{A trip to Oxford [continued(8)]}[19th November 1969]

[Redbook1:102-104][19691119:1630c]{A trip to Oxford [continued(8)]}[19th November 1969]

4.30pm Wednesday 19th November 1969 [continued]

            There was something very revivifying (?), or perhaps rejuvenating, about that half-day in Oxford.  I didn't finish it feeling any happier, superficially, but I felt straightened inside; more certain, perhaps, of what I was uncertain about.  Yet what in that trip caused this?  Nothing in the detail; just, I think, the fact of being away from [the school] and in the company of people whom I knew, although I did not know them, that I could trust.  If that is “liberalisation", then roll on!

We went to a tea shoppe opposite Fullers (?) since Fullers was ... fuller.  Inside I became, at one stage, very red for no reason, and so, being embarrassed, even redder and more embarrassed.  I then -- surprise? -- asked if the room was hot or if it was just me.  To hell with position!  Why can't I be just me?

            F and I looked at Lincoln College, which F is trying for.  Something he said suddenly made me wonder if it was all worth it -- something he said about people there talking about football and beer all the time.  And IA wrote back from New College, Oxford -- was it? -- saying that the promised land had not turned out to be quite so marvellous after all....  Oh God, please not another [School]!  But Oh God, please let me get there, even if it is.

            We joined the others at Blackwell's, where I found a fascinating-looking book on children's games all over England and their relevance to history and pre--history (I think).  Their railway history section was ridiculously small -- but perhaps there was more stored away.  When Blackwell's shut soon afterwards, V -- the system encourages surnames about [teachers] and full names about boys -- took us past the Sheldonian, the Bodleian (and the Radcliffe Reading Room), and to Christchurch College, his old college.  We went into the Cathedral as the choir were coming out, and looked around.  After a few minutes someone said he was going to lock up the Cathedral so we left again.  That seems all wrong to me -- locking people out.

            It was bitterly cold outside.  Everything seemed strangely unreal, or extra-real.  We climbed some stone steps -- so worn in the middle they try to push you back -- which might have come from "a man for all seasons", but Christchurch (dining) Hall was closed for repairs.  We looked at the remains of an old abbey (?) in a small court next door, then returned the way we had come via Christchurch library and Hertford College.  I should add that all this time V never stopped talking, prompted and answered by all of us, on everything from life at Oxford when he was there to the history and purpose of individual buildings.  We went to a pub called the Turf, where we each had half a pint of beer and a meal.  Our chicken pies were individual, dry, and tasteless; B’s ham and chips look much nicer. B drank all his beer in the first seven minutes and became rather merry.  We discussed Marlow’s Faustus (?), for which he is being auditioned in a minor part, and Tamburlaine (?) the Great.*  There was a parrot or other bird which kept wolf whistling; it took me about twenty minutes to realise that it was not a man.  There were some awkward silences.

            Afterwards we bypassed the main cinema, which was showing "I am curious – Yellow”, which F and I would both have liked to have seen, and went to the Scala to see intellectual films.  The first one was modelled vaguely on “Kind Hearts and Coronets”, but was not nearly so funny, except for a scene explaining Cambridge life.  I suspect it was made by Oxford or Cambridge -- probably Cambridge -- graduates between five and ten years ago.  The second one was called “The Red and the White”, and was interesting as a piece of history but bad by the standards of today.  Nevertheless, it was less biased than I expected.  It showed, I think (English subtitles), the fate of a Hungarian detachment of ex P.O.W.s fighting for the Reds in Russia after 1917, in the civil war against the Whites.  There was a marvellous slow-motion horsemen sequence at the beginning, but I felt that on the whole the film owed a lot to 1920’s Westerns (I hope there were some!)  -- U.S. cavalry to the rescue, that kind of thing.

            Afterwards we came home; silence after Swindon.

*Neither of which I knew anything about (11.4.70)

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