones) from the Amazon river, Eliza bonds with the creature and soon decides to break him out of the laboratory and return him to his home.
The film doesn’t need to add sinister government forces for you to draw parallels with films like E.T., but Michael Shannon’s brusquely sinister Colonel Strickland is a towering ‘monster’ for our heroes to come up against.
Within this gang of heroes, there’s hardly a false note to be found. Octavia Spencer, playing Eliza’s colleague (and often her voice), is wonderfully endearing as Zelda. Richard Jenkins, as her cat-owning artist neighbour Giles, is truly delightful.
Each of the main players is in some way at a socio-cultural disadvantage – Eliza is mute, Giles is gay, Zelda is an African-American woman. The film clearly enjoys pitting society’s outcasts against the traditional patriarchal and American values embodied by the unabashedly villainous Strickland, alongside drawing unexpected parallels between these characters and Jones’ creature.
The creature himself is an incredible feat of design. He has to look suitably monstrous, and wild enough for you to believe he’s a river creature, but also with enough anthropomorphic features that you understand why Eliza would feel an affinity for and, ultimately, an attraction to him.
Yes, you read that right – it’s no secret by now that The Shape of Water is a truly bizarre-on-paper love story between a woman and a fish. Yes, they fall in love. Yes, they have sex. No, you don’t get to see them do it, you perverts. But that’s not the point – the point is that when the two of them do fall in love, it makes perfect sense within the film’s internal logic, and you end up as swept away with their romance as you would be in any other love story.
You see, Guillermo Del Toro has always been a not-so-secret romantic, and his films absolutely reflect that innate romantic sensibility. Pacific Rim is nothing if not a huge love letter to giant robots and kaiju monsters, Crimson Peak is just about the most romantic gothic ghost tale imaginable, and The Shape of Water takes Del Toro’s love of cinema to new heights.
His traditionally lavish production design and cinematography are finally used to capture and frame an actual blossoming romance.
The film is filled with camera compositions that are so gorgeous you could fall in love with them in complete isolation to the rest of the film itself, while Alexandre Desplat’s whistle-filled score sweeps the film away on a wave of pathos.
Like many of this year’s Oscar nominees, the period setting often belies surprisingly timely political commentary – if an audience member chooses to draw parallels to Trump’s America or the #MeToo movement, it’s certainly possible.
But the story itself is painted in frustratingly binary shades – Shannon is certainly a menacing antagonist, but his motivations are textureless and bland, and that feels like a missed opportunity. When the film is taking such big swings in having the two central lovers be a fish and a woman, more moral complexity in the details would surely have enhanced the main narrative.
The film’s central balancing act of creating a world which is both nostalgic for a romantic past, yet often vicious and hard-hitting, is so perfectly executed that it couldn’t be easier to give yourself over to the film’s unique brand of oddness.
It’s strange, it’s unabashedly romantic, it’s probably the most unique thing you’ll see in cinemas this year, and it could only have come from the mind of the legend himself: Guillermo Del Toro.
Withnail and I was a buddy comedy unlike any other
“We’ve gone on holiday by mistake” is just one of the many highly quotable lines in Withnail and I. It also summarises the nature of my trip to Cowley’s Picture Palace – more a happy accident, however, than a mistake. In sun-soaked Cowley, on a Sunday afternoon, I was willingly roped into seeing this cult classic that I had never heard of before. What I found was a buddy comedy unlike any other.
As a resident of North Oxford, Cowley seems like a distant land, filled with lively bars and eateries, compared to the suffocating suburbia of Summertown. The Picture Palace itself is a novelty giving an exciting glimpse into cinemas of old. Tickets are paid for in a booth outside. Once through the front door you are immediately in the picture room, no reception, no corridor. A tiny concession stand offers roughly a pint of ale at £4. The Sunday crowd was surprisingly old and unpretentious. One criticism would be the acoustics, with lines of dialogue occasionally being lost. Ironically this added to our post-show discussion as we attempted to stitch our knowledge of the plot together.
Withnail and I itself is slow to start, beginning with a series of awkwardly connected vignettes. The film follows the misfortunes of the eccentric Withnail and his anonymous friend credited as ‘I’. However, as the second act begins, the film finds its footing with the pace both comedic and dramatic. Much of Withnail’s humour is drawn out through its embellished characters as opposed to conventional jokes or set-up and payoff action. Its characters are so striking that one can see its influence in all sorts of British comedy. Spaced, Bottom, The Mighty Boosh and Peep Show all have similarly deprived dysfunctional duos.
One way in which Withnail and I has aged poorly, however, is in its treatment of gay people. While Richard Griffith’s role as Monty, an eccentric homosexual, who aggressively comes onto ‘I’, could be viewed as simply a one of a kind humourous character, one can’t help feel that Withnail is playing off of a negative gay stereotype.
The stereotype of forceful gay men has been used to shame gay people and was sinisterly employed by Kevin Spacey to excuse his behaviour towards a young actor. There is some degree of sympathetic portrayal for Monty, especially in his subtly solemn farewell note. However, the depiction of Monty’s treatment of ‘I’, a young actor himself, should be criticised for its danger in cementing a damaging stereotype, which is a little too close to home.
The film is beautifully shot, deftly using camera work to both enhance certain jokes and produce visual gags of its own. Striking landscapes of Cumbria and London are employed not with any particular shoehorning but as a general backdrop for the action on screen, giving it an additional degree of wonder.
“We are 91 days from the end of this decade and there’s gonna be a lot of refugees” is another one of Withnail’s great aphorisms. This film is in part about the end of an era – set in 1969 it depicts the slow and painful death of the hippie. While some move on to greater things, for instance ‘I’ landing a big acting role and cutting his hair, others stay stuck in the past, slipping into oblivion. As Withnail departs in the final scene, a park fence turns into a row of prison bars. Withnail and hippies like him are reduced from free spirits to imprisoned addicts.
Written by Bruce Robinson, Withnail and I is an autographical film to some degree. Robinson’s experience of the ’60s is clearly portrayed by the aforementioned depiction of its death. However, the true heart of this film comes from its depiction of these two friends.
What makes Withnail and I stand out from other buddy comedies is how it depicts the disintegration of a friendship. There is no reconciliation or sentimentality at the end of the film, instead we are left with an unspoken but lasting disagreement. It is an experience all too relevant and common for the Oxford student, whose social life moves at a lightning pace – we meet a new friend, take delight in who they are, and then slowly realise they are not all they are cracked up to be.
That moment of realisation is followed by a cold, unspoken uncoupling. Here, Withnail clearly hasn’t fully accepted or realised that ‘I’ is leaving not just their apartment but leaving Withnail himself. Although Withnail undeniably treated ‘I’ with contempt, attempting to pawn him off to his uncle for a cottage, no one leaves this film totally in the right. ‘I’ heads to the station in the final scenes, speaking to Withnail as if he were a mere acquaintance and refusing to allow him to accompany him further. Withnail and I perfectly depicts the moral ambiguity of a failed friendship, balancing the wrongs of the bad friend and the one who jumped ship.
Recipe corner: cheese
In order to be interested in this article, you must love cheese – even just one type of cheese. Cheese is, undoubtedly, one of the most delicious things. Whilst I do not necessarily agree, I can understand that the taste of strong cheeses, or even the idea of blue cheese, might be too much for some people. However, you don’t have to like that – just always have a stash of your favourite grated cheese is sufficient if that’s what you like. For around £2 at basically any supermarket, you can buy a packet of either one of these and instantly improve any of your meals. I love mozzarella, but simple cheddar can also transform meals immeasurably.
We can start with the obvious – pasta. I struggle to understand the point of eating pasta without cheese, especially if it is of a tomato-based sauce. It is a sad reality when you buy a pasta bake, which supposedly ‘comes with grated cheese’, only to find out that this is only a very limited amount. The great thing is that, if you have your own packet to hand, you can add huge amounts without hesitation. It is even better if you melt mozzarella over the garlic bread or doughballs you happen to have bought to eat with your pasta.
At this time of the year, I love buying soup to melt cheese into. I highly recommend either tomato basil soup or French onion soup for this endeavour. Heat up your soup and throw in your cheese and, if your JCR is kind enough to offer you free toast, dip some in to accompany your meal.
If that doesn’t appeal to you, then surely the thought of cheesy potatoes will. If Hassan doesn’t add enough cheese to go with your chips, or if you wish McDonald’s provided you with this option, then clearly having your own packet can solve these issues. Alternatively, you can add some to the mash or jacket potatoes you might be making for dinner.
I don’t mean to be cheesy, but cheese is an incomparably wonderful food product that can improve pretty much any meal, one bag at a time.
@tici_alencar
New community hub for Wadham House
A vacant building owned by Wadham College will be turned into a community hub.
Aristotle House will be re-purposed by Makespace Oxford into a venue for charities, workers’ cooperatives and social enterprises.
The workspace will house a community events space, meeting rooms, an edible garden, a community café, and workshop space.
It aims to involve marginalised and vulnerable communities through training and employment opportunities.
Makespace Oxford hope that the new workspace will “leverage Oxford’s empty and under-used space for community benefit and raise awareness of new and creative uses for urban space.”
Founding director of Makespace Oxford, Andy Edwards, told Cherwell: “Makespace Oxford is an approach to empty and underused space which could be applied anywhere in Oxford and is not limited to one building in Jericho.
“[We have] been developing very positive discussions with Oxford University Estates department regarding optimising the use of their space, with the potential to use any existing buildings they have for meanwhile workspace and these conversations are ongoing.”
However, he continued: “I would like to see the University work with colleges to publish better data on empty and underused spaces.
“Makespace Oxford hopes to develop a successful working example of what is possible when a college, the council and the community work together.
“But there is a hesitance from the University to release information and this is hampering the opportunity.”
Wadham College had originally scheduled the building to be re-developed into offices and apartments. They have delayed progressing the construction work, citing concerns over “potential traffic and care for the trees”.
They are expected to re-consider developing the building after Makespace’s lease elapses in 2020.
A spokesperson for Wadham College said: “We do not want to leave the building unused, and have agreed a tenancy with Makespace Oxford under which they will manage and make the building available to variety of social enterprises, charities and other small businesses.
“Wadham believes the activities will make a very positive contribution to the local community.”
Makespace Oxford aim to continue the acquisition of college property around the city: “Over the last three years we’ve been developing a model for working with land owners who are looking to convert their empty premises into hives of activity for local social enterprises.
“We’re in an ongoing process of seeking empty and underused spaces capable of incubating exciting new ventures whilst they await redevelopment.”
The University did not respond to Cherwell’s request for comment.
Hedda: “the story of a woman who demands a better life”
Hedda, Lucy Kirkwood’s adaptation of Henrik Ibsen’s classic, is being staged at the Oxford Playhouse this week by Perepeteia Productions. Part of the Vote season, celebrating 100 years of female suffrage, and directly following Charlotte Vickers’s Breaking the Fifth Wall festival, a week-long extravaganza celebrating women in theatre, Hedda’s feminist message couldn’t find a better time be put on stage. We chatted to the female members of the cast and crew about what Hedda means to them – here’s what they had to say:
India Opzoomer – plays Hedda Gabler
“There aren’t many roles like Hedda. She’s an actor’s dream. I feel so grateful to have been given the opportunity be part of such a wonderful production and take on such a beautifully complicated character. She may be despairing, but I’ve never been so happy”
Georgie Murphy – plays Thea Eldridge
“Hedda is a snapshot of six people searching for something worthwhile in their lives, and their different ways of trying to get it, and coping without it. They’re restless, frustrated, at times elated, and their lives intersect at a point where their energies destroy and create. All six of them feel so close to us today – I think that’s what makes them so challenging, but equally, all the more vulnerable, relatable and special”
Christina Hill – Stage Manager
“Hedda is the story of a woman who demands a better life for herself. She refuses to take up the domestic role offered to her by the men in her life because she measures her life by different standards from everyone else. No matter how much power she exerts over the people in her life, her isolation ultimately destroys her, and at the centre of her tragedy we find a frustration to control the uncontrollable which is only too human.”
Tracey Mwaniki – Assistant Production Manager
“Hedda to me is a new way of storytelling. It constructs a narrative and builds a unique strong female character but grants her the privilege of nuance, something I think all creative people could learn from”
Julia Denby-Jones – Marketing Assistant
“Hedda is timeless. She’s been the fascination of the world stage for over 100 years. She’s frustrating, revered, despised, adored. Each new interpretation breathes life into her, yet she remains utterly elusive. It’s a role that continues to evolve in the most magical way.”
Hedda is playing at the Oxford Playhouse from February 21st to 24th.
A round-up of a dominant season for Oxford’s men’s and women’s fencers
Another successful season for Oxford’s fencing teams leaves them comfortably in second place in terms of Bucs points contributions to the University, having accumulated only six points fewer than Oxford’s hockey teams. Off the back of being named the Oxford University Sports Team of the Year for 2017, the fencers have pushed on to produce some impressive performances, and results, in the first few weeks of 2018.
The women’s Blues have won nine out of their ten matches, accruing 27 points and a hits for/hits against score of 260 along the way, taking them to the top of the Premier South division.
Their closest rivals are Imperial, with six wins, 18 points, and a hits for/hits against score of 43. With characteristic dominance, Oxford won the league following an undefeated quinte, a number of matches fenced over the same weekend, in late January.
Although the women’s 2nd team, the Assassins, lost out to a couple of very strong teams in the form of Loughborough 1st and Birmingham 1st, they also managed to notch up wins against Warwick 1st and Nottingham 2nd in their last quinte of the season on 11 February.
Chiara McDermott, the women’s Blues captain, who spoke to Cherwell about these successes for both women’s teams, said: “Our year has got off to a fantastic start, with the women’s Blues smashing both Bucs quintes to finish top of the Premier South league and gaining a bye to the quarter-finals of the Bucs championships.”
Looking to the future, McDermott went on to say “I am excited to continue our success by beating Cambridge again at our 2018 Varsity Match in March, and am confident we will surpass last year’s achievements for which we were recognised at the 2017 Oxford University Sports Awards, where we won Team of the Year.”
However, success has not been limited to the women’s teams this season. The Assassins sealed their triumph in the Midlands 2B division over the course of a home quinte against Birmingham 2nd, Anglia Ruskin 1st and Oxford Brookes 1st.
Perhaps understandably given the high stakes, the Blues began nervously against Anglia Ruskin, who had clearly strengthened since they were well beaten by the Assassins last year. Anglia Ruskin piled on the pressure until the last set of matches in foil, but this proved to be the strongest weapon for the Assassins, as it had been all season, and they eventually ran out 135-113 winners.
The Assassins won the next game against Birmingham much more comfortably, by a margin of 135 points to 52. Meanwhile, other fixtures played out favourably for them, with Brookes losing to Warwick.
This ensured that, having already beaten every other team in the league this season, the Assassins would be certain of clinching the league title if they won at least one of the matches in their final game, a local derby against Oxford Brookes. Despite losing with both foil and épée weapons, the sabre team put in a determined display to hold off a Brookes upset. They secured victory in the match by 123 to 112 and, more importantly, in the league as a whole.
Three days later, the Assassins added insult to injury for their vanquished Brookes opponents by beating them in the Bucs Midlands Conference Cup, this time in all three weapon categories.
This was a successful start to their title defence, having narrowly won last year’s final against Aston University. This latest in a series of victories saw the Assassins through to the semi-finals of the cup, and from there they will be confident of repeating last year’s feat.
Whoopi Goldberg latest to postpone Union talk
Whoopi Goldberg has become the fourth speaker in the past two weeks to postpone a visit to the Oxford Union.
The actress and television host has delayed her appearance at the debating society due to “unavoidable changes to her work schedule”.
Last Saturday, Cherwell reported that DJ duo The Chainsmokers, German footballer Mesut Özil, and American comedian David Cross had cancelled their visits due to “factors beyond [the Union’s] control”.
The talks were set to be four of the highlights in this term’s line-up.
A statement offered by the Oxford Union said: “the event has been postponed to a date yet to be decided due to unavoidable work commitments that have come up on Whoopi’s end. We are working to reschedule.
“As before, these are factors out of our control, as the schedule’s [sic] of such individuals are incredibly hectic and subject to change.”
Goldberg, the second black woman in the history of the Academy Awards to win an acting Oscar, was scheduled to speak on 24 February.
Her appearance has been replaced in the Union’s term card with a talk from American journalist Michael Wolff, whose recent book Fire & Fury: Inside The Trump White House attracted international media coverage and topped the New York Times best-sellers list.
The Chainsmokers, listed by Forbes as the third-highest paid DJs worldwide, had been due to speak on 13 February.
They were unavailable due to illness.
Mesut Özil was due to visit on 20 February, just two days before his side’s Europa League last-32 game at home to Östersunds.
His Arsenal team-mate Héctor Bellerín became the first active Premier League footballer to appear at the Union last week.
David Cross, known for his stand-up comedy as well as performances in Mr Show and Arrested Development, was scheduled to speak on 21 February.
The Union also underlined that it has continued to announce new speakers throughout the term.
As well as Wolff, Japanese designer Yohji Yamamoto’s visit has been confirmed. He will appear on 5 March.
In a previous statement, a spokesperson for the Union said: “The schedules of these high-profile individuals, are as you can imagine, incredibly subject to change.
“Whilst the Union committee work hard to ensure that cancellations are minimal, it’s sometimes just beyond our control.
“The Chainsmokers have both fallen ill, and needed to cancel as they really can’t take on any other commitments with an incredibly hectic tour schedule.
“The other two speakers’ cancellations were also factors for scheduling reasons that were simply beyond our control.
“It’s a shame that there’s been three in such short succession, but again, it really is down to random chance.”
The Union also said it hoped that their appearances could be rearranged.
The society said: “Hopefully we’ll be able to rearrange these visits for a later date – I understand it’s disappointing for members to hear, but they should know that we really are doing that we can to secure their visits.
“It’s also worth adding that just as speakers cancel, we’ve also had several additions – busy schedules of course mean that events are sometimes cancelled, but equally means that sometimes things can’t be arranged unless at short notice, which leads to new additions!”
Brakes review – ‘ticklingly funny and quietly frightening’
It takes me a while to recognise creator Mercedes Grower in her own film. Off the screen, or rather, in front of it, as she introduces her two-year, zero-budget passion project, she seems entirely down to earth. Grower comes across like the cool godmother who used to take you to one side and talk to you frankly about the world in a way you wished everyone would. Her on-screen character, by contrast, is traipsing around Soho in the snow wearing a leopard-print coat, heavily pregnant and seeming young and very lost.
It is no surprise, then, that Grower was an actor first, and that most of the incredible actors who took part as unpaid collaborators in Brakes were already her friends and acquaintances. She is stunningly convincing, as well as effortlessly funny: just as much in fact as both Noel Fielding and Julian Barratt, renowned duo from classic British comedy The Mighty Boosh, who also feature in the film. During the Q&A following the programme, when asked about how far the collaboration went, and to what extent the actors’ improv affected the thread of the scenes, Grower reveals that, on the whole, each scene was as much a riff off prompts as it was scripted. As the ‘writer’, director and producer, it would be perhaps better to term Grower the mother of this humble, unpolished masterpiece. She gave birth to a concept and surrounded it by the people who would take it to all the right places: and then had to organise all the distribution herself, as she tells us, humorous and fatigued.
The film follows nine couples, all based in London, who we watch break up and then meet for the first time. The first chapter, perhaps somewhat predictably named ‘Part 2’, interweaves a series of break-ups both absurd and familiar. Even Noel Fielding and Grower banging on either side of a public bathroom toilet door and shouting about how its not a ‘real front door’ is framed by the familiarity of feeling totally and utterly disconnected from someone you love. Another couple break up through a mundane argument about commitment dressed as a zombie and Frankenstein’s bride on a beautiful, dilapidated roof garden. In one of the weaker, though no less poignant, vignettes, a middle-aged pair can’t even summon up the energy to properly row about how they have fallen out of love with each other in their expensive Baker Street apartment and how he is probably sleeping with someone else called ‘Fiona’. The comic centre-piece of the film is Julian Barratt’s character, who stalks a guy he had a one-night stand with in Barcelona back to London, and then uses ice-creams to try and convince him that they should be together on the Southbank. The second – or ‘first’ – part, opens with him topless above the camera, playing the ukulele and singing creepily.
Grower tells us that they in fact had an earlier piece of narrative filmed for this couple, but that she was so determined to use this shot to open the second chapter that they had to cut it altogether. It is easy to see why she made this decision: it is the perfect incarnation of everything that is both ticklingly funny and quietly frightening about the subject matter of her film. At base level, it does end on a high. Instead of watching all these couples break up last, we watch them break up first, and get together last.
Grower describes it as a kind of figure-of-eight thought-process that we all go through with relationships. First, as we get to the end we all look back on, and reassess the beginning. Second, after it is all over we still find the courage to start all over again with someone else. It uses something cripplingly depressing to make us look upwards and laugh. The film would, in all honesty, be quite unwatchable if made the conventional way around. Not many people could sit through nearly an hour of emotionally draining, nihilistic break-ups without the promise of something better coming afterwards. All in all, it was heartening to meet the creator behind this piece of independent cinema. A high-budget gloss would almost certainly have ruined the concept. The homemade feel of the image and sound-quality, as well as the messy, ‘what-they-had-time-for’ nature of some of the shots, perfectly matches the sense of emotional messiness which comes with the subject-matter.
It is sad to think that, in being accustomed to Hollywood polish as the sole medium of story telling, we are unwittingly making ourselves incapable of appreciating anything with blemishes. Nothing in the breakups depicted here is fairy-tale or Hollywood, so why should it be filmed as such?
Let’s talk about: Imposter Syndrome
I don’t think I’m alone in admitting that the day I received my Oxford offer was among the best of my life. It was overwhelming, to realise that the very thing that had been a pipe dream for so long was suddenly my reality. And however much we settle in and realise that Oxford is, at the heart of it, just a university, filled with ordinary students living their lives, it’s still hard not to feel at least a little overwhelmed by the sight of the throngs of subfusc-clad individuals filing into the Sheldonian and finding themselves declared members of the oldest university in the English-speaking world.
For many people, the change can be dizzying – the realisation that what has been a distant goal you’ve been working towards for months, even years, is here. Then the haze of dreaminess starts to evaporate as reality sets in. And reality isn’t always pretty. Sometimes it’s study sessions in the ambience of the Rad Cam, or dressing to the nines for Formal Hall, but reality is also frantic 3am essay crises, reality is a whole group of students used to being among the top of their academic spheres at school suddenly hearing things like “a somewhat flimsy argument” or “not your best essay, I’m afraid.” And then the panic starts to set in. The odds of making it to Oxford were slim to begin with, but when you’re not excelling 100% of the time, the fear emerges: why am I here at all?
It’s a conflict that arises in part from the fact that many people have spent the longest time looking at Oxford as a destination: hard work and stressed all-nighters are supposed to be part of the long journey get you here. And we’ve all heard the warnings about what we’re in for – intense tutes, a deluge of essays, brutal exams – but at some point, all of us made the decision that it was all worth it, if we could only earn our place in these hallowed halls. But the fact is, hard as it is to get in, being here is often harder – there’s more work, more expectation, and more doubt.
The offer letters and UCAS notifications that validated years of effort in school are things of the past now, and suddenly we’re small fish in a very big pond. People used to getting As and A*s without blinking are suddenly left panicking with the unhappy realisation that receiving a First is more fable than fact for many. For better or for worse, the fact is that Oxford often invites a group of people who are used to measuring their worth by any kind of results-based, external validation: exam grades, competitions, certificates…tangible proof of excellence. This means that the realisation – and however prepared we think we are, it’s hard to truly realise this until we’re actually here – that Oxford is not simply another sign of achievement, but a challenging, strenuous journey unto itself can be disorienting.
I don’t mean that everyone came here expecting to just rest on their laurels. The fact is that getting into Oxford requires hard work, and for some people, being greeted with yet more intensity can lead to a feeling of being burned out. It’s hard to reconcile that with the intellectual enrichment you feel like you’re supposed to be gaining from this education. Add this to any number of other factors – maybe you don’t feel posh enough, maybe you’re the only BME person doing your course at your college, maybe you feel self-conscious about an accent – and it’s unsurprising that people are often left feeling like they’re waiting for the other shoe to drop, for someone to tell them that getting here was an elaborate prank and they’re not cut out for it after all.
Perhaps the only way to work past the imposter syndrome is to realise that your place at Oxford isn’t supposed to be a stagnant position to be consistently maintained: your offer was a gateway, not a podium. You didn’t get in because you fooled your tutors into thinking you were the ‘Classic Oxonian’, you got in because your tutors thought you could gain something from Oxford, and Oxford could gain something from you. It’s easy to look at the dreaming spires and forget that first and foremost, Oxford is an institute of learning. So next time you feel like you don’t belong, remember that Oxford is only as good as its students, and now that you’re in here, you’re one of them, and that you do in fact belong.
