CAM 64

Cambridge Alumni Magazine Issue 64 Michaelmas 2011

In this issue:

Footlights Mrs Darwin’s greenhouse The Arab spring Violence and civil society A coming of age

CAM/64

Contents

CAM Cambridge Alumni Magazine Issue 64 Michaelmas Term 2011

Image courtesy Murray Edwards

Regulars Letters Don’s diary Update Diary Connect My room, your room The best...

History of a friendship

16

Charlie Troman

47

02 03 04 08 11

Secret Cambridge 16

A coming of age

18

Review University matters 39 Debate 40 Books 43 12 Music 45 13 Sport 47 Prize crossword 48 14

Features CAM is 21. To celebrate, Lucy Jolin explores the rituals marking the end of childhood and the start of adult life.

Fringe benefits

22

Thirty years ago Emma Thompson, Stephen Fry and Hugh Laurie took Edinburgh by storm.

William Ham Bevan investigates the enduring appeal of the Footlights Revue.

Charlie Troman

36 CAM is published three times a year, in the Lent, Easter and Michaelmas terms and is sent free to Cambridge alumni.

It is available to non-alumni on subscription. For further information contact the Alumni Relations Office.

The opinions expressed in CAM are those of the contributors and not necessarily those of the University of Cambridge.

Editor Mira Katbamna Managing Editor Morven Knowles Design and Art Direction Smith www.smithltd.co.uk Print Pindar Publisher The University of Cambridge Development Office 1 Quayside Bridge Street Cambridge CB5 8AB Tel +44 (0)1223 332288

This publication contains paper manufactured

by Chain-of-Custody certified suppliers operating within internationally recognised environmental standards in order to ensure sustainable sourcing and production.

Editorial enquiries Tel +44 (0)1223 760155 cameditor@alumni.cam.ac.uk

Dividing lines

26

Architect Dr Wendy Pullan says that conflict in cities is natural – but understanding it is always complicated.

Alumni enquiries Tel +44 (0)1223 760150 contact@alumni.cam.ac.uk www.alumni.cam.ac.uk www.facebook.com/ cambridgealumni www.twitter.com/CARO1209

Violence and civil society

Modern life is still infused with the fear of terrorism and political violence. Nobel Laureate, Professor Amartya Sen, argues that civil society holds the key to peace.

Advertising enquiries Tel +44 (0)20 7520 9474 landmark@lps.co.uk Services offered by advertisers are not specifically endorsed by the editor or the University of Cambridge. The publisher reserves the right to decline or withdraw advertisements.

Cover: Ben Ashenden.

Photograph by Charlie Troman.

Copyright © 2011 The University of Cambridge.

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Gold Award Winner 2010 Robert Sibley Magazine of the Year Award 2010

Taught by greatness

36

The Pilkington Prizes have one criterion: excellence in teaching. The students of this year’s winners discuss what it’s like being taught by one of Cambridge’s greats.

CAM 64 01

EDITOR’S LETTER

Your letters

CAM is 21

C

AM celebrates its 21st birthday this term.

Published during the Michaelmas Term of 1990, the inaugural issue contained a feature examining the Gulf crisis and a review of Clive James’s memoir, May Week Was in June.

That CAM has thrived over the last two decades is undoubtedly down to the dedication and talent of its distinguished former editors – most notably the late Dr Peter Richards, who led the publication for more than ten years, and also Jonathan Gregson (launch editor), Sarah Woodward and Martin Thompson. It is also testament to CAM’s readers who, with praise, criticism and lively interjection, keep this magazine fighting fit.

So what does this 21st birthday issue have to offer?

On page 18, we examine the preparations that accompany coming of age, whether in the form of flagellation and fasting, or the mostly more sedate activity of reading Winnie the Pooh. In our piece on the Arab Spring (page 40), we look at why the stereotype of the iPhone-wielding revolutionary is a fallacy; and on page 30, the Nobel Laureate Professor Amartya Sen, argues that civil society holds the key to the ‘war on terror’.

Elsewhere, we tread the boards with the Footlights, visit Joanne Harris’s old room at Catz and listen in on current students explaining just why their teachers are deserving winners of a Pilkington Prize.

By tradition, birthdays are celebrated with a toast.

In this case, there can be only one choice. Happy reading!

Mira Katbamna (Caius 1995)

In this issue:

Supercomputers Public intellectuals Two wheels good Secret Cambridge My room, your room Summer reading

A degree of success While realising how necessary good exam results are in the present competitive market, they are not always a full measure of success (Update, CAM 63).

My neighbour in Pembroke, Roger Eddison, and I both scored Thirds. He became a very successful civil servant, largely setting up a public health service for Greece, and I was a consulting surgeon in the NHS. So no one should despair. Robert Petley, the third in our group did make a top First, but was killed as a bomber pilot; what a waste.

Robert AD Crawford (Pembroke 1935)

Two wheels good Given that CAM is generally a serious magazine (and a very interesting one, congratulations) I was surprised to see the latest edition fronted by a very pretty girl on a bicycle.

O tempora. O mores. What next? Two pretty girls? And how many bicycles? I can’t wait.

Alex Lawrie (Corpus 1965) CAM does such a splendid job of showcasing Cambridge – research, lifestyle, dons and departments.

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So why does the charming cover girl of CAM 63 look so dejected?

Is she embarrassed by the acute yet serious error of her T-shirt?

Dick Joyce (Jesus 1947) I’m appalled at the irresponsibility of your magazine in publishing just two [of ten] photos of cyclists wearing helmets. While you were at it, why didn’t you depict the same number smoking? Some of your cyclists are clearly about to set out for the open road.

Helmets have been compulsory in New Zealand for some 20 years as we believe in conserving our (finer) intellects, rather than risk smashing them to smithereens.

Mark Stocker (King’s 1975) During her term as Vice-Chancellor, Dame Rosemary Murray sequestrated a bicycle stand at the Trinity Lane entrance to the Old Schools and had it mounted with a plaque proclaiming ‘ViceChancellor’. Unlike other places, official transport in Cambridge University in those days generally had two wheels.

Vernon McElroy (Director of Estate Management 1975–87)

An obsession with monarchy Being resident in Germany, I report a very different experience from that of Christine Clayton (CAM 63). Serious conversations about monarchy have reflected not merely a fascination for the British Crown, but also a need to discover more about its role in modern democracy. One might describe this need as a subliminal wrestling with the question: could monarchy still be relevant to Germany and to other European states?

The perceived failings of modern political processes, and of politicians themselves; recurring doubts about the ‘European Idea’;

We are always delighted to receive your emails and letters.

Email your letters to: cameditor@alumni.cam.ac.uk

Don’s Diary

Write to us at: CAM, Cambridge Alumni Relations Office, 1 Quayside, Bridge Street, Cambridge, CB5 8AB. Please mark your letter ‘for publication’.

You can read more CAM letters at www.alumni.cam.ac.uk/news/cam/letters.

Letters may be edited for length.

the question of whether modern democracies have yet to define the role of a head of state; and an undoubted admiration for the successful resolution of this question in the UK – all these issues are of particular relevance to countries in which monarchy has once been a significant part of history and may still be reflected in language and in cultural heritage.

Alwyn Cartwright (Fitzwilliam 1946)

Praise When the Cambridge Alumni Magazine arrived through my letterbox, my first thought was that, in these cash-strapped times, it would be someone wanting money – but now I positively look forward to it coming. I read it almost cover to cover, finding many interesting ideas even when the subject appears at first sight to be unpromising, such as research in the building industry or bikes. I loved ‘From Little Acorns’, about a friendly and efficient cluster, clusters being in the scientific news at the moment, and I even read the letters. So from a position of disdain, I have become an avid reader of anything and everything in this magazine. I can always rely on the quality and enthusiasm of the contributors to make the incomprehensible fascinating.

Rachel Lewington (Homerton 1955) I have kept CAM 62 on display since I received it, meaning by ‘on display’ that I’ve kept it where I continually have it in sight. The cover is the most stunning and memorable that I have ever seen in a magazine, alumni or other. I have only one question, which does not express a reservation in my praise. Can the young woman really have a neck as long as she is pictured as having, or was her face inserted after the costume had been photographed?

David Braybrooke (Downing 1945)

Dr Joan Lasenby is a University Senior Lecturer in the Signal Processing and Communications Group of the Department of Engineering

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don’t normally lecture in the Easter term, but on the day of the royal wedding I am standing in for a colleague and due to lecture on image processing with particular emphasis on algorithms used for photo-editing. The lecture is at 10am in the Department of Engineering; at 11am Kate will arrive at Westminster Abbey. I wonder how many students will turn up. It would be a shame, I think to myself, if they missed the lecture, as I have carefully compiled all my image processing examples using pictures of William and Kate.

I need not have worried. Second year information engineers are more interested in Fourier transforms than pomp and circumstance and it is a full house. Nevertheless, I make sure I finish five minutes early so they can rush off and see Kate’s dress!

By longstanding tradition, the Signal Processing Group meets for coffee and cake at 11am on a Friday in our tea room. We, the staff, worry if our PhD students fail to show up, but cake or no, a lot of work gets done. A significant proportion of my work involves 3D reconstruction using multiple camera systems – this is the sort of technology you may associate with Hollywood blockbusters such as Lord of the Rings and Avatar.

In our case, we are working alongside doctors from Addenbrooke’s Hospital and PneumaCare to investigate the feasibility of using motion capture techniques to measure breathing in classes of patients (such as babies) who cannot use conventional methods such as blowing into a mouthpiece containing a pressure sensor.

Standard motion capture systems are large, difficult to set up and invasive (you need to place markers on the subject).

fascinating ‘job’ involving scrutiny of all planned publications, a process rendered enlightening and entertaining by learned and quick-witted colleagues from both the University and the Press. That said, it does mean wading through about 1000 pages of material every fortnight!

The CUP meeting finishes just before 4pm, at which point I have to rush to Trinity to teach.

Although I read Maths at Trinity, I somehow migrated to Engineering after a brief spell in Physics and it was lovely to return to my student college as a fellow. Today’s supervisions are second year exam revision sessions. Friday afternoon is not a popular time for pre-exam supervisions, and it is a stressful time of year for the students and for me. The college system means that you have a big responsibility for your charges: you chose them, and you want to see them emerge at the other end with good results, having also done lots of the things they enjoy, and generally as mature and capable adults.

Supervisions finished, I head to Trinity gym.

I have been a keen runner since the age of 12, and today it keeps me sane when things get frantic.

While I’m in athletics mode, I make a mental note of all the things we need to sort out for the next academic year regarding the Cambridge University Hare & Hounds (the University’s crosscountry running club), of which I am President.

Part of my research in fact involves the use of motion analysis, video analysis and signal processing for sporting projects. Could I have a better job, I ask myself?

To solve this problem we have come up with a compact system using just two cameras and projected structured light that produces real-time dynamic reconstructions of chest wall movements and hence charts lung volume changes over time. This is a robust and easy-to-use system and clinical trials are currently under way. It is a wonderful information engineering project that presents many fascinating intellectual challenges.

As I drive home, I begin to look forward to a summer in which I might be able to do some research. I wonder how I survived when my children were small and I had to dash back from work to pick them up from the local after-school club that I ran; but the fact is that life doesn’t really get easier, it just changes. Those academics who feel as though their lives are full of committee meetings and administration should read James Miller’s excellent 1962 article ‘How Newton discovered the law of gravitation’ – it will both make you laugh and make you feel better!

Fridays also mean a visit to the Pitt Building for a publishing meeting of the Cambridge University Press. I became a Syndic of the Press in October 2010 and so am something of a new girl. It is a

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UPDATE MICHAELMAS TERM EVENTS

Alumni Weekend

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ith a packed schedule of lectures, tours and social events, the 21st Alumni Weekend marked its birthday in style. Over three days in September, the University welcomed back almost 1000 alumni to socialise, renew acquaintances and catch up with the best of current Cambridge research.

Highlights of the diverse lecture programme included Professor Sir Bruce Ponder presenting Cambridge’s latest advances in cancer treatment, Professor Christopher Clark revisiting the causes of World War I and Dr Carolin Crawford demonstrating that outer space is anything but silent.

The forthcoming Olympics provided a pervasive theme, with talks on why the marathon was not an Ancient Olympic event, the Munich Games of 1972, and the relationship between politics and sport.

On Saturday afternoon, the Vice-Chancellor took part in a lively interview with BBC journalist Stephen Sackur, with questions submitted in advance by alumni.

This was followed by a compelling lecture by the historian David Starkey, putting forward new perspectives on Henry VIII. Now an established Alumni Weekend tradition, the ‘Come and Sing’ event assembled an alumni choir to rehearse and perform Fauré’s Requiem and Schubert’s Mass in G in King’s College Chapel. And throughout the Weekend, many guests took advantage of the exclusive tours of Colleges, University buildings and archives.

The 2012 Alumni Weekend will take place between 21 and 23 September. To find out more information visit www.alumni.cam.ac.uk/weekend.

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UNIVERSITY

Alumni vote for new Chancellor

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ver 5500 alumni converged on the Senate-House for two days last month to vote for the University’s next Chancellor. In the first actively contested poll since 1847, Lord Sainsbury of Turville was elected to succeed the Duke of Edinburgh.

Among those to make the journey to Cambridge was Matt Castle (Pembroke 1999). Speaking before travelling up from Darlington, he said: “It’s an important opportunity. It’s great that the University values its alumni in these decisions. I’ll be heading down in the early morning, and make a full day of it.

I’m hoping to wander along the Backs if the weather holds out, have a drink at the Mill, and meet up with some of my College and rowing contemporaries.”

As a long-time Cambridge resident, Eric Southern (Peterhouse 1939) conceded that voting would be less onerous for him. “All I need to do is

totter down Newmarket Road,” he said. “I’ll see if any of my friends are there. But I shan’t do any politicking!”

All members of the Senate – holders of the MA or other qualifying degree, and current Regent House members – were entitled to cast their vote in person on October 14 or 15, and many Colleges hosted events for alumni.

Lord Sainsbury, the philanthropist and former Minister of Science, and the University’s nominated candidate, won. He said: “I am pleased to have been elected, and would like to thank all those who have supported me, and the other candidates who have made this such a friendly election. I am particularly pleased the election did not turn into a battle between the arts and humanities and science, or between political parties, and I look forward to championing the University in the years ahead.”

New Leukemia SCOR at Cambridge The Department of Haematology has overcome stiff international competition to win a $6.3m Centre Grant from the US Leukemia and Lymphoma Society and a £2.3m CRUK programme grant to work on haematological malignancies.

Professor Tony Green led a consortium of research groups to win the US award, making the department the only leukaemia Specialised Centre of Research outside the USA.

UPDATE MICHAELMAS TERM

British Academy Fellowships Eight academics have been elected to the fellowship of the British Academy. They are: Professor Robin Alexander, Dr Neil Kenny, Professor Nicholas de Lange, Professor Robert Gordon, Professor Sylvia Huot, Professor Raymond Geuss, Professor Susan Owens and Professor Per-Olof Wikström.

UNIVERSITY

UNIVERSITY

iPhone App

Vice-Chancellor’s annual address

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ant to stay up-to-date with news and events from within the University through your iPhone? A new app enables you to do just that.

As well as feeding the latest research and news direct to your phone, the free app includes a daily events service listing exhibitions, festivals, lectures and other activities happening across the University and allows you to explore the University’s library collections.

You can also access videos and audio media through the app, including the Cambridge Ideas series of films and other content located on the University’s YouTube and iTunes U channels. And the interactive map ensures you won’t get lost.

To download the app search for ‘University of Cambridge’ in Apple’s App Store. And to get your hands on a Cambridge blue iPhone cover visit www.alumni.cam.ac.uk/benefits/merchandise.

I

n his annual address, the ViceChancellor spelt out the “new imperatives” for the University in 2012, after a year of turbulent change in higher education.

Speaking in the Senate-House on 1 October, Professor Sir Leszek Borysiewicz reiterated Cambridge’s commitment to excellence on the international stage – a topic of his inaugural speech a year ago. The University, he asserted, must ensure it is valued as “an immense asset to the country and to the world”.

After a year in which the national focus had been on undergraduates, he said, research would reclaim its share of attention – and Cambridge should continue to develop strategic research directions to lead the way in tackling big questions such as climate change and food security. The Vice-Chancellor urged recognition of the role played by graduate

Angus Muir

Sarah Wood

Left: David Baddiel Right: Ali Smith Far right: Claire Tomalin

students and postdoctoral researchers, saying: “They will become leaders in their chosen careers, and I want them to consider Cambridge to be the place where, as researchers, they were best supported.”

A final imperative, he said, was the development of Cambridge’s relationship with its supporters. “Our global alumni and our many other friends are willing to invest in our future because we consistently translate our mission and values into excellence in teaching, research and scholarship.”

Professor Borysiewicz also used his speech to pay tribute to the outgoing Chancellor for 35 years of “unstinting hard work”. “Prince Philip has been the University’s great ambassador over three decades and more, and Cambridge owes him a debt of gratitude,” he said.

To read the address in full visit: www. admin.cam.ac.uk /offices/v-c/biography/speeches

Wordfest, Cambridge’s very own biannual literary festival, returns on Sunday 27 November with a line -up sure to send you rushing to your nearest library (or indeed, Heffers).

Claire Tomalin (Newnham 1951) will be discussing her major new biography of Charles Dickens, published to coincide with the 200th anniversary of his birth, while Ali Smith (Newnham 1985), returns with her novel, There but for the. They will be joined by Ian Hislop and Adam McQueen on Private Eye at 50, Alistair Darling on the financial crisis, David Baddiel (King’s 1983) on his new novel, Diana Athill on her life and work and Peter Popham on his biography of Aung San Suu Kyi. www.cambridgewordfest.co.uk.

CAM 64 05

UPDATE MICHAELMAS TERM

New master for Jesus Professor Ian White has been elected Master of Jesus College. Professor White is Professor of Optical Communications in the Engineering Department and Head of Photonics Research. He was previously ProVice-Chancellor for Institutional Affairs, where he has been succeeded

by Professor Jeremy Sanders FRS. He succeeds Professor Robert Mair CBE.

Electa/Leemage/Lebrecht Music & Arts

MUSEUMS

New Director for Kettle’s Yard

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FACULTY

Linguistics merged

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he Department of Linguistics and the Research Centre for English and Applied Linguistics have merged to form the Department of Theoretical and Applied Linguistics.

The new department (which will sit within the Faculty of Modern and Medieval Languages) will be able to provide stronger theoretical, empirical and interdisciplinary research across the board from historical linguistics and comparative syntax to language processing and computational linguistics.

New to the department will be the broader teaching of both theoretical and applied linguistics topics for undergraduates and graduates. Next year the launch of

a joint MPhil will give students greater freedom to combine theoretical and applied study.

Dr Nicholas White, Chairman, Faculty of Modern and Medieval Languages says that the new department will be a new departure for languages at Cambridge.

“The new department is fantastically well placed to attract new students because it brings together, for the first time in Cambridge, such a remarkable range of teaching and research in both theoretical and applied linguistics.”

For more information about the new department, visit: www.mml.cam.ac.uk/dtal.

ettle’s Yard has announced the appointment of Andrew Nairne as its new Director.

Nairne succeeds Michael Harrison, who is retiring after 19 years in the role.

The appointment comes at an important time for the collection: work is about to begin on a new education wing, after the success of a £5m appeal.

Founded in 1957 by HS ‘Jim’ Ede, Kettle’s Yard became part of Cambridge University in 1966. Since then, while still best known to students as the place to get real art to hang in your student room, Kettle’s Yard has become internationally renowned for its collection and programme of exhibitions.

Nairne was most recently Executive Director, Arts for Arts Council England. As a curator and gallery director he has worked with artists at the forefront of the contemporary visual arts from Jake and Dinos Chapman and Tracey Emin to Olafur Eliasson and Ernesto Neto.

The forthcoming development will provide new education spaces, an expanded art library, a project gallery and proper collection storage.

For more information, visit www.kettlesyard.co.uk.

UNIVERSITY

Cambridge tops tables The University of Cambridge has been ranked number one in the world for the second year running in the 2011 QS World University Rankings.

The rankings assess factors including reputation, graduate employability, research and staff–student ratios and are compiled from surveys of more than 33,000 academics and 16,000 graduate employers across the globe, among the largest ever conducted.

The Vice-Chancellor, Professor Sir Leszek Borysiewicz, said: “It is welcome to see the best British universities ranked with the best in the world by the 2011 QS World University Rankings.

“As one of the world’s leading research universities Cambridge makes a unique contribution to society and to the individual, not just here in the UK but globally.

We help to uphold the reputation of the UK as a centre of excellence internationally.”

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DIARY AUTUMN/ WINTER MUSIC

CUMS Choral and Chamber Music Concert & Supper Monday 12 March 2012, 7–10 pm, London

Smith

The Cambridge University Musical Society (CUMS) invites you to an exclusive concert and supper in London. Cambridge University Chamber Choir and other Cambridge musicians will perform, followed by a two-course buffet supper with the musicians.

Tickets cost £50 per person.

SPORT

Celebration Dinner Saturday 12 May 2012, 6.15pm, The Painted Hall, The Old Royal Naval College, London, sponsored by Hill.

NETWORKING

Getting together in style Monday 5 December 2011, 7.30–9.30 pm, London

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of sports. All alumni and their guests are warmly invited to book for this event. The dress code is black tie and tickets cost £212 per person. www.alumni.cam.ac.uk/events Ed Clayton

The Cambridge alumni community is represented in almost every sector, at almost every level, so it is no surprise that when we come together the results can be spectacular. This December Sir Paul Judge (Trinity 1968) once again invites alumni to join him at his riverside apartment for an evening of networking and to enjoy stunning views of the London skyline. The evening is hosted by Sir Paul and members of the Alumni Advisory Board.

Tickets cost £48 per person.

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or many at Cambridge sport is a hugely important part of undergraduate life. This elegant dinner in the spectacular surroundings of the Painted Hall at the Old Royal Naval College in London is a chance to honour Cambridge sporting achievement with a distinct nod to the major events in London which follow shortly after in the year. After a drinks reception, alumni and guests will proceed to a three-course dinner featuring some spectacular dinner theatre, and a few surprises, at tables hosted by Cambridge Olympians and sporting greats, giving you a chance to meet athletes from a wide range

DIARY AUTUMN/ WINTER

How to book Book online at www.alumni.cam.ac.uk.

If you don’t have internet access you can phone us to book or send us a letter.

Don’t forget to include your (and your guests’) full name, College, matriculation date and membership number (where applicable).

Please be aware that all events are subject to change. Pre-booking is essential for all events unless otherwise indicated.

BUSINESS

INTERNATIONAL

Global Alumni Conference Friday, Saturday & Sunday , 13–15 April 2012

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the Grand Hyatt Hong Kong.

The third day of the Conference (Sunday 15 April) is specifically designed for alumni involved in running the global network of more than 400 volunteer-led groups. Building on the success of the annual UK-based volunteer Leadership Conference, CARO staff look forward to welcoming alumni group leaders to learn more about volunteer-led groups and to share best practice.

The drinks reception and Alumni Groups Leadership Conference are free to attend. Tickets for the lecture day on Saturday cost £75 per person or HK$1000 and include lunch and coffee. Alumni can book for all or some of the events. Advance booking is required and places are limited.

Business Briefings are back for a second series. Drawing on up-to-the-minute research and led by Cambridge Judge Business School faculty, the new programme will examine what continues to be a rapidly changing business environment. Events will take place in London and internationally.

To join the business briefing mailing list and to find out more about the 2011/12 series visit: www.cambridgejudgebriefings.com.

Paul Wearing

ext year alumni have the opportunity to enjoy the first Cambridge Global Alumni Conference, which will be held in Hong Kong.

Alumni can join the Vice-Chancellor for a series of events taking place over one weekend starting with an evening drinks reception on Friday 13 April hosted by one of our thriving local volunteer-led groups the Friends of Cambridge University in Hong Kong.

On Saturday 14 April, the ViceChancellor Professor Sir Leszek Borysiewicz, the Master of St Catharine’s Professor Dame Jean Thomas, and an array of distinguished academics will come together to provide alumni with a thought provoking day of discussion, lectures and networking at

Cambridge Judge Business Briefings

DEPARTMENT OF GENETICS

Genetics Symposium Friday 7 September 2012, Churchill College The Arthur Balfour Chair of Genetics at Cambridge marks its centenary in 2012. To celebrate, the Department of Genetics will be hosting a one-day symposium and dinner at Churchill College. All alumni and former members of the department are very warmly invited. For more information please email: events@alumni.cam.ac.uk.

David Franklin

Contact CARO Website: www.alumni.cam.ac.uk Email: events@admin.cam.ac.uk Telephone: +44 (0)1223 332288 Post: Cambridge Alumni Relations Office University of Cambridge 1 Quayside, Bridge Street Cambridge, CB5 8AB CAM 64 09

Celebrate your Cambridge connection.

The University of Cambridge exclusive alumni pen – available in gilded silver, sterling silver and black acrylic.

For an extremely special gift this season, give someone the chance to join Sir Winston Churchill, Florence Nightingale and Edgar Wallace in owning a beautiful and practical fountain pen from Onoto, one of England’s oldest and most respected pen companies.

Created exclusively for the University, these bestselling pens offer a unique way to mark a Cambridge connection, whether for an alumnus or alumna or for a current student at the University.

Each pen bears the University shield in 23ct gold plate and may also be personalised with: • College shield • Name or initials engraved on the barrel • Matriculation or graduation year engraved on the gilded silver cap ring.

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E S TA B L I S H E D I N E N G L A N D 1 9 0 5

For more information and to order, telephone Onoto on + 44 (0)1603 811165 or visit www.onoto.com/cambridge.asp Order by 1 December to guarantee Christmas delivery.

Applies to UK only.

Please contact Onoto for overseas delivery details.

See the range of other Cambridge gifts available...

The merchandise range is specially developed for CARO and all purchases directly benefit the work of the Alumni Relations Office.

www.alumni.cam.ac.uk/benefits/merchandise

CONNECT

BlueSci available to alumni BlueSci, the University’s longest running student-run science magazine, is now available to alumni.

To receive three issues a year and help promote the understanding of science in the University, visit the website www.blusci.org or email membership@bluesci.co. Standard subscriptions cost £12, overseas subscriptions are £16 and sponsored subscriptions are between £20 and £50.

Tippl’d tales Do you have happy memories of Varsity Blind Wine Tasting? Pol Roger Champagne would like to hear from you. The company is compiling a special edition book to coincide with the 60th anniversary of the Varsity Match in spring 2013 and would like to include alumni reminiscences and photographs. For further information contact Jennifer Segal at js@jsnewsmedia.com.

Robin Heighway-Bury

ONLINE SERVICES

Log on to update your details Want to view and update your contact details with the University more easily?

Using your alumni membership number (printed on your CAMCard and on the cover sheet accompanying CAM), you can now register for a new part of the alumni website to update your email address and other contact details we hold for you.

In the New Year, alumni who are already signed up to cantab.net (the lifetime email service available to all graduates) will be able to connect directly to their account from the home page, and those not currently signed up to the service will be able to set up an account easily. Alumni who are registered will also soon be able to take advantage of a new online Business Directory and benefit from improved networking opportunities.

To register, to opt out, or for more information, visit the website www.alumni.cam.ac.uk, telephone + 44 (0)1223 760163 or email website@alumni.cam.ac.uk.

To register securely, enter your first College and alumni membership number.

• You will then be presented with your preferred name, surname and year of matriculation.

• Once you have selected these and clicked ‘next’, you will be asked to enter your date of birth.

• Your online account will then be authenticated and you will be taken to your profile page where you can check the email address we hold for you and create a password for your account.

Please note that, unfortunately, opting out will mean you will no longer receive the CARO e-bulletin or e-communications from University departments, clubs and societies who contact you via the Alumni and Development Offices.

Cambridge around the world A number of new alumni groups have just started, including a dining club in Hamburg, an Oxbridge Muslim alumni shared-interest group and Cambridge Societies in Queensland and Bolivia. For more information on how to access the network of over 400 groups which keep Cambridge alumni connected across the world visit www.alumni.cam.ac.uk/groups.

Email for life Did you know that over 59,500 alumni have signed up to an email for life address which identifies them as a member of the University? The cantab.net service includes an email address and email account that can be used wherever you are, enabling friends and contacts to stay in touch however frequently you change jobs, location or ISP. All alumni who have matriculated and studied at the University are eligible for a cantab.net account. To find out more go to www.alumni.cam.ac.uk/benefits/email.

Andy Potts

Data Protection statement As part of a wider project, the University Development Office (CUDO) and the Alumni Relations Office (CARO) have reviewed data protection procedures.

Our revised data protection statement can be found in full on the cover sheet enclosed with this issue of CAM and is also available online at: www.alumni.cam.ac.uk/ dataprotection.

CAM 64 11

MY ROOM, YOUR ROOM WOODLARK 7, SHERLOCK COURT ST CATHARINE’S

Words Leigh Brauman Photograph Charlie Troman Joanne Harris (St Catharine’s 1982) is a novelist best known for her book Chocolat, which was made into a film starring Johnny Depp. Her latest novel, Blueeyedboy, is published by Black Swan.

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Peter Bullock is a third year Natsci (Chemistry) who says he doesn’t feel bad about not going to the library. “You don’t need the library to be a science student: you have lecture notes and Wikipedia and that’s all you need.”

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retty much anything can be cooked in a sandwich toaster if you try,” declares the novelist Joanne Harris. “Sausages were a particular favourite of mine. In those days sandwich toasters had these little dips in them, just big enough to accommodate a sausage. The smell would always drift down the staircase. Occasionally one of the porters would rush up to ask if anyone had been cooking in the gyp room – which wasn’t allowed – but of course no one had.”

Third year Natsci Peter Bullock laughs at this and agrees that Woodlark 7, a large, light, woodpanelled room which just happens to be situated directly over the Porters’ Lodge has many merits but also a few hazards.

“It’s no good for parties,” Bullock submits, “but it’s very quiet – I can’t hear the porters, though I think they can hear me!”

Sausages aside, Harris says the room looks much like it did in her day. The ancient gas fire and peeling walls may have gone, but the narrow bed (“It’s really just a plank, isn’t it?” she says) and basin-in-cupboard arrangement remain. Where today Bullock has pinned

THE BEST...

NOOK IN CAMBRIDGE Laurie Tuffrey read English (Fitzwilliam 2008) Cambridge may be endowed with more than its fair share of courtyards, cloisters and alleyways, but all these potential favourite nooks are subject to extreme seasonal variation. In the winter, the best recess might be the nearest street that takes you out of the wind, or, better still, a corner of a café, safely ensconced with coffee and cake. In the summer months, a shaded spot in college gardens or a tangle of trees beside the river are both good hideaways. In exam term – and with any reading examiners in mind – my favoured corner is in the UL, North Wing, Floor 2, with a carefully chosen pile of books and an envious eye out for the camera-toting tourists basking in the sun.

However, the best year-round nook, the one that provides succour and mental shelter come rain or shine, requires a little stroll away from the centre. Head down Queens’ Road along the Backs and follow it round to where it peels off into Grantchester Street. Navigate the little complex of streets to Grantchester Meadows; walk a hundred paces and here, where the path opens onto the first field, is

the best nook in Cambridge.

The beauty of this corner is its position on the edge of the city. Turn back and you head into the academic bastion, the spires doubling as visual prompts to underwritten essays and the unexplored regions of reading lists. Walk away, and the concerns of work recede from your mind at the same rate as the spires do from your sightline. At the end of the path is Grantchester, a vision of hazy afternoons, fronded with scones, jam and cream. Beyond lie the perpetually under-appreciated flatlands of Cambridgeshire. The fields open out and the land expands further in every direction, England’s own Big Sky Country. It’s a giant perspective just a few footsteps south of my enclave in the field.

The philosopher Henry David Thoreau advised people to walk for at least four hours every day. But while his books call me back to the library, standing on the edge of the field his words seem ever harder to ignore.

My solution for some guilt-free Thoreau-esque tramping? Take a book.

Steve Bond

up a Periodic Table and a poster entitled E-cownomics, Harris remembers a Bob Venosa reproduction (“one of those hippy-ish, spacey pictures”) and a poster of Jeff Wayne’s War of the Worlds. “People still have that on their walls!” says Bullock.

“What I liked about the room was the beautiful view that you get from your desk,” Harris says. “When the magnolia comes into bloom it has an amazing scent. You can open the window and it just wafts in.”

It turns out that Harris and Bullock, though from opposing sides of the arts-science divide, have a surprisingly similar approach to work and play.

Harris, who read French and German, admits she was always busy away from the library, whether depping for her bass teacher at gigs in London or going to the theatre. Bullock too finds much to occupy him away from the lecture hall: a keen player of Third Team football, he is hoping to take up rugby this year, having just given up singing in the College choir.

And when an initially cagey Bullock confesses to a notorious St Chad’s Freshers Week party (it’s become something of a Catz tradition apparently) that ended in a fire alarm error, Harris surprises him by saying that she’s heard of the party (from the Admissions Tutor, no less) and can match him.

“A number of friends and I used to have water fights in the Quad using bath sponges dipped in water.

You waited until it was dark and then jumped out and sponged people,” she says. “In my first year I managed to do this to the Chaplain by accident. Fortunately he was very sweet about it because I did think, ‘Here ends my career right now…’”

Neither places much importance on attendance at lectures. Harris says she quickly realised that reading the texts meant she was free to think up her own theories, while Bullock, though conceding that lecture notes are essential (“I would have trouble coming up with my own theory of quantum mechanics”), admits he has already slept through one of his two lectures – and it is only the first day of term. “I’ve got a 50% record,” he says, ruefully.

Nonetheless, both are awed by the power of the supervision. “I had a very wonderful, and somewhat eccentric German tutor who would talk about everything apart from my essay,” says Harris.

“She would feed me strange alcoholic beverages from Germany and I’d then have to cycle back full of whatever liqueur she’d been plying me with. She was very good at broadening people’s horizons.”

Bullock agrees.

“Supervisions, full stop, are great. The only text-book I’ve got for Chemistry is the definitive book for undergraduates – the authors were my supervisors last year. So that’s a bit special.”

What would they each bequest to future occupants?

For Harris it’s simple: “I think that sandwich toaster, though illegal, was probably the most useful thing I had.” And Bullock? “I think everyone needs a Periodic Table poster to look at while they are cleaning their teeth,” he says.

‘In my first year I managed to sponge the Chaplain by accident...’

CAM 64 13

Mani Aiyar (standing) and Khurshid Kasuri (seated) photographed in the Master’s Lodge, Trinity Hall.

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Cabinet ministers in opposing Indian and Pakistani governments, Mani Aiyar (Trinity Hall 1961) and Khurshid Kasuri (Trinity Hall 1961) say they agree about almost everything – apart from how they first met.

A

rriving at Trinity Hall from Pakistan in 1961, Khurshid Kasuri remembers meeting Mani Aiyar at their matriculation photograph. “Going for the photograph I saw a South Asian face,” Kasuri says.

“Together with another Pakistani, I went up to Mani and asked him if he was from India.

He said yes, and I stood next to him in the photograph.”

Aiyar, however, maintains they met a day or two earlier, before their first hall. “Tuesday 8 October 1961 at 7pm was when this historic meeting took place,” he teases. “Khurshid is mixing up two separate events!”

“I arrived and was very nervous because I didn’t know what would be done with my steel trunk,” Aiyar explains. “I’d been told in India of the great differences here – they don’t have servants in England – so how on earth was the steel trunk to be taken up to the second floor of the B staircase?”

Reassured by the porter, when Aiyar returned from his room he encountered two Pakistanis. “We started talking and it turned out Khurshid was from Lahore, which is where I was born. I had come by boat from Bombay to Liverpool and on the way we’d stopped in Karachi, so there was enough to talk about.”

While they bicker gently over the detail today, 50 years ago both were thousands of miles from home and took comfort from their shared – although recently divided – continent and interest in politics.

“We realised we had common interests in politics and that brought us together,” says Kasuri, who read law. Aiyar, who read economics, was the more active of the two in student politics, going on Aldermaston marches and bidding to become president of the Union.

“I almost made it!” he says. “I had only two years to do it but became secretary of the Union and my president was Ken Clarke.”

The pair were regulars at Oxfam fundraising events, even though Aiyar admits his motives were far from selfless. “I used to attend the Oxfam lunches to get rid of my hunger,” he says, making Khurshid laugh a lot. “Every time there was fish served in hall – and I couldn’t stick fish, not even now – I used to rush off to the 2s 6d Oxfam lunches of bread and cheese because there was no limit on the amount you could eat!”. Arriving in Cambridge only 14 years after partition, both also shared a healthy scepticism about what really divided Indians from Pakistanis.

“I was quite curious to get to know an Indian – one had heard so much negativity in Pakistan,” Kasuri explains, “so I was trying to get to know what an Indian feels like and talks like, and also to make the point that it is possible to rise above communalism. And in the process we developed a lifelong friendship.”

“I made a lot of Pakistani friends at Cambridge,” Aiyar agrees, adding by way of punchline, “they always had the prettiest girlfriends and I was hoping that some of the detritus would come my way!” Again, the pair dissolve into laughter.

Both say their upbringings helped them rise above communalism, although they come from very different families: Kasuri’s father and grandfather were both politicians while Aiyar’s mother – a devout Hindu – spent the last 20 years of her life in an ashram.

“In my case it was my politics that influenced my friendship,” Aiyar says. “I had a large number of Indian Muslim friends and couldn’t believe that an Indian Muslim was very different to a Pakistani Muslim, so it made no sense whatsoever for India to base its politics with

Words Becky Allen Photograph Steve Bond

HISTORY OF A FRIENDSHIP

MIDNIGHT’S CHILDREN

Pakistan on the myth that the Pakistanis were largely Muslims and the Indians were largely Hindus.

“I myself was virtually a communist and certainly an atheist so religion meant nothing to me. What did matter to me was to ensure that people who did believe in religion lived together harmoniously. So I never had any hang-ups about meeting Pakistanis or getting to know them, and Cambridge was really the first opportunity of doing so.”

Despite religious and political differences (Kasuri describes himself as “left of centre” while describing Aiyar as “too much to the left”), the pair agree on international relations.

“We’re on exactly the same side – for India –Pakistan normalisation first, followed by friendship. That’s where the future for Pakistan–India lies, and 1.5 billion people’s destinies are affected by that,” Kasuri says.

While Kasuri has spent a lifetime in politics, Aiyar worked for the Indian Foreign Service for 26 years before standing for election, and their paths crossed regularly. Aiyar became India’s first Consul General in Pakistan and, some 40 years after leaving Cambridge, both found themselves in their respective governments: Kasuri as Pakistan’s Foreign Minister and Aiyar as India’s Minister for Petroleum.

Now, as then, they believe peace is not only possible, but essential. “When I became Foreign Minister my first statement to the media was that I wanted peace with India, and that it served the interests of Pakistan,” says Kasuri.

“So over the years since I met Mani I thought my original ideas were not wrong – that an Indian and Pakistani could be friends, and that India and Pakistan could be friends too. All that was needed was a just solution.”

Kasuri is optimistic about a solution being reached. “I believe that peace is possible because I know the detail, I know that the bottom lines can be met, that there is a way around even Kashmir,” he says.

Since meeting at Cambridge their friendship has grown to include a large measure of mutual admiration – and a tiny bit of envy: for what they achieved on the international stage, for having the courage of their convictions and – for one of them at least – for going to prison for those beliefs.

Even this, Aiyar turns into a joke. “When we were at Cambridge I rather liked him but it was after I got to Pakistan that I began admiring him,” he explains. “Most of that time Khurshid was either in jail or about to be jailed. I’ve always been envious of him [because] you don’t qualify as a subcontinental politician until you’ve been jailed – and I never have been.

“But the story about Khurshid in jail is that even there he sends for his silk pyjamas and his fancy dressing gown and puts on a cravat,” at which the pair laugh uproariously. “His fellow jailbirds are still trying to recover from being incarcerated with him!”

To share the history of your friendship email us at: cameditor@alumni.cam.ac.uk CAM 64 15

SECRET CAMBRIDGE

MrsDarwin’s Greenhouse Words Becky Allen Images Steve Bond

S

trolling through the grounds of Murray Edwards College you would be forgiven for failing to notice a small, aged greenhouse resting its old iron bones against the Coach House.

At the height of summer, the greenhouse is empty.

The decorated porous floor tiles have been swept clean, the doors and windows stand open to release the heat, and the staging is bare save for a pair of mousetraps.

But look a little closer at the greenhouse’s sunken walls and you’ll find clinging to the brickwork two hart’s tongue ferns – a living link to one of Cambridge’s most famous wives: Emma Darwin.

Following the death of Charles Darwin in 1882, Emma decided to divide her life between Kent and Cambridge, spending summers at Down House and winters at 16 CAM 64

The Grove. The greenhouse became hers in 1883 when she bought The Grove (which is now part of Fitzwilliam College). That spring, while the house was being readied for her, she declared herself “much charmed with the place. I never saw such a display of primroses anywhere, especially under each of the beech trees they were like a carpet.”

In time her sons became her neighbours there: on one side of The Grove Francis built Wychfield, while on the other Horace constructed The Orchard – where Murray Edwards College now stands.

A testament to Victorian craftsmanship, the greenhouse remains unaltered (although refurbished) since Emma’s day. Built from cast iron and western red cedar – an American timber whose natural oils prevent it from rotting – it has glass shaped and arranged like fish scales to encourage rainwater to drain away from the woodwork.

“All the iron, all the glass, and all the wood are original,” says Jo Cobb, head gardener at Murray Edwards, “and so are the cast iron heating pipes. Some poor boy would have had to get up in the night to stoke the boiler in winter.”

And it’s the sunken design of the greenhouse – as well as its relic hart’s tongues – that make Jo believe it was once a fernery. “Emma Darwin probably used it as a fern house because it’s sunken to conserve the heat,” she explains.

Almost 130 years on, Jo values the same features of the greenhouse that Emma Darwin once prized. “It’s fabulous. In winter we just heat it with a 3kW heater and that keeps it frost-free,” she says, protecting the College’s tender perennials – salvias from South America, showy dahlias, banana palms and datura – from the Cambridge cold.

Students can only admire Emma Darwin’s greenhouse from the outside, however, as it is the only part of Murray Edwards garden out of bounds to them.

That students are now encouraged to make full use of the rest of the College garden – to walk on its grass, pick its flowers for their rooms, and even harvest fruit and veg for their suppers – is the result of the Murray Edwards’ gardeners exhibiting at Chelsea Flower Show in 2007, where they won a Bronze Flora medal.

“Chelsea was the pinnacle of us being a display garden,” Jo remembers, “but when we came back we had this huge crisis and asked ourselves fundamental questions about why we were gardening. I think we were very, very tired!”

But their fatigue bore fruit. “We decided that caring should be a metaphor for our garden, so we changed our display garden into something more like a back garden, somewhere with fabulous things in it but also somewhere you could do fabulous things,” she says.

Today, those fabulous things include vines trained up the tennis court fencing (whose grapes regularly find their way into wine), a vegetable garden where students can enjoy a healthy crop of courgettes, runner beans, chard, onions, tomatoes and strawberries, and there’s even a small field of wheat, which last year was milled and made into bread.

The students love the garden, especially its herbs, says Jo. “Students from the Middle East really like the mint for their tea, we grew methi for our Indian students, and at the moment we’re growing tomatillos for students from South America. They use it for making salsa and it seems very close to their hearts.” All of which, you feel, Emma Darwin would have appreciated.

Above: The greenhouse in the last days of summer.

Opposite page, top: the view from Fitzwilliam.

Opposite page, bottom: Vent mechanism; stippled floor tiles.

18 CAM 64

AComingof Age Twenty-one years ago we published the first issue of CAM. To celebrate, Lucy Jolin examines the rituals that mark the transition from childhood to adulthood.

Illustration Chris Wadden

D

r Stephen Hugh-Jones, Emeritus Research Associate of the Department of Social Anthropology and a fellow of King’s College, is standing in a longhouse in a forest in north-west Amazonia, being whipped. It is his third day of flagellation and he is painted black. He is allowed no contact with fire. He will spend the next month in seclusion, fasting. Then he will be made to drink a concoction of hot chilli while being painted red. If he makes it through the rite of passage, only then will he become a full member of the group. Only then will he properly come of age.

There’s something slightly archaic about that phrase to Western ears: it’s redolent of a Regency buck finally getting to throw away his inheritance at the faro table, a solemn Tudor teenager taking on the burden of his father’s feuds, an eager student throwing in his studies to crush the Kaiser by Christmas. Or it’s a Weird World newspaper column about tribal ritual, something that funny foreigners do which is so far removed from our own experience that we can chuckle about it over our cornflakes. Coming of age officially seems to mean less than it did, as the lines between childhood, teenagehood and adulthood become increasingly legally and culturally blurred.

Historically, 21 was the age at which the child became the man – the number which created adulthood. But 21 has lost its focus. The Family Law Reform Act of 1969 shaved three years off the age at which an upstanding UK citizen could legally vote. The new age of majority was now 18. Lesser-known rights won by 18-year-olds included the right to be hypnotised in public places (formerly 21, as described in the Hypnotism Act of 1952), to be described as a minor (rather than infant), and to exercise certain rights over the Duchy of Cornwall (if you happened to be Prince Charles). These days, the key to the door unlocks little but the right to drive a category D1 minibus with a maximum of 16 passenger seats. Does coming of age as a ritual, as a recognised transition, an excuse for a party, really matter any more?

The shadow of adulthood has always fallen early. Coming of age is the most important theme in children’s literature, says Professor Maria Nikolajeva, Professor of Education at the Cambridge Faculty of Education and an expert on children’s literature. “Even in books for very young children,” she says. “Because it is imminent.”

It’s perhaps relevant that in few children’s books does the hero or heroine come of age in a way that’s actually linked to their age or birthday. Instead, the transition could be something as simple as having a chat with your stuffed bear in the forest. As Christopher Robin puts it to Pooh before his departure for boarding school: “I’m not going to do Nothing any more … They don’t let you.”

The House at Pooh Corner, says Nikolajeva, who cites it as her favourite book, is “a profound book. It’s built up towards Christopher Robin’s inevitable departure in a very interesting way. First it’s all innocent games. Then new characters come in and disturb the balance.

Then there’s this big storm when Owl’s home is disrupted. All is built towards the farewell to childhood. But it’s also an affirmation of childhood – something that you bear with you through your life, but also something that you have to leave behind and it’s very painful.”

Indeed, Dr Hugh-Jones points out that, although the rituals we use to mark the transition are drastically different, virtually every society has them. And while Tibetan hair-changing festivities to mark a teenage girl’s puberty and blood-letting of adolescent males in Papua New Guinea might seem far removed from, say, an American teenager’s prom night, the basic patterns are the same.

“All rites of passage have a tripartite structure,” he says. “There is either a formal part followed by an informal part, or the other way round – informality followed by formality. Then, there is a kind of hiatus – a nether region, the honeymoon, when you’re neither one thing nor the other. There’s a contrast between chaos and order, formality and informality. Take the tribal rite of passage which I underwent.

CAM 64 19

The first part was no fire and the second bit Coming of age within a familiar religious was fire. In the first part we were painted framework – the confirmation, the bar or head to toe with black and in the second bat mitzvah – is perhaps the most widely bit we were painted head to toe with red. recognised ritual which still exists in the In 1907, the enterprising Dr Duncan MacDougall decided to calculate the weight of the departing soul. He weighed So again you see this switching pattern.

West. Professor David Ford, Regius six patients just before and just after they expired.

Not all rites of passage conform exactly Professor of Divinity and director of the As a control, he also performed the same experiment on to this pattern but it is very common and Cambridge Inter-Faith Programme recalls 15 dying dogs. Result: no weight loss from the dogs, and seems to underlie an awful lot of rites of asking a group of Omani Ibadi Muslims from one human, a loss of three-quarters of an ounce – passage world-wide. Look at the marriage how they marked religious coming of age.

21 grams.

MacDougall’s experiments were denounced as nonceremony – the formality of the vicar’s “They said it is through taking a full part in sense as soon as he published his results. But it’s perhaps speeches contrasted with the traditionally the prayers and the Ramadan fast, which is testament to the power of 21 that this myth about the fun and risqué best man’s speech. done when they enter puberty. It is not human soul weighing 21 grams has endured ever since.

The pattern seems to be constant but the marked by a special ceremony, and it struck After all, there’s a certain glamour around the number. content differs.” me that much religious coming of age, Where to store the private wine collections of Marilyn What is the point of these rituals? “One Monroe, Elizabeth Taylor, Richard Nixon and Gloria indeed most of what we grow into, is Swanson? Why, the 21 Club in New York, formerly a welltheory focuses on how the whole thing is actually like that – entering into the known Prohibition speakeasy, of course. (It must have organised, this patterning, which seems to practices of a family, school, community or been highly satisfying when Prohibition was repealed by be characteristic,” says Hugh-Jones. “One the 21st Amendment.) tradition because it is ‘the done thing’ and aspect of this patterning is that the rituals respected people do it.”

It’s hard to think of another number making such an effective denouement to a card game. Announcing serve to create time. If there wasn’t What need do these rituals serve? a lunch time, there is a sense in which there ‘Vingt-et-un!’ is somehow far more satisfying than shouting Undoubtedly, says Ford, they have power.

‘Twenty-one!’ wouldn’t be a before-noon and an afterTwenty-one is also a number in the Fibonacci sequence, “I think it is one of the major challenges noon. So lunch is a ritual, marking time. facing our world to seek wise and responwhere each number in the sequence is the sum of the previous two (start with 0, then 1). The sequence is not If you’re in a ship crossing the equator, sible forms of faith, and the shaping of lives simply a mathematical curiosity. These numbers appear there is absolutely nothing that you would and communities through rich and deep again and again in nature – the so-called Fibonacci see that marks the line. It’s just one boring rituals that have been developed and tested spirals of sea shells, pine cones, flower petals and leaf day after another. But by making a ritual over centuries is essential to this. If you like, arrangements.

– the crossing of the line ritual, an example rituals might be seen as the DNA of a habitSo it’s not hard to see how 21 could come to be associated with something mystical. Even in the rational of burlesque and bawdiness – you create able tradition of understanding, imagining 21st century. the line that isn’t there. People say that it’s and behaving. It’s like a condensed because you cross the line that you have the code that shapes ongoing life in line with ritual. But actually you can turn it round and say that it’s the a wisdom that goes way back in history but can also undergo all sorts ritual that creates the line. If it wasn’t for Christmas, you wouldn’t of new developments and mutations, good or bad. Religions are dense have a New Year and an old year. It’s the festivities which create with meaning and purpose. We all need meaning to make sense of the time. It’s these rites of coming of age that in a sense create the ourselves and our world.” age. If there wasn’t any ritualisation, you wouldn’t notice it.”

So it does matter, this transition, and it seems that the urge to mark Or as Douglas Adams observed, “Time is an illusion. Lunchtime, time, to find meaning through ritual, is something that survives no doubly so.” matter what. But perhaps it’s not just how you come of age – it’s how Could there be a neurological reason for this urge to mark the you seek to make sense of it that matters, whether that guidance is transition between child and adult? For years it was suspected that found in the hallucinations of a hot chilli drink, the words of the New the human brain showed dramatic changes during growing up, Testament, the patterns of your brain or the wisdom of a stuffed bear. but these theories were impossible to prove when working only with “I have written several books on coming of age in children’s literature animal brains. Advances in brain scanning technology over the last and I am still struggling with the ambivalence displayed,” says three decades now mean that neuroscientists can demonstrate what Nikolajeva. “Either coming of age is desirable or it’s something to be Professor Ian Goodyer, Professor of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry avoided at all costs. This sends very contradictory messages to young at the School of Clinical Medicine calls the “redistribution of neural readers. Because if you’re telling them that childhood is a good place to architecture” which takes place between the ages of 8 and 21. be and that growing up is undesirable, you are lying.

The teenage years are notorious for their chaos and uncertainty “Take Peter Pan – on the one hand, there is this exceptional child with good reason, says Goodyer. “There’s a lot of work at the moment who never grows up because he wants to have fun, but he is also around whether many shifts in behaviour are in part contributed a lonely, unfortunate and unhappy person because he is not human. to by alterations in the way in which the brain’s architecture – and the He is denied. He has not chosen to be initiated in what it is to be associated functions – change. Sleep has been studied – alterations in human – growing up, creating, interacting with other people and so sleep patterns, changes in energy levels, along with increases in rapid on. He is so bitter. His mother has forgotten him and replaced him and sometimes, if not frequent, incorrect decision making. with another baby. But Wendy is affirmative. She chooses, very clearly, “All these things are probably a behavioural consequence of neural growing up, because – as JM Barrie tells us – ‘Wendy was grown up. changes. So it’s harder in adolescent years than it is in childhood years You need not be sorry for her. She was one of the kind that likes to or adult years to prevent yourself from responding rapidly, which grow up. In the end she grew up of her own free will a day quicker than may or may not be a good thing. It’s the speed of response that seems other girls’. to be something that marks a distinction between the three age periods “Because to deny altogether the necessity of growing up is to deny of childhood, adolescence and adulthood.” Here’s that tripartite the very essence of being a human being. If we say to children structure again as a repeating pattern in nature: the brain’s developthat childhood is a happy place, stay there, then we deny ourselves as ment mirroring periods of calm, followed by chaos, followed by grown-ups, as human beings.” an emergence into the adult world. The peace and tranquillity of the Hundred Acre Wood is shattered by the appearance of an excitable tiger with a taste for Extract of Malt.

The power of 21

CAM 64 21

I

n late August 1981, on the penultimate day of their run at the Edinburgh Fringe, the cast of the Footlights revue became aware that an interloper had joined them on stage. Already a comic star, Rowan Atkinson had crept behind the then-unknown sextet of Stephen Fry (Queens’ 1978), Hugh Laurie (Selwyn 1978), Tony Slattery (Trinity Hall 1978), Paul Shearer (St John’s 1979), Emma Thompson (Newnham 1978) and Penny Dwyer (Homerton 1979), as they took their curtain call.

The ambush was for Atkinson to announce that the group had won a new prize: the Perrier Award, instituted for the festival’s best comedy production. As well as heralding the arrival of some great comic talents, the prize was to have a profound effect on the reputation of the Footlights – arguably surpassing even the achievements of Peter Cook (Pembroke 1957), Jonathan Miller (St John’s 1953) and sundry Pythons and Goodies, decades earlier.

Paul Shearer, later to join the cast of The Fast Show, says: “We assumed they wouldn’t want to give it to such an established comedy group, and we thought there would be anti-Oxbridge feeling. But with the quality

of the material and the performances from Hugh, Stephen, Emma and Tony, and to a lesser extent Penny and myself, the judges felt they had to award it to us. It was a wonderful thing for us at the time.”

Almost 30 years later, on a morning halfway through their run, the cast of the 2011 Footlights revue, Pretty Little Panic, are gathered around the kitchen table in their rented Edinburgh flat – rather too conveniently located opposite one of the city’s biggest nightclubs. Ben Ashenden (Trinity Hall 2008), Adam Lawrence (Jesus 2009) and Alex Owen (St John’s 2008) are bleary-eyed; Mark Fiddaman (Corpus Christi 2008) just out of the shower, is wearing only a towel.

“Doing the Footlights show here is a double-edged sword,” says Lawrence. “We get an incredible venue and time slot, given that the four of us are amateurs who have not done much before. We get 180 people coming to see us each day. No comedians get that here unless they’re already successful.

“But the other side is that people have high expectations, and demand that it’s better than the average student show. There’s little goodwill or a feeling of ‘Let’s give these lads a chance’.”

Fringebenefits Thirty years ago a troupe of Cambridge unknowns, including Stephen Fry, Hugh Laurie, Tony Slattery and Emma Thompson, took Edinburgh by storm. This year, as every year, a fresh crop of University talent is hoping for success. William Ham Bevan investigates the enduring appeal of the Footlights revue.

Image courtesy Foster’s Edinburgh Comedy Awards

Main photograph Charlie Troman

RIght: The first Perrier Award, 1981. (Left-toright): Hugh Laurie, Rowan Atkinson, Tony Slattery, Stephen Fry, Penny Dwyer, Emma Thompson, Paul Shearer.

22 CAM 64

Opposite page: (Left-to-right) Mark Fiddaman, Alex Owen, Ben Ashenden and Adam Lawrence pictured backstage.

CAM 64 23

For them, as for generations of Footlighters, the summer tour is an established rite of passage. It bridges the gap between student and professional comedy, granting exposure beyond the University and the chance of being talent-spotted.

Paul Shearer believes that for many performers, doing the Fringe is the determining factor in whether they try to make a living out of comedy, or put it to one side for good. He says: “It becomes that moment of choice. At the Fringe, there’s the feeling that it really might be possible to carve out a career in entertainment.

“My choice was not to apply for a proper job, and then when I was picked up by an agent, it seemed to be a choice that was justified. Thirty years on, I’ve still never applied for a real job.”

Sophie Winkleman (Trinity Hall 1998), the only female cast member of the Perrier Awardnominated 2001 revue, Far Too Happy, agrees. “Edinburgh is where things either take flight and explode, or whimper away into the darkness. I found it so magical that afterwards, I couldn’t imagine doing anything sensible, steady or certain. I chose a life of complete mayhem because of Footlights – totally and utterly.”

Since Cambridge, Winkleman has gone on to success on stage and screen, including a spell with the Royal Shakespeare Company and the role of Big Suze in the acclaimed Channel 4 comedy Peep Show; but she still recalls Edinburgh as “one of the best times of my life”.

She says: “We were bounding round to see other acts, and back to do our own show.

We were always changing it, because we wanted it to be perfect: our antennae were quivering permanently for three weeks.”

Inevitably, the fine-tuning of the show at Edinburgh brings about disappointments.

Two-time cast member Neil Mullarkey (Robinson 1980), who now uses his improvisation skills in executive training, explains: “On the rest of the tour, you do a two-act show, because the theatre lives or dies by its bar takings at the interval.

“But when you take it to Edinburgh, you cut it from two hours to one and a quarter.

Suddenly you’ve got to deal with taking out sketches, and it’s no longer possible to give everyone equal exposure. A lot of egos are trampled upon.”

In a 2009 South Bank Show retrospective on the Footlights, one-time vice-president Griff Rhys Jones (Emmanuel 1972) said: “You learn naked competitiveness and a political understanding of how to get on.” But at Edinburgh, raw ambition is tempered by the need to remain on speaking terms with the rest of the cast and company, particularly when the tour is continuing after the Fringe.

Now the headmaster of an Ely primary school and a Church of England ordinand, James Hickish is a veteran of the summer 24 CAM 64

‘For Edinburgh you cut the show to an hour and a quarter. Suddenly you’ve got to deal with taking out sketches. A lot of egos are trampled on.’

tours of 1990 and 1991, and well remembers the anxieties of being spotted. “Before every performance, people would be saying, ‘oh, there’s someone in from The Guardian, the BBC or such-and-such an agency’. Your expectations and anxiety would go up, and then you’d never hear from them.”

On tour, he recalls being concerned that agents seemed more impressed with the other performers – including Ben Miller (St Catharine’s 1985), Andy Parsons (Christ’s 1985) and Sue Perkins (New Hall 1988) – than with him and his writing partner, Nick Ball (Girton 1988). But then came the call from BBC executives looking for a duo to replace resident comedians Trevor and Simon on the Saturday morning children’s programme, Going Live.

“It was the most exciting thing,” he says.

“Nick and I were grandly flown down from Edinburgh to London, and then back in time for the evening show. But we decided to keep this a secret.

“When we got to the rehearsal space in Acton, we were shown into a room where some other folk had already left their luggage to go into the audition. We immediately recognised their bags – they belonged to some other people from the Footlights, who like us hadn’t told anybody they were up for the roles!”

Internal machinations are one thing, but often there’s disapproval from elsewhere to contend with, too – something James Lark (Girton 1999) calls “The Curse of the Footlights”. A committee member from 2000 to 2002, Lark went on to co-write Fringe, a book that details how to survive Edinburgh.

“In a way, the Footlights name is an albatross,” he says. “You read reviews where groups have been unfavourably compared with that cast of 1981, but it’s not a fair comparison. What people have seen of Fry, Laurie and the others is generally not their Footlights show, but what they did afterwards as professionals.”

On occasion, the prejudice develops into

open hostility. In 1995, Scotland on Sunday branded the revue “unfocused, immature tosh trading on its name … these students, like most students, should shut up until they grow up.” A 2005 Northern Youth Theatre show entitled Not the Footlights drew punters in with the tagline ‘For people who hate all things Cambridge’.

The charge that the Footlights revue rests on its laurels is one with which James Lark particularly disagrees. “Something that remains strong about the Footlights is that every year, there’s a different approach.

So audiences don’t usually see what they expect: if they go there for a Fry and Laurie sketch show, they’re unlikely to get it.”

This was certainly true of the 1999 show, This Way Up. Sky News producer Naomi Kerbel (Magdalene 1998), who was part of the five-strong cast, says: “It was a clowning comedy, and a very physical show. And with that sort of show, if for any reason there’s something off with the performance, it’s hard for the audience to find it funny. We did have a few nights like that, when it bombed.

And the critics love to see that when it’s the Cambridge Footlights.”

For all that, she believes that the positives of the Footlights name far outweigh the negatives. “You do feel the weight of history on your shoulders – and in our year, we were followed by Edinburgh or Bust, a Channel 4 fly-on-the-wall documentary. Yes, it upped the pressure; but mostly, we felt very grateful to have packed audiences.”

I ask the current cast whether they have encountered any antipathy. “The closest we’ve seen to anything like that is on the Royal Mile,” says Alex Owen. “There are a lot of students handing out flyers there for hours.

And there’s sometimes a sense that they don’t think we need to be flyering. They think we’ve already got all the publicity, and we’re just using up poster space.

“But the reality is that we do need it, and perhaps more than they do, because we have a big venue and need lots of people through the doors each day.”

Recent years have seen a vast expansion and professionalisation of the Fringe.

The Foster’s Edinburgh Comedy Awards, as the Perrier Awards have become, are all but unattainable for even the most gifted amateur.

And with the explosion of new media and so many other ways of getting original comedy to a wider audience, does Edinburgh still have anything like the relevance of 30 years ago?

James Lark says: “Granted, it’s far cheaper to get a London fringe venue; and given the number of people you’re competing with in Edinburgh, it’s also far easier to get someone from the industry to come and see you.

“But this is the biggest arts festival in the world, and you simply can’t go anywhere else where 2000 people are showcasing what they do. The whole place just buzzes for a month.

And that’s why it’s so special.”

C

“

onflict is a natural part of the urban condition,” says architect Dr Wendy Pullan. “It is dynamic.

It can be destructive but it can also be constructive. Whereas peace … when you try to find a static solution – a peace process, a peace treaty – you’ll never solve all the problems because things continue to change.”

Critically, for Pullan, cities in conflict are also places where lives are lived out, groceries bought, taxes paid.

As the lead investigator for the Conflict in Cities project, Pullan, who is Director of the Martin Centre for Research in the Department of Architecture, has spent much of the past 10 years examining how people in Belfast and Jerusalem respond and adapt to the territorial politics being played out in their midst.

The Conflict in Cities project, which today includes Brussels, Berlin, Mostar, Nicosia, Beirut, Tripoli and Kirkuk, began in an area north of Damascus Gate, the main entrance to Jerusalem’s Old City.

“It sounds like one of those jokes – my team comprised an Israeli, a Palestinian and a German,” Pullan says of the pilot project. “We studied the urban topography – examining what happened in times of relative quiet and in times of great unrest, and looking particularly at where there were points of interaction.”

What they found was surprising: when interviewed, Israelis and Palestinians invariably talked of a divided city where one side never had any dealings with the other. “But our research showed that in fact there are many areas of interaction in the city. In periods of

extreme unrest they separated very quickly, but it also returned to normal very fast as well,” she says.

Where is interaction most likely to take place?

At the shops, of course. “Shopping is marvellous for creating neutral areas,” Pullan says, “but also certain institutions such as the cinema, or the post office, or the VAT office. It’s not always ‘nice’ interaction – I’m not trying to rose-tint it – sometimes that interaction is absolutely hostile. But it’s much more a part of everyday life than ordinary people admit.”

Interestingly, Pullan’s researchers in Belfast have seen similar results. “Of course Belfast is a very different conflict, at a very different stage – people are not afraid to go into the centre of Belfast at night for example,” she says. “But this business of mixing is there again. It’s not that they are all friends, it’s simply that [people from different sides of the conflict] are using the spaces in reasonable ways together, or the same spaces at different times of the day.”

Mixing in this way matters, Pullan says, almost because it is casual, everyday. “It’s a shared space, even in its most simple format – the person who serves you in a shop, or in the queue after you is from the other group. In Belfast, a colleague has looked at how young people identify themselves through clothing and jewellery and so on – so they all know who is in a space. Sometimes that causes trouble, but it also breeds an interest in each other,” she says.

“Or in Jerusalem, which has potential for much more violence, sharing a space means that Palestinians

Architect Dr Wendy Pullan says that from Mostar to Jerusalem, and from Belfast to Berlin, conflict is part of the urban condition.

Words Leigh Brauman Photographs Charlie Troman

CV 1972 Graduates from University of Toronto 1978 Begins teaching architecture in Jerusalem 1995 PhD Cambridge 2003 First ESRC grant secured for Conflict in Cities 2006 Royal Institute of British Architects President’s Award for Outstanding university-led research 2007 ESRC Large Grant and Conflict in Cities project expanded to nine cities 2011 ‘Capturing Urban Conflicts’ exhibition.

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Dividing lines

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hear Hebrew and Israelis hear Arabic – just the fact of hearing the other language is important because the opportunities to do so are so few.”

Although Pullan says that drawing parallels between the two cities is “probably the most difficult part of the project”, issues around walls – whether the West Bank barrier or the series of peace walls that have sprung up across Belfast – recur in both.

“Given the weapons we have today, a wall seems so unsophisticated, and yet walls are being used increasingly, often on a big scale like the wall between the US and Mexico, or between Greece and Turkey,” she says.

“In Belfast people have asked for the peace walls – and I think we do have to look at them as a symbolic act and an act of desperation.”

Pullan makes the distinction between ‘thick’ and ‘thin’ walls, pointing out that not all walls are bad.

“I’ve done quite a lot of work looking at the walls of historic cities, and clearly, there was a point when every city had a wall used for defence, but which also gave a sense of inside and outside, citizen and not. Walls can give an order to the city.

“The difference however is that those structures allowed transitions. So, for example, there are certainly social and economic, and perhaps even political, transactions going on at Damascus Gate that are echoed in how the spaces have been used and changed.

It’s a differentiated structure, and there’s a richness to that – it’s a ‘thick’ wall – thick physically and thick metaphorically. Whereas a ‘thin’ wall is often imposed and, like the wall in Palestine or the Berlin Wall, operates in one dimension without any of the cultural richness.”

In fact, Pullan believes that ‘thin’ walls such as the Berlin Wall or the wall in Palestine can come down relatively easily. Their power lies not in the walls themselves, she argues, but in everything that goes with them. “The wall in Palestine has come with a very harsh regime,” she says. “And so, while the wall seems to have resulted in a period of relative calm, it’s hard to be sure whether it’s the wall or the regime that has had this effect. I don’t think the wall would be that meaningful alone – it has breaches in it and there all sorts of things you can do to pass through and we have researched some of that. But the controls along the wall, the flying checkpoints, the heavy policy of arresting – that has a huge impact.”

Wendy Pullan has always been fascinated by cities.

Brought up in Canada, she ended up studying for a fine art degree after being told by her careers counsellor that “architecture was no profession for a woman”.

But although she admits “I actually don’t draw very well – I’m a lot more interested in the cerebral side of it”, architecture pulled her back, and she completed her second degree, this time in architecture, at the University of British Columbia.

“I’ve always felt good in the centre of a city. I am interested in streets and how people interact and why that is,” she says. “The UBC course runs a programme to send students and tutors abroad for four months, and in my year, after considering South America and India, they settled on Jerusalem.

“It was a different city then. We lived in a Palestinian hotel in east Jerusalem and studied with an Israeli architecture school in west Jerusalem and every day we crossed no man’s land, which in those days really was barren and empty.”

‘Pullan makes the distinction between “thick” and “thin” walls, saying that thin walls can come down relatively easily. Their power lies not in the walls themselves, she argues, but in everything that goes with them. ’

Pullan lived in Jerusalem for 13 years before moving to Cambridge to do a PhD and then take up a lectureship in the Department of Architecture and a Fellowship at Clare College. And although she misses urban life, she says that paradoxically, the small city of Cambridge is the perfect place from which to run a large research project on big cities.

So, can you design your way out of a problem?

Can architecture be an actor in conflict? Pullan says that there’s little doubt that design makes a difference, but direct impact is more easily seen in extreme cases.

“A good example is the tunnel between the Jewish and Muslim Quarters in Jerusalem’s Old City. For centuries, at the critical point [where they border each other], there was no direct connection between the two quarters – you had to go up some stairs and round and back down to get from one to the other. People knew the route of course, but it was a bit of a contortion.

“After 1967, an old Roman tunnel was reopened, establishing a direct connection. The result is that when young male settlers based in the Muslim Quarter cause trouble they are able to run directly back into the Jewish Quarter.”

Although it is a good example of a change in the spatial quality of an area having a direct impact on conflict, Pullan says that in reality that kind of impact is rare. More commonly, the consequences of design are more uncertain.

“The Israelis have built an amphitheatre and park in front of the Damascus Gate. It was a major regeneration project in an area that was very scruffy. But the new park has long avenues of palm trees with alleys between them which are very good for police surveillance and the Palestinians, who are the majority of the population in this area, are not very pleased to have this panopticon landed on them.

“However, interestingly, there is an area right next to the new development that has been touched just a little bit. A few benches have been put in and there is a tree.

Shops have developed around it, and that is where people actually spend time. So good design – especially design that leaves room for people – can make a huge difference.

But it cannot be a solution by itself.”

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Modern political discourse is still infused with the fear of terrorism and politically motivated violence. Nobel Laureate, Professor Amartya Sen, argues that it is civil society, rather than military might, which holds the key to peace.

ESSAY:

VIOLENCE &CIVIL SOCIETY T Illustration: Oliver Jeffers

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he widespread prevalence of terrorism and political violence in the contemporary world has led to many initiatives in recent years aimed at removing the scourge. Military might has sometimes been rapidly deployed, with less informed justification in some cases than in others.

And yet group violence through systematic instigation is not exclusively, nor primarily, a military challenge. I do not dispute that military initiatives can sometimes be of limited use, but it is civil initiatives, at the national as well as global level, which are essential for successfully confronting organised violence and terrorism in the world today.

What should these initiatives be? They have to be a part of the engagement of democracy in the broad sense – that of ‘government by discussion’ analysed by John Stuart Mill. Democracy is more than a collection of specific institutions, such as balloting and elections – it is also dialogue, freedom of information and unrestricted discussion.

These are also the central features of civil paths to peace.

The first challenge is to overcome confused and flammable readings of the world. While we human beings all have many affiliations – related to nationality, language, religion, profession, neighbourhood, social commitments and other connections – the cultivation of group violence proceeds through separating out one affiliation as someone’s only significant identity.

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It is not just terrorists and other cultivators of group-based violence who champion this outlook. In the West those who see religious divisions as uniquely significant, who read conflict as an inevitable ‘clash of civilisations’, lend it support. Indeed, even the well-meaning, but excessively narrow approach of expanding the dialogue between religious groups (much championed right now) can seriously undermine other civil engagements, such as those linked to language, literature, cultural functions, social interactions and political commitments (unless it is placed firmly within a broader picture of plural identities and multiple channels of social relations).

Underlying the approach of civilisational clash is an oddly artificial view of history, which seems to say that distinct ‘civilisations’ have grown separately, like trees on different plots of land. Aside from missing out much of world history, the civilisational approach also takes a mind-boggling shortcut in describing human identity – and the consequences of that can be disastrous. Violence between persons is then seen as an alleged animosity between distinct civilisations.

The civilisational explanation of global violence is largely moored on a solitarist approach to human identity – it sees human beings as members of just one group, defined solely by their native civilisation or religion. But a solitarist approach is, in fact, an excellent way of misunderstanding nearly everyone in the world. In our normal lives, we see ourselves as members of a variety of groups – we belong to all of them. The same person can be, without contradiction, a South African citizen, of Asian origin, with Indian ancestry, a Christian, a socialist, a woman, a vegetarian, a jazz musician, a doctor, a feminist, a heterosexual, a believer in gay and lesbian rights, and one who believes that the most important problem to address today is how to make South Africa the cricket champion of the world.

Each of these identities can be of significance to the individual, depending on the problem at hand and the context of choice, and the priorities between them can be influenced by one’s own values as well as by social pressures. There is no reason to think that whatever civilisational identity a person has – religious, communal, regional, national or global – must invariably dominate over every other relation or affiliation that person might have.

As a result, trying to understand global violence through the lens of the ‘clash of civilisations’ does not bear scrutiny: the reasoning is too crude. Nonetheless, reductionist cultivations of singular identities have indeed been responsible for a good deal of what can be called ‘engineered bloodshed’ across the world. This engineering mostly takes the form of fomenting and cultivating alienated perceptions of differences.

I recall from my own childhood in immediately pre-independent India, how the Hindu–Muslim riots suddenly erupted in the 1940s in Dhaka and Calcutta and elsewhere, linked with the politics of partition, and the speed with which the broad human beings of summer were suddenly transformed, through ruthless political cultivation of communal alienation, into brutal Hindus and fierce Muslims of the winter. Yet these conflicts were not spontaneous unfoldings of

‘The solitarist approach is an excellent way of misunderstanding nearly everyone in the world. The same person can be, without contradiction, of Asian origin, a Christian, a socialist, a woman, a jazz musician, a doctor, and one who believes that the most important problem in the world today is how to make South Africa the cricket champion of the world.’

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a ‘natural and inescapable’ clash, as indeed the peaceful, tolerant and politically secular history of Bangladesh and West Bengal that followed handsomely illustrates. The identity of language and literature in East Pakistan overwhelmed that of religious sectarianism within a few years of the communal riots, and made the secular democracy of Bangladesh a polity in which the vast majority of Bangladeshi Muslims easily accepted that there was no conflict between being a good Muslim and a patriotic Bengali, allowing religious freedom to all.

Aside from the need to disestablish the claim that alleged clashes of civilisations, religions or communities must be natural processes, it is also important to appreciate that no matter how momentous religious differences may appear to some today, other divisions also have the potential for creating strife and carnage.

For example, appeals to country and nationality played a rousing role in the immensely bloody war in Europe between 1914 and 1918, and a shared religious background of Christianity did nothing to stop the Germans, the British and the French from tearing each other apart.

Yet, today, the Germans, the French and the British mix with each other in peace and tranquillity and sit together to decide what to do in their continent without reaching for their guns.

L

et me, for the moment, leave the cultural approaches there.

What about the other approach, the one of political economy?

This line of reasoning sees poverty and inequality as the root causes of violence. It is not hard to see that the injustice of inequality can generate intolerance and that the suffering of poverty can provoke anger and fury. From Afghanistan and Sudan to Somalia and Haiti, there are plenty of examples of the dual adversities of deprivation and violence faced by people in different parts of the world.

Poverty can certainly make a person outraged and desperate, and a sense of injustice can be a good ground for rebellion – even bloody rebellion. But the simple thesis linking poverty with violence is riddled with epistemic problems. The claim that poverty is responsible for group violence is empirically much too crude both because the linkage of poverty and violence is far from universally observed, and because there are other social factors associated with poverty and violence.

The case of Calcutta is instructive here: one of the poorest cities in India – and indeed the world – it has a very low crime rate. Indeed, for serious crimes, the poor city of Calcutta has the lowest incidence among all the Indian cities. It also emerges that Indian cities in general are strikingly low in the incidence of violent crime by world standards, and Calcutta seems to have the lowest homicide rate not only in India, but also in the world.

Calcutta does, of course, have a long distance to go to eradicate poverty and to put its material house in order. It is important to remember that the low crime rate does not make those nasty problems go away. And yet there is something important to note – and even to celebrate – in the recognition that poverty does not inescapably

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produce violence, independently of political movements as well as social and cultural interactions.

Poverty can co-exist with peace and apparent tranquillity, and the causal reasoning linking poverty to violence has gaps that need to be acknowledged. Impoverishment can, of course, yield provocation to defy the established laws and rules, but it need not give people the initiative and the inclination to do anything particularly violent.

Indeed, destitution can be accompanied not only by economic debility, but also by political impotence and debility. The emaciated victims of deprivation can be too frail and too dejected to fight and battle, or even to protest and holler. It is not surprising that intense suffering and inequity have often been accompanied by astonishing peace and deafening silence. For example, the 1840s, the years of famine in Ireland, were among the most peaceful. As it happens, the Irish do not have an exceptional reputation for excessive docility, and yet this time was, by and large, one of order and peace.

This does not, however, indicate that the poverty, starvation and inequity of the Irish famines had no long-run effects on violence in Ireland. Indeed, the memory of injustice and neglect had the effect of severely alienating the Irish from Britain, and contributed greatly to the violence that characterised Anglo-Irish relations over more than a century and a half. Economic destitution may not lead to an immediate rebellion, but it would be wrong to presume from this that there is no connection between poverty and violence.

There is a similarity here with the experience of the Middle East.

There are, of course, many influences that have made the situation as difficult as it has been in recent decades, including the apparent difficulty of some world leaders to think clearly on the subject.

But among the many connections, it is hard to ignore the memory of ill-treatment of the Middle East by Western powers during the colonial days, when the new masters could subdue one nation after another and draw – and redraw – the boundaries between countries just as they liked. That abuse of power did not cause many riots in the 19th century, but the silence of the vanquished – the peace of the trampled – does not indicate that the subject matter was gone forever, and would not leave behind a terrible memory of ill-treatment.

If the strong but less immediate linking of poverty and injustice to violence has some weak plausibility (as I believe it does), then we have to see how the ideas of identity and culture add to the reach of these issues of political economy, rather than competing with their influence in an ‘either this or that’ way.

Poverty and inequality must have a role in promoting and sustaining violence, but that role, I would argue, has to be sought not through an exclusive concentration on deprivation and destitution in isolation from society and culture, but through looking for a larger and much more extensive framework with interactive roles of poverty and other features of society.

So while the fierce nastiness of al-Qaida against Western targets cannot be justified by any invoking of history, the fact that those in whose name the terrorists work have had unequal treatment from

Western colonialists in the past makes the invitation to barbarity that much easier to sell. The absence of an ethical justification for such a linkage does not eliminate the fact that it has power to move people to blind rage.

Inequalities of military strength, political power and economy might leave behind huge inheritances of discontent. This is so even when the process is not apparently linked with force and strong-armed behaviour, for example, the injustice of leaving hundreds of millions behind in global economic and social progress, or condemning millions of others to untreated ailments that can be eliminated or effectively restrained but are not because the global economic mechanism fails to provide life-saving drugs to those who need them most.

Acts of terrorism and homicide are, of course, criminal activities calling for effective security measures, and no serious analysis of group violence can fail to take note of that basic understanding. But the analysis cannot end there, since many social, economic and political initiatives can be undertaken to confront and defeat the appeal on which the fomenters of violence and terrorism draw to get active foot soldiers and passive sympathisers.

Fatalistic theorists of civilisational clash and the hurried advocates of economic reductionism spurn an examination of the cultural and social factors as well as features of political economy that are all-important in understanding violence in the world today. These elements do not work in isolation, and we have to resist the tempting shortcuts that claim to deliver insight through their single-minded concentration on one factor or another, ignoring other important features of an integrated picture. Perhaps most importantly, we have reason to understand that these distinct causal antecedents of violence are not immovable objects that are able to defy and overwhelm all human efforts to create a more peaceful social order.

It is important to see the often-neglected connection between mutual understanding and the way society functions and operates.

Indeed, but for the political vision that inspired South Africa’s antiapartheid movement, led by Nelson Mandela and also Desmond Tutu, South Africa today would be covered not with reconciliation but with violent revenge. Similarly, during the days of barbarities of the world wars in the early twentieth century, well reflected, for example, in the slaughters in the trenches and battlefields during 1914–18, and in the carpet bombing of cities in the 1940s, it might have been hard to imagine that visionary changes could make such massacres entirely obsolete within just a few years.

What is altogether magnificent is that what seems to lie far beyond feasibility today may become, through our own efforts, entirely achievable and thoroughly ordinary tomorrow. We can get strength from Proust, quoted by Nadine Gordimer in her book Writing and Being: “Do not be afraid to go too far, for the truth lies beyond.”

That recognition, which is important in general, may be especially so in our moments of dejection about human insecurity in our troubleridden world.

Nobel Laureate Professor Amartya Sen (Trinity 1953) is a fellow and former master of Trinity College. Peace and Democratic Society, edited by Amartya Sen is published by Open Book Publishers www.openbookpublishers.com.

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T

he Pilkington Teaching Prizes are a unique institution in Cambridge. The awards are open to all academic staff; the sole criterion is excellence in teaching, and past winners have been drawn from the full breadth of the University’s faculties and departments.

The prizes were established in 1994 following a donation from the late Sir Alastair Pilkington (Trinity 1938) during his time as chairman of the Cambridge Foundation.

A prominent businessman and philanthropist, Sir Alastair was best known for inventing the ‘float’ method of glassmaking, transforming the industry throughout the world.

Sir Alastair Pilkington The prizes are awarded annually, and next year will draw upon additional funds, thanks to a legacy from Clifford Anthony Ingram (Downing 1940).

Student feedback is a vital element of the selection process. Here, we speak to three recipients of the 2011 Pilkington Teaching Prizes, and some of those they have supervised.

Taught bygreatness Photographs Charlie Troman Along with Brendan Burchell, Andy Jeffries and Charles Weiss, prizes were awarded to:

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Dr Lucy Delap, College Teaching Officer and Newton Trust Associate Lecturer, Faculty of History Dr Mark Gurnell, University Lecturer, Department of Medicine Dr Barry Kingston, University Senior Lecturer, Department of Pathology Dr David Oldfield, Affiliated Lecturer, Department of History of Art Dr David Perry, Consultant Haematologist, Addenbrooke’s Hospital and University Associate Lecturer, School of Clinical Medicine

Dr Paul Russell, College Teaching Officer and Affiliated Lecturer, Faculty of Mathematics Dr David Scott, Deputy Head (Teaching), Department of Chemical Engineering and Biotechnology Dr Hugh Shercliff, University Senior Lecturer, Department of Engineering Professor David Ward, Head of Physics Teaching, Department of Physics

CW I think there were a couple of elements involved in my winning the prize. I’ve spearheaded a scheme to help students who have just got their places prepare for Cambridge. I also use a lot of computerised materials in conjunction with my supervisions – so if I ask undergraduates to do something, there’s probably an online resource that can James Tiffin (below left) is enhance their learning. a third year Classics And yes, I am passionate about Greek and undergraduate Latin.

These are complex linguistic systems, at Clare. and many students don’t know what’s about to hit them when they get here. Seeing them come to grips with it is really exciting – it unlocks the whole course when they can access these great literatures without constantly looking at translations or consulting a dictionary.

I think Classics has suffered in this country, because people still associate it with stuffy schoolmasters. You can kill the subject quite easily if you’re not enthusiastic; that will come across clearly.

JT In teaching Greek and Latin language, Dr Weiss manages to push and challenge us, while we still feel that we’re enjoying the experience. It feels as though he’s learning with you, rather than sending a message down from on high.

Language and grammar could be quite dry, but his enthusiasm for the subject is impossible not to catch. I don’t know of any other tutor who would suddenly exclaim “that’s sexy Latin” and get excited about a point of syntax when we’re in a translation class. So we don’t feel reserved about getting too much into the subject ourselves.

Dr Weiss pulls his students into the whole classical world. Outside the classroom, he puts on Classics film nights for the students at Clare – we’ll watch old and obscure films of the Odyssey or Fellini’s Satyricon, and then a blockbuster like Gladiator or 300. He really tries to get us to live the subject.

Charles Weiss (below right) is a language teaching officer at the Faculty of Classics and Fellow and Director of Studies in Classics at Clare.

AJ I think they chose to give me the prize both for looking after the course and looking after the students. I don’t think anything I’ve done has been particularly earth-shattering. Rather, it has been an evolutionary process, involving lots of small things.

Rachel Nixon I took on responsibility for the curriculum (above right) is in the sixth year of her in the early 1990s. Since then, I have revised it Veterinary Medicine and introduced new components that needed course at Girton. to be brought in. I think one of the changes that will turn out to have the most impact is the introduction of communications-skills teaching.

People used to think this was something students would just absorb, but it really needs to be taught. We now use actors to set up scenarios, and we video the students practising their skills. Communicating properly is undoubtedly one of the most important things for a doctor or vet to be able to do.

We’re the smallest veterinary school, and we have a very close relationship between staff and students – so fortunately, we’re able to give all of them personal attention.

RN We’ve found Andy Jefferies has a way of putting across material clearly. He’ll go over the same material that we’ve heard in a lecture, but explain it in a very different way. I’ve ended up lending my second year notes for pathology to a lot of other people – they’ve done the rounds! He has always been very willing to go beyond the strict curriculum, and to spend time helping us out with things we’re finding difficult. Our year group were struggling a little with histology, and getting stressed before the exams. He was willing to spare his time to write up summaries and cover the ground again. It really worked for us.

The communications-skills sessions were quite scary, but have been very useful – such as knowing how to avoid asking the client leading questions when you’re taking a consultation, and how to come across sympathetically when things go wrong. On my work placements, I feel a lot more confident having had this training.

Andy Jefferies (above left) is Director of Teaching in the Department of Veterinary Medicine.

BB I must have been an unusual case for the Pilkington Prize. In the past, it has primarily been seen as something to do with undergraduate teaching, but over the years, my teaching has shifted more towards the graduate level.

Julia Gumy (above One thing I’ve been aware of is that being right) is a third year a PhD student can be a very lonely experience.

PhD student In the British system, they often don’t have in Sociology at Magdalene. classes or exams to bring them together, and can end up very isolated. A while ago, I started a reading group, and it’s useful not only because we get to sit down and talk about a text, but because it gets the students talking to and socialising with each other.

I’m still in touch with many of the members of the group from the past 10 years – in fact, I’m just back from the wedding of one of my former doctoral students in Latvia. We’re now in the process of starting an alumni network of the reading group. That’s a rewarding thing: seeing PhD students succeed through sometimes difficult times, and staying in touch with them as they start their careers.

JG Dr Burchell is relaxed and approachable, and very supportive of student initiatives. I’m the graduate representative in the faculty, and he spends a lot of time helping us to develop and evaluate our proposals to improve the graduate experience.

For instance, we thought it would be good for PhD students to have some formal courses in their first year, to give them a bit more structure. This isn’t common practice at Cambridge, but we presented a good case, and he convinced the department that it would be beneficial. They’re now in place for first years coming in to the faculty.

On a personal note, I had to take time off last year because of family illness. Because Dr Burchell was so supportive, I managed to recover all the lost work time and get back on track quickly. It’s so important to have this empathy. A PhD lasts three to four years, and it’s almost inevitable that things will happen to disrupt the schedule.

Brendan Burchell (above left) is a senior lecturer at the Department of Sociology.

CAM 64 37

Review Our contributors

Richard Wigmore is a distinguished musicologist, specialising in the Viennese Classical period and Lieder.

He writes regularly for Gramophone, BBC Music Magazine and the Daily Telegraph and is the author of The Faber Pocket Guide to Haydn and Schubert: The Complete Song Texts.

Glen Rangwala is a lecturer in the Department of Politics and International Studies and a fellow of Trinity College.

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University Matters Professor John Rallison Pro-Vice-Chancellor for Education

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Debate Glen Rangwala argues that focusing on social media distracts from the real causes of the Arab Spring

40

Books Dr Corin Throsby discusses John Berger’s Ways of Seeing

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Music Daniel Harding, conductor

45

Sport Lacrosse

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Prize crossword King’s Alumnus by Schadenfreude

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University Matters A new model for funding undergraduate education John Rallison Pro-Vice-Chancellor for Education Patrick Morgan

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or those of us involved in undergraduate education, the past two years have been turbulent. The government teaching grant has been cut and a new model for funding undergraduates has been introduced. A market in fees between different universities has been introduced but its shortand long-term consequences are as yet unclear.

Cambridge’s cuts started in 2009 with a £5m reduction in teaching grant. At the same time responsibility for higher education (HE) was shifted to the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills and Lord Browne’s enquiry into the funding of HE was established. Since the 2010 general election the pace of change has accelerated with a further 60% reduction in teaching grant; the introduction of market principles and a lifting of the cap on tuition fees to £9000 pa; a new agreement with the Office for Fair Access (OFFA) on widening participation; and a deepening gulf in student funding arrangements between different parts of the UK. At the time of writing, consultations are taking place on further proposals for the funding of HE that have appeared in a government White Paper.

Collegiate Cambridge’s response to this radical (some would say reckless) experiment with the funding of the HE sector has been one of concern and protest. Most would accept that a degree brings individual financial benefit, so it is reasonable that students be expected to make a contribution themselves.

But graduates also bring benefits to society of both financial and other kinds. It is not clear that the new arrangements strike the appropriate balance, and the terms of debate (symbolised, perhaps, by the transfer of responsibility for HE to a Department for Business) by which education is measured and valued for its economic benefit are too narrow.

How should Cambridge respond to the new market? We start from a position of strength: applications from the very brightest students remain strong; we top the National Student Survey in terms of student satisfaction; our graduates are highly employable; we are top of most UK newspaper league tables; we are consistently in the top six in international league tables and best in Europe. Central to our reputation is maintaining standards of excellence in our staff and students. We are determined that our admissions standards

‘Collegiate Cambridge’s response to this radical (some would say reckless) experiment with the funding of the higher education sector has been one of concern and protest.’

must be maintained. We do not at present admit as many high-performing students from state schools as the national average performance suggests we should and we have agreed with OFFA an ambitious target to raise that proportion so as to match the national average.

After an earnest internal debate, Cambridge decided to charge the highest fee permitted (£9000 pa). However, an important feature of the government proposals is that no student (from England) will be required to find this fee

during their period of study. It can be supported by a government loan to be repaid, effectively as a graduate tax, by those graduates earning more than £21,000 (further details at www.cam.ac.uk/studentfinance). This loan arrangement should support, in part, those students from poorer backgrounds, but Cambridge will be providing additional support to this group through non-repayable bursaries of up to £3500 pa with more for mature students (further details at www.cam.ac.uk/cambridgebursary).

The jewel in our crown is the supervision system by which undergraduates are taught in small groups. It will be preserved, but some features are being reviewed, including the proposal that one-to-one supervisions are phased out. Indeed, supervising two or three students together – which is usual in science disciplines – can, in many cases, offer greater educational benefit. We are also seeking to use our lecture courses more efficiently by sharing across Triposes, and we are developing new, innovative Triposes in Human, Social and Political Sciences and in Psychology. Both will revitalise our offerings in the social sciences, offer a broad introduction to their core disciplines, and appeal, we hope, to a talented group of applicants that we are at present failing to attract.

W

hat next? The 2011 government White Paper promises a wider market in HE with new private providers and lower fees. Financial pressures may make some subjects (especially science subjects) unviable at some institutions; student numbers at others may fall, resulting in closures and mergers. The impact of the new fee regime on postgraduate study has been largely overlooked, and is of particular concern to research-intensive universities such as ours. The challenge for collegiate Cambridge will be to maintain international standards of excellence across all our disciplines during this turbulent period. It is a challenge we are confident that we can meet.

CAM 64 39

Debate: The Arab Spring is not about Twitter

W

hy, after decades of living under authoritarian rule, have populations across about a dozen countries in the Middle East engaged in simultaneous civil uprisings? The explanations most often cited in popular discussion revolve around social media, a young population (the so called ‘youth bulge’) and economic deprivation.

But initial results from a large-scale polling project suggest that revolution is powered by issues more complex than iPhone-wielding twenty-somethings.

The Department of Politics and International Studies has been running a programme with pollsters YouGov to track evolving popular opinion across 18 Arab countries through 2011. It uses a mix of internet-based polling (for which YouGov is perhaps best known) and door-to-door surveys. We’ve tried not only to ask the obvious questions, such as the views on the government and the opposition, but also those which bring out implicit attitudes towards political questions. What do you think of the unemployed? Or immigrants? If you were having a dispute with your neighbour, to whom would you turn? The answers are interesting in their own right, but tracking how they have changed since the early days of the Arab Spring is particularly valuable.

Our findings so far are striking. From early 2011, there has been a widespread and so far unshaken sense that a regional transformation has been under way, having its origins in a mass protest movement, which will make changes for the better. Even when protests in one country have been met by severe state repression, the large majority of people around the region as a whole agree that the protesters in that country will be successful in bringing about the changes they are seeking within the next five years. In short, the idea of the Arab Spring is one that has been accepted by a large proportion of the population in each of the 18 countries surveyed, and is a powerful one.

However the differences – especially differences in the kinds of issues that have brought people to align themselves with the Arab Spring – are also significant. Differences between countries have grown over the period

40 CAM 64

of the uprising, as coherent national consensuses develop around key themes.

In some countries, issues of principle have come to dominate popular political priorities: in Bahrain, the aspiration for civic equality has been the overriding theme around which national views have converged; in Syria, freedom of speech and of association dominates the majority’s stated wishes.

But these two themes barely register as political priorities in many countries.

In Tunisia and Egypt, the first two countries in which long-established governments were overthrown, personal security has come to dominate popular concerns, among both those who strongly supported the national revolutions and the small proportion who remain unsure of its benefits. In Yemen, declining personal incomes are central to the support for the protest movement, but in most Arab countries, those who support the Arab Spring most strongly also report real or anticipated increases in their personal incomes.

Indeed, in contrast to those who have portrayed the participants in the Arab Spring as predominantly young, educated and unemployed – the ‘youth bulge’ explanation for the uprisings – the results we’ve seen indicate that in most (though not all) countries, those over 35 years old are slightly more likely to take part in protests than those under 35. In addition, concern over unemployment is most consistently expressed in countries that have not experienced significant protests so far in 2011. The extent of the use of the internet for registering and organising political opposition varies enormously from one country to the next.

What seems to emerge from these snapshots of public opinion is a series of uprisings with different grievances, often different types of participants, and quite distinct types of political aspirations. But what appears to unite them is the very idea of the Arab Spring, within which supporters, activists and even opponents of political reform contextualise the protests they see in their own countries.

People’s attitudes towards protesters in their own countries, and their assessment of the likelihood of their success, are very highly correlated with their views towards opposition movements in other Arab countries that have

Photos: Jonathan Rashad, Khashayar Elyassi, Roger Green.

Words Glen Rangwala Illustration Sarah Hanson

‘Our results contrast with those who have portrayed the Arab Spring as predominately young, educated and unemployed – the “youth bulge” explanations for the uprisings.’

come to the fore during 2011. This correlation is much more significant than the congruence of other political views across countries.

The idea of the Arab Spring, the ideal of collective action spanning the region, is one that generates affiliations independently of the particularities of individual situations.

We can extrapolate a bit further too.

If people identify their national protest movements with the broader region-wide phenomenon of the Arab Spring, the perceived success of a civic uprising in one country will reinforce the estimations of the likelihood of similar achievements at home. This does not mean that all governments of the region will fall; indeed, in many countries, especially in the Gulf region, many think that domestic reforms have already been spurred by the Arab Spring and are being brought about under the stewardship of the current monarchy. However, in those countries in which the cause of reform has become inextricably linked to the question of who holds political power, the examples of Tunisia and Egypt have given protesters a sense of confidence in the likelihood, perhaps even the inevitability, of the end of the old political order.

Governments there see the picture differently. Unlike Egypt and Tunisia, where political elites had lost a collective sense of purpose in favour of private enrichment, and where few anticipated radical political change at the time, there remain governments in the region that are still strongly motivated by the desire to retain power. They see little possibility now of achieving this through making concessions to protest movements that are spurred by the confidence of watching regimes being toppled elsewhere. It is perhaps this very awareness of popular opinion that has made resistance to protests so virulent: governments who realise that their hold on power has been recognised as tenuous, determined to demonstrate the opposite, facing protesters who are confident of the possibilities of their own success. The Arab Spring demonstrates both the possibility and the danger of an idea.

Glen Rangwala is a lecturer in the Department of Politics and International Studies and a fellow of Trinity College. He spoke about his research at a debate on the Arab Spring at this year’s Cambridge Festival of Ideas. www.cam.ac.uk/festivalofideas.

CAM 64 41

Books Corin Throsby discusses John Berger’s Waysof Seeing Words Leigh Brauman Steve Bond

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t’s not often that a jumble of poorly photocopied pages makes a lifelong impression, but Dr Corin Throsby says that in the case of John Berger’s seminal postmodern text, Ways of Seeing, form was almost as significant as content.

“My art class was given Ways of Seeing as black and white photocopied handouts – a reproduction of a reproduction, which Berger would surely find hilarious,” she says.

“I wish I still had them. They would have been the old school fade-y type and were black around the edges because the book wasn’t A4.

It was very striking.”

Ways of Seeing, based on a four-part BBC television series of the same name, consists of seven essays, three of which are constructed using only images. “One of the interesting things about it is the way it is laid out – it looks a bit like a fanzine, and that’s central to Berger’s argument,” Throsby says. “He wants to draw your attention to the book as a produced thing. We just went one step further by reading it as photocopies.”

As a specialist in the literature of the Romantic period and the history of what is now called celebrity culture, Throsby says that Berger’s approach to the high culture/low culture dichotomy was the start of a serious academic interest.

“I can definitely trace my interest in the relationship between high and low art back to Berger, but in fact Berger has much to say on so many of the topics I look at now.

For example, I am really interested in reader response and Ways of Seeing was the first time I thought about how the reader creates meaning, how the text is not a holy relic and that context is important.

“Similarly, working on celebrity culture in the Romantic period, it is interesting to think about what Berger says about the celebrity status of a piece of art. He talks about how perception of monetary value can influence the way we see and value a painting and it’s the same process with human celebrities – because someone is worth something financially that alone can make them mystically special.

So it is amazing how many different directions it has informed my current research.”

Despite the book’s influence, it was something of an accident that the self-confessed

‘My class was given Ways of Seeing as black and white photocopied handouts – a reproduction of a reproduction, which Berger would surely find hilarious.’

nerdy Throsby encountered John Berger’s book at all. At high school in Australia, Throsby spent most of her early teenage years competing for top marks, but then decided to take a different direction.

“I took art when I was 15 because it seemed fun. Ways of Seeing was the first book we were given and it was a bit of a revelation.

I really felt intellectually engaged and was thinking critically for myself for the first time which was very exciting. What I had anticipated would be my easiest subject turned out to be the most rewarding.

“I was really, really into TV and my family were into high culture, making me the family freak,” she says. “But Berger is unembarrassed to be talking about pop culture in a serious way, and he makes it so clear and accessible. Cultural studies has such a bad reputation for using ridiculous jargon – writing about Madonna in terms of her posthegemonic, feministic, transgressive dominant gender narrative for example – just to make it seem legitimate. Berger doesn’t feel the need for any of that, but writes about everyday things in a deeply intelligent way.”

The copy of Ways of Seeing Throsby owns today might be an ordinary – if very creased – paperback, but it still retains a special place in her library in Cambridge. “I didn’t bring all my books to the UK, but I did bring this one,” she says. “ I’ve written my name, the date and the place I bought it in the front cover – and it feels like an old friend.”

CAM 64 43

Daniel Harding: a CD shortlist Britten The Turn of the Screw Virgin 545521-2 Mozart Cosi fan tutte Virgin 344716-9 (DVD) Mahler Symphony No. 10 DG 4777347

Music Faustian Pact

CAMCard holders receive a 10% discount on all CD purchases at Heffers Sound in Trinity Street, Cambridge.

Conductor Daniel Harding discusses Schumann’s Scenes From Goethe’s Faust.

Words Richard Wigmore

D

aniel Harding (Trinity 1994) was just 17 when he recorded Schoenberg’s modernist shocker Pierrot lunaire – hailed by Stravinsky as the “solar plexus of 20th-century music”. A recording of that performance found its way into the hands of Simon Rattle, who promptly offered Harding a job as his assistant. After a year juggling conducting engagements with reading music at Cambridge, he received the irresistible offer to work as assistant to Claudio Abbado, who quickly dubbed Harding “my little genius”. That same year, 1995, came the moment he defines as life-changing: stepping in at the eleventh hour for Simon Rattle in a performance of Mahler’s Das Lied von der Erde in Paris.

Harding has barely looked back. Mahler symphonies and Mozart operas feature large in his eclectic repertoire, yet when asked to nominate the piece he most relishes conducting, he comes up with a left-field choice: Robert Schumann’s Scenes from Goethe’s Faust, a strangely powerful work of episodic fragments that lies somewhere between opera, cantata and oratorio.

“It’s very personal, of course,” he says.

“But for me this wonderful music is just about the biggest musical and intellectual challenge of all, immensely demanding both for musicians and audiences.

“The first challenge is finding a baritone to take the role of Faust – the German equivalent of Hamlet. He has to be vocally superb, of course, with a minute understanding of the text, and a good enough actor to play Faust on stage. For me there’s only one singer who combines the necessary voice, intellect and dramatic flair, and that’s Christian Gerhaher.

I could listen to him merely reading Goethe’s text. It was Christian who kindled my enthusiasm for Schumann’s Faust. After I’d done Mahler’s Das Lied von der Erde with him I asked him what he’d like to do next.

He immediately came up with Faust, which I barely knew. Discovering it was one of life’s epiphanies for me.”

Late Schumann has too often been viewed with condescension by musicians who parrot the old saw that his inspiration declined inexorably after the glory years of the 1830s and early 1840s. But for Harding, as for others sympathetic to the cause, his later works have

‘Harding’s is a left-field choice: Robert Schumann’s Scenes from Goethe’s Faust is a strangely powerful work of episodic fragments that lies somewhere between opera, cantata and oratorio.’

a unique fascination. “Even for someone who flies the Schumann flag, as I do, there are late pieces that are seriously problematic, like the C minor Mass and the Requiem.

They don’t open their secrets easily as, say, Schumann’s symphonies do. They tend to be withdrawn, often bizarre. But with courage and patience they yield huge rewards.

“As for Faust, both the music and the poetry – perhaps the densest and most complex

in the German language – require a huge effort from both performers and listeners if they want to get the most out of it. Goethe’s often symbolic language takes time to absorb; and it’s a piece that’s never going to be top of the charts, especially for non-German speakers.

Unlike, say, Tchaikovsky’s setting of Pushkin in Eugene Onegin, where the subtlety of the original is diluted, Schumann’s scenes boldly set Goethe’s poetry unaltered.

“In musical language there’s a vast difference between Part Three, Faust’s Transfiguration, which Schumann wrote first, and Parts One and Two, the Gretchen scenes and the scene of Faust’s death. In Part Three the poetry is stranger, more hermetic, yet the music is paradoxically more inviting: I wouldn’t quite say it’s Mendelssohnian, as it’s sometimes described, but it’s more mellifluous and generous than Parts One and Two. Perhaps my favourite number is Hier ist die Aussicht frei, sung by Doctor Marianus, who represents Faust’s purified soul – it’s music of amazing, simple lyrical beauty, yet as so often with Schumann, the melodies and harmonies never unfold quite as you expect.”

If Schumann’s friend Mendelssohn is a sublimated influence in Part Three of Faust, Parts One and Two can distantly evoke Wagner, with whom Schumann struck up an uneasy friendship in Dresden. (He was not alone in findng Wagner far too fond of the sound of his own voice.)

“The text of Part One, especially – the Gretchen story – is much less obscure and mystical than Part Three, but the music is freer, more dramatic. Some of it is as startlingly modern as early and middle-period Wagner, though the music never sounds like anyone but Schumann: the scene in the cathedral, with Mephistopheles whispering malignly in Gretchen’s ear, and the chorus chanting the Dies irae. Even more astonishing is the scene of Faust’s blinding by the figure of Care, and then his death, with a C major funeral march.

There’s a strangeness, a discomfort about [it], like so much of the greatest Schumann.

And it’s this that constantly draws me back.”

CAM 64 45

Charlie Troman

Sport Carl Tilbury: Lacrosse Words Becky Allen

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s a sport that involves wearing vests known as pinnies and which, in the UK at least, is usually associated with girls’ schools, men’s lacrosse is perhaps surprisingly not for the faint-hearted.

The modern sport traces its roots to games played by Native Americans, games that lasted several days and involved hundreds of men from opposing tribes or villages.

Today, teams are smaller and games shorter, but in many respects men’s lacrosse bears striking similarities to its ancestors, variously described as ‘stick ball’, ‘men hit a round object’ and – more ominously – ‘little brother of war’ and ‘bump hips’.

“It’s certainly a full contact sport,” says Carl Tilbury, captain of the men’s lacrosse team and a fourth year chemical engineering undergraduate at St John’s.

If you’ve never watched men’s lacrosse, you’ll see from the armour they don how fullon that contact can be.

“We wear a full head helmet, like ice hockey or American football, with a face mask and grill to stop the ball going in. Goalies also wear neck protection, because you don’t want a rubber ball travelling at 90 miles an hour hitting you in the throat,” he says. “Then there’s shoulder and chest protection, upperarm guards, gloves and a box, which is

advisable if you’re in goal or a defender.”

Add to that a large metal stick – six foot long if you are a defender – and little brother of war sounds like a pretty accurate description of modern lacrosse.

Although a player’s legs, head and neck are not meant to be hit, anyone with – or near – the ball is fair game. “You’re only meant to use a stick on an opponent’s gloves or stick, but if the ball’s on the ground you’ll see a lot of hitting,” Carl explains. “And you can come in leading with your hands or shoulders and floor an opponent.”

Despite starting to play lacrosse at the age of 16, when coaches from the touring US team visited his school in Reading to promote the game, Carl has so far escaped serious injury.

“Mostly it’s just pulled hamstrings or bruised arms,” he says, though adding almost as an afterthought, “I have been concussed a few times.”

Some of his opponents, however, have fared worse. “Once when shooting I hit someone.

He ended up on the floor unconscious and when they took his helmet off he was bleeding from his ears,” Carl remembers.

The game’s controlled aggression is what drew him to lacrosse as a teenager. “That’s what was attractive to start with, but as I played more the skill involved is what’s kept me interested. You need good hand–eye coordination, good stick skills, and you need to be agile to beat your opponents,” he says.

Spending the second year of his degree on the MIT exchange programme in the USA – where the men’s game is more popular, and taken far more seriously compared with the UK – has made a huge difference to Carl’s game. “It was good to be in the US, they had great facilities. We trained every day, and had four coaches for a team of 24. It was sweet!” he says.

The men’s game is, however, spreading among UK universities, and Carl wishes lacrosse was more widely played in schools.

“There needs to be more focus on the game among schools to make a big difference to the men’s sport in the UK,” he says.

In common with many Cambridge club captains, Carl’s primary sporting goal this season is the Varsity Match, which he hopes will be a hat trick against Oxford come March: “We’ve won the last two matches but before that we had a run when we didn’t do so well.”

Due to graduate next year, Carl is keen on doing a PhD at Cambridge, not least because of the University’s plans to boost its sports facilities. “I’m really looking forward to the new year and the new season,” he says. “I’m not ready to leave yet, and a new sports centre would really encourage me to stay.”

www.culacrosse.org

CAM 64 47

CAM 64 Prize Crossword

✄

King’sAlumnus

by Schadenfreude

One letter must be removed from the answers to 12 across clues and the residue arranged to form a word for grid entry.

The removed letters describe the puzzle’s dedicatee who must be highlighted in the completed grid.

One letter must be removed from each of the remaining clues before solving, never leaving a non-word.

These letters spell out five pairs of words, each pair cryptically suggesting a thematic 12-letter word (hyphenated). Solvers must locate a two word phrase (synonymous with the thematic word) which will appear twice in the completed grid and replace each occurrence of that phrase by different thematic aliases. All final grid entries are real words and numbers in brackets refer to the lengths of grid entries. Chambers (2008) is recommended.

ACROSS 1 Aircraft accepted by Scandinavian backers returned immediately (8) 8 Dried fruit may thus be rejected (5) 12 Relaxed mind keeping a driver on course (7) 14 Tender Mandy with no end of beauty in appearance (6) 15 Hooligan not averse to go after

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Japanese footwear from NZ (6) 16 Airliner ditches still carrying judge (7) 17 Peripheral address once incomplete (5) 19 Narrow ridge over outcrop (6) 21 Greek dialect I see is back in London’s city area (4) 22 Striking controller new in project (4) 24 Irish Rebel drinking English porter in Scotland once (4) 25 One-time Indian cropper exercises before getting drunk (4) 28 Sun on earth mound abandoned by active flying insects (5) 30 Pudus observed turning, about four (6) 32 Fit chap out of Wye caught by axe (4) 35 Some fellows recovering Spenser’s precious metal (4) 36 Roman given a name in university adopted by old school from the east (6) 37 I changed the old style moral significance (5) 38 Like a Turkish coin no longer in use (4) 41 Women once proclaimed improperly (4) 43 Jump over tar at the front (4) 45 Very good Asian tent for some private (4)

47 Lead pipe almost confused Oban’s clumsy swimmer (6) 50 Insider stealing wife from victor (5) 51 American bird subdues forgotten fires (7) 53 An island canal open in India (6) 55 Once husky expert with class (6) 56 Crossword puzzle to please oldfashioned retired Frenchman (7) 57 Positions in society unknown for bright Americans (5) 58 Marine creature in Ellie’s yard tied up again (8).

DOWN 1 Juliet’s joining tea dance organised nearby (8) 2 Lustful king with a navy to mend (6) 3 Casual mover meeting theologian (3) 4 Coast beside railroad line (4) 5 Unsuitable Australian glass (5) 6 For some you hoot in support (4) 7 Check over adult teat (3) 8 Farce includes tense dangerous frenzy (5) 9 Millets bases are beginning to jettison female waders (7) 10 Iron man not bold amongst soldiers (4) 11 Lout right to vacate corner seat (6) 13 Princess fussed with the extremes of eloquence (5)

18 Nice newt missing its crest departs first (6) 20 Jock’s push turned over Cardiff’s main tube (6) 23 Variation of Elgar’s tone perhaps (5) 24 Mugger caught next to ruins by only child (4) 26 Godly ruler translated Bode’s Law, dropping the end of preface (6) 27 Agent definitely not taking care at sea (5) 29 Awfully smug dean, not a skinflint (6) 31 German car accommodating our assurgent housewife (4) 33 Smoke before early spread?

Agreed! (8) 34 Retail operatives seen saving money after spring (7) 37 Need stand-by substituted US group backing to depart (6) 39 One German follows soon ending in the net (5) 40 Calum and Charlie in pile up (6) 42 Holy man occupying caves is silent (5) 44 Legally take hold of whaler heading south east (5) 46 Riot overturned by a hill in Meath (4) 48 Composer to get rid of local shed and oven (4) 49 Pillars changed in Riga (4) 52 Morsel perhaps Henry’s stolen from college (3) 54 Name of mean terrorists (3).

All entries to be received by 9 January 2012.

Send completed crosswords: • by post to CAM 64 Prize Crossword, CARO, 1 Quayside, Bridge Street, Cambridge CB5 8AB. • by email to cameditor@alumni.cam.ac.uk • or enter online at www.alumni.cam.ac.uk/news/cam The first correct entrant drawn will win a copy of The Cambridge Book of Days, a miscellany of Cambridge connections through the year by Rosemary Zanders (The History Press, £9.99), and £35 to spend on CUP publications. Two runners-up will also receive £35 to spend on C U P publications.

Solutions and winners will be printed in CAM 65 and posted online at www.alumni.cam.ac.uk/news/cam on 16 January 2012.

Solution to CAM 63 Crossword What’s the word?

by Schadenfreude The quotation is: “What is a highbrow?

He is a man who has found something more interesting than women” (Edgar Wallace).The quotation can be found in ODQ4 inter alia. The unclued entries consist of pairs of definitions of HIGH and BROW. Winner: Andrew Moore (Queens’ 1984) Runners-up: John Kitchen (Magdalene 1968) and Douglas Stanford (King’s 1964)

Cambridge Alumni Magazine Issue 64 Michaelmas 2011

In this issue:

Footlights Mrs Darwin’s greenhouse The Arab spring Violence and civil society A coming of age