I’ve just bought a double-bill of Umberto Eco’s ‘The Name of the Rose’ and Barbara Tuchman’s ‘A Distant Mirror’ for Henry’s and my younger sister. Nelly’s a huge fan of historical mysteries who can tell you more about Richard III and the murdered princes, the Holy Grail and Pompei than is probably healthy for a 16 year old.
I thought Tuchman would be a good all-round introduction to medieval European history – I bet I’m not the only one who read it as a teenager and took a degree in medieval history as a result. I was amazed to see the book is now over 20 years old and I wondered – has it aged well? How is the book regarded by medievalists? Any other recommendations?
Here’s another question while I’m tapping CT’s collective brain power; Nelly’s thinking of applying to Oxford to study history, maybe with politics. (I think she should do PPE, but she says I’ll have to live vicariously through my own children if I have them, and not through my younger siblings.) Any ideas/prejudices/anecdotes about which colleges to apply to? The little I know about Oxford colleges I learnt from University Challenge.
Where’s a good place to be challenged but not hot-housed? What are the women’s colleges like? (bearing in mind that one blue-stocking in the family is probably enough) How to avoid the rugger-buggers? (fine people, but you don’t necessarily want to be sharing accommodation with them for 3 years.) And, how important is the choice of college for both academic and social life? Answers on the back of a postcard…
{ 25 comments }
Joe Carter 03.11.04 at 6:57 pm
Rugger-buggers? Can you translate that into English (or at least Americanese) for us.
Richard 03.11.04 at 7:15 pm
Think jocks, but with more drinking, singing of obscene songs, and shitting in pint pots…
Maria 03.11.04 at 7:17 pm
I believe you would call them football jocks. Rugger buggers are rugby players, fine upstanding young men but when in groups not known for their refined wit, high minded entertainments, or respect for the delicacy of one’s youngest sister. (OTOH, another sister is marrying one!)
Troy 03.11.04 at 7:17 pm
I had to look that one up, too, Joe. According to http://www.urbandictionary.com, they are “One who plays Rugby. Especially pertaining to Old Boy network toffs. e.g.,The rugger-buggers got the corporate boxes.” (A toff being a public schoolboy, rather well to do, with decent manners.)
Nelly 03.11.04 at 7:20 pm
By the way, thanks to all the rugger buggers who kicked England’s ass last Saturday.
William 03.11.04 at 7:25 pm
I did my PhD in Oxford, based in St Peter’s, though your college matters much less as a graduate student than as an undergrad.
How important is the choice of college to academic and social life? It impacts the flavour of both much more than the quality. All colleges are full of young, bright people, so Nelly’ll probably have a good time wherever she goes. The decision seems much more important at the time than it turns out to be in retrospect.
I remember (ten years ago) Balliol and St John’s as being good for humanities, New as being good for law and science, Queen’s and Christchurch as being a bit sporty. Wadham has perhaps a bit more of a sense of community throughout the whole college (as opposed to just within the undergrad community) than most. Worcester has a cool duckpond, which matters a lot in the summer; I always liked walking round there. St Peter’s itself was a bit rugger-buggery, but they were consciously trying to address it and (from what I could tell) doing a reasonable job; I have very fond memories. My experience of other colleges’ undergraduate life was mainly through playing on our pool team, so I don’t have much exposure to the women’s colleges. I think at the moment there’s only one, St Hilda’s, which is on the wrong side of Magdalen Bridge and to my mind should be ruled out for that reason alone.
For what it’s worth, my father studied history in Oriel and later went on to be head of Politics in UCD (and may well have lectured Henry at some point). So presumably it was good for history then, but that was the late 1940s…
JX 03.11.04 at 7:26 pm
Maria,
Purely on the basis of my own experience, this is the advice I would give Nelly.
>Where’s a good place to be challenged but not hot-housed?
This will depend largely on her tutors and, to a lesser extent, on the competitiveness of the students in her course and year. That said, Balliol, Magdalen and St. John have hot-house reputations.
>What are the women’s colleges like? (bearing in mind that one blue-stocking in the family is probably enough)
When I went down in 1997, St. Hilda’s was the last female-only college left and there was already talk of accepting male students. I had a handful of friends there and it didn’t harm them at all.
>How to avoid the rugger-buggers? (fine people, but you don’t necessarily want to be sharing accommodation with them for 3 years.)
Luck of the draw. I didn’t find it that difficult. Of course, I may simply have become inured. If she really wanted to she could apply to one of the religious permanent private halls.
>And, how important is the choice of college for both academic and social life?
Academic: Very important. Most of my tutorials were in college so if there are any academics Nelly’s keen on, I would advise her to apply to their colleges.
Social: I noticed that British students’ social circles didn’t extend far beyond the college whereas international students’ did. Not just with compatriots but with other international students in general. International students just couldn’t relate to British students (white, Asian and black) as well as they could with each other. Which gave us something in common, I suppose.
Other than that, location, location, location. A Univ student could roll out of bed 10 minutes before an exam or lecture. A student at St. Hugh’s doesn’t have that luxury. This will also have an impact on social life.
If you have more questions, e-mail me. This is already much longer than a postcard.
Henry Farrell 03.11.04 at 7:43 pm
William – I remember your father of course; he was head of department during my first two years as an undergraduate at UCD. I liked him very much. I still have his survey book on Northern Ireland on my bookshelf, and find it helpful – it’s obviously a little old at this stage, but it really did a splendid job of drawing a rather chaotic and complex literature into a coherent whole.
nick 03.11.04 at 8:11 pm
Hmm. As an undergraduate, almost all of your tuition happens through the college, so choose wisely. Jesus recently lost Niall Ferguson to NYC (and less recently, John Gray to LSE), and I don’t really know too much about their replacements, though I’m sure they’re perfectly fine.
I won’t repeat what jx said, because it’s all good — colleges are the life-blood of Oxford, and choosing the right one can make the difference between being happy and being miserable. (I applied to Magdalen and ended up, somewhat randomly, at Jesus: it was a good twist of fate.) jx is also right about international students being less ‘collegiate’ (especially those who use Rhodes House as their base) but that also applies to those at St Hilda’s, as well, since no-one goes to their college to socialise.
[ Ruggerbuggers can be avoided, unless you’re at Teddy Hall. Same with boaties and Oriel. ]
Also remember that colleges vary widely in wealth: being at a college that offers subsidised, college-owned and maintained accomodation for all its undergraduates makes life so much cheaper and less of a hassle than if you have to deal with Oxford’s slumlords.
Nelly’s of the Irish persuasion, yes? Well, Jesus has a very decent Celtic fringe (as many from NI and the Republic as from Wales these days), and Hertford has Tom Paulin and Roy Foster in its midst, though I doubt that the Roy does undergraduate tutorials…
Anyway, tell her to book herself a place for the Open Day on September 17th, when many of the colleges and the History faculty throw open their doors. It’s a pity that it’s during the Long Vac, so there’s less chance to talk to undergraduates about college life, but there’ll most likely be plenty of stressed finalists around to share their experiences over tea and cake.
(And as jx said, email me with any questions.)
MQ 03.11.04 at 8:13 pm
I’d really like to hear commentary on “A Distant Mirror” from anyone with training in medieval history. I loved that book, it is wonderfully written, and I have always been curious about how more current scholars view it. Although in my experience fields like medieval history do not change too quickly (the intellectual fashions change, but not the underlying knowledge of the period), so I would doubt it has been “discredited”.
As for “rugger-buggers”, they are not always a laughing matter. Back when I was younger I made the acquaintance of bunch of Australian rugby players who made a fairly regular practice of gang raping women. They claimed the women were always into it (once drunk enough, I guess), but who knows.
duncan 03.11.04 at 8:35 pm
Yes, the college you go to is very important since, as has already been said, it’s likely to determine both your social life and who teaches you. The best scholars aren’t always the best teachers, but they do tend to have the best contacts at other colleges. So if you want to study something your college can’t teach in-house, you will probably have to find someone at another college to teach you. Big names can hook you up much better than little names. I’m not quite sure I understand the idea about hot-housing. Isn’t Oxford one big hot-house?
push 03.11.04 at 8:51 pm
In reply to above post about Jesus, let me vouch for John Gray’s replacement; a highly thoughtful and lovely tutor who really goes all out for his students…
Tom Runnacles 03.11.04 at 9:26 pm
Following up a little on Jesus H. College…
I loved the place. Not a hothouse, not stuffed full of beautiful people, not too sporty, just a really good mixture – even I managed to fit in.
It’s also smack in the centre of town, rich enough to house all its undergraduates and graduates (or at least it was from ’89-’97, the duration of my own eternal student period) at subsidised rates. Back then the College was also keen to throw money at book grants, travel bursaries, etc. I don’t know whether this generosity has survived the turn of the new century, though …
Good to hear from ‘push’ that John Gray has a worthy replacement. He may be a bit doolally these days, but he was a life-changing teacher for me.
As the others have said, feel free to mail with questions.
Andrew 03.11.04 at 10:17 pm
As for Tuchman, I recall Distant Mirror being a well-written, but uncritical retelling of the Coucy story pulled right from Froissart. Well, not directly from Froissart, but from an abridged translation of the chronicles. In addition to being sloppy with her sources, I had the distinct impression that Tuchman was rather smitten with Coucy. By focusing on Coucy, Tuchman offers a rather unbalanced picture of a dynamic century.
But aging well? As far as I know, the academy has never been thrilled by Distant Mirror. Medievalists, especially those who considered themselves proper and professional historians had a field day with her book. Very few medievalists have defended her book as good history, let alone solid scholarship. There are some (esp. Norman Cantor) who feel this was amplified due to the jealous nature of scholars that hate to see someone selling their stories (and selling them extremely well!) to a popular audience.
See Bernie Bachrach’s review in AHR (84:3) for more on the shoddy history and see Norman Cantor’s Inventing the Middle Ages for a discussion of how medievalists received Tuchman’s book.
Now, concerning your sister and Oxford, where is she getting her current education? That can make a big difference on how she adjusts to Oxford college life (esp. if she’s coming from the American system.)
ajay 03.12.04 at 9:42 am
(declaration of interest: I am a St John’s man…)
You can probably ignore St Anne’s and St Hugh’s (too far out). Keble and St Catherine’s are too ugly. St Hilda’s is too insular.
Queen’s is a bit sport-focussed (not so much rugby as rowing). Balliol is terribly political – in a Union and a national sense. Christ Church, unfortunately, is still a little self-consciously aristocratic. As is Brasenose. Pembroke is too poor.
Both my brothers studied history at Oxford: one at Merton, one (still there) at Exeter. Both colleges are good for history, as are St John’s and Magdalen. So is Balliol – but see warning on politics. So is, I believe, Magdalen. St John’s is fairly apolitical, has a large number of foreign graduate students and is also staggeringly rich. This makes for low-ish battels (rent) and decent facilities. But, see above, I’m probably biased.
St John’s, Balliol, Magdalen and Merton fight it out every year for top place in academic terms, and there probably isn’t much to choose between them: all are also rather old (Merton is the oldest) which is important, and rather beautiful (St John’s gardens and Magdalen’s cloisters are famous, and living in a nice-looking college makes a lot of difference). Best bet is to look up the history dons on the college websites and see which ones are interested in the same things your sister is. And see above on the open day – definitely a good idea.
Jolyon 03.12.04 at 11:30 am
Above all, I suggest that your sister does what she loves and not what she thinks might be useful afterwards. Everyone I know who did the latter (a) regretted the lost opportunity to study what they loved and (b) did not feel that the ‘useful’ option had, in fact, been of any great help in their career.
As an aside, I should advise against PPE, the Technical Drawing of degrees.
Matt McG 03.12.04 at 12:46 pm
I’d second pretty much all of the things said above.
Choosing your college matters a lot. It’s important to find out how many people are taking your course within your college.
I arrived at Oxford as a graduate philosophy student to find I was the only philosophy graduate student at Brasenose and that of the 120 others they were pretty much all lawyers, ancient historians or economists. Friends who went to Balliol or Univ. where they had more philosophy grad students got more out of their college I think. I probably go months without going into college [which is fairly common among grad students I suspect] but would probably be there more if there were more people doing what I do.
Also, location matters. Central is good. Being in one of the peripheral (geographically) colleges isn’t great.
Pick a college with good tutors in the subject area you want to study as an undergraduate you won’t have much access to people outside of your college except in cases where there is no teaching available in college in that area.
Although, again, as mentioned above, the biggest names aren’t necessarily the best tutors. Nevertheless, there’s no point in choosing a college that doesn’t have plenty of tutors in your subject area.
Also, as mentioned above, some colleges are rich. This makes for highly subsidised housing, book allowances, better IT facilities, better sporting facilities, etc. etc.
Rod 03.12.04 at 2:15 pm
At undergrad level, colleges really matter – they are the centre of your academic and social life. I’ve heard good things about St Hildas (the only women’s college). But it all depends on what she wants.
The best thing to do is visit a college and talk to some students already there, but from experience, to avoid the rugger buggers I’d definitely steer clear of Oriel and Brasenose.
Rod 03.12.04 at 2:36 pm
Actually, there is an alternative prospectus on the Student’s Union website that might be a good place to start.
http://www.ousu.org/main/prospectivestudents
Maria 03.12.04 at 5:54 pm
Huge, huge thanks to everyone who’s taken the time and given their thoughts. It’s amazingly helpful – the kind of info you could never glean from official sources.
I’m even thinking of putting some of the comments on various colleges into a table of some sort and sticking it up on the web along with the advice, so that it could be helpful for others too. Mind you, some of the views could put noses out of joint!
Andrew, Nelly is of the Irish persuasion as Nick puts it, so culture shock in Oxford shouldn’t be much more pronounced than it probably is for the average British student going there (though that’s probably not saying much). But she’s managed 6 months so far of being the only foreigner in a french high school, so I think she should handle Oxford.
Again, thanks to everyone. The collective brain power and experience of this blog is really something special.
Paul 03.12.04 at 9:38 pm
Second hand recommendation of “A Distant Mirror” but a friend of mine (Ginger of Perverse Active Memory actually) with a degree in History and a strong interest in Medieval studies, recently recommended it to me when I asked her for a good general medieval history.
Liz 03.12.04 at 9:53 pm
For what it’s worth:
My sister went to St Catherine’s (for English Lit) and had a great time. It may seem ugly but apparently its architect won awards, so we must just be an ignorant public.
When I was applying for PPE I researched a bit and went for Keeble as the best option (I didn’t get in and ended up at York.) I also interviewed at Teddy’s and it was very poor and lacking in resources; I think that’s something important to look for. Of course, depending on what kind of school your sister attends, she’ll need to check out the % of students from state schools a college accepts to make sure she applies somewhere she’ll have better odds of getting in. (I think Keeble and St Catz were pretty good on that score, from a state school perpective)
nick 03.12.04 at 10:51 pm
To add to rob’s comment, lots of Oxford colleges have their own student-edited ‘alternative prospectus‘ online at the relevant college website: they’re often more useful when it comes to judging what it’s like being a student, as opposed to ‘studying for a degree’.
(With some caveats, though. The current gay-marriage furore reminded me of the time when the Jesus alternative prospectus encountered the blue pencil wrt its LGB page, back in the days when Section 28 could be used as a sledgehammer in that regard. The college scandal-sheet offered its own ‘SCR-approved’ version at the end of term, entitled ‘Why we’re not at all bothered by Queers at Jesus’.)
John Smith 03.13.04 at 11:30 pm
Anyone interested in medieval Europe in general, and medieval France in particular, should be an habitué of the Gallica site with all sorts of goodness for those with patience or broadband. (Including pretty much the entire set of Froissart (in the Lettenhove edition) on which Distant Mirror is based, as someone said above.) Lots of Rolls Series and other English history stuff that our very own British Library has done sweet FA to digitize.
The Gallica site has been playing up recently, as it does periodically – but since it’s light years ahead of any other, you have to forgive it!
Naomi Chana 03.15.04 at 3:04 pm
There is a group which meets at the annual medieval studies conference in Kalamazoo called the Fourteenth Century Society; it consists of scholars across various disciplines who focus on the fourteenth century. Last year (I think it was) they sponsored a sizable session on the 25th anniversary of A Distant Mirror, and while the panelists used Tuchman’s book as a jumping-off point for any number of reworkings or critiques of her narrative, the tone of the session was pretty positive. The fact is that that book has inspired an awful lot of us in scholarship. On the whole most medievalists I’ve encountered are pretty fond of ADM even when we disagree with many of Tuchman’s premises or find her scholarship dated and not terribly thorough.
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