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The Man Booker winner on dead Tudors, sex, drugs and rock and roll
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Monday 15 October 2012 • Issue 598 • www.exepose.ex.ac.uk • Twitter: @Exepose • www.facebook.com/Exepose
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University spends £99,514 on Apple products for staff Photo: Joshua Irwandi
Guild President says “cheaper alternatives could have been purchased” EXCLUSIVE Tom Payne Editor
>> The University has invested in nearly £100,000 worth of Apple products since 2010
Comment: Just how safe is Exeter? - PAGES 6-7
Features: Key events from the past 25 years - PAGE 14-15
THE University has provided staff with £99,514 worth of iPads and iPhones since 2010, Exeposé can reveal. In total, 132 iPads and and 91 iPhones were purchased by departments. In addition to the Apple devices, 121 iPads were purchased with protective covers. The Apple ‘Smart Covers’, which are optional accessories, can cost up to £35 each. The University also invested in a range of accessories, including two keyboards (costing £57 each from Apple), cables, adaptors, docks, an iPad Protection Plan (£69 from Apple) and a Camera Connection Kit. A spokesperson for the University has admitted that it is possible some late transactions were not included in these totals, meaning the grand total could amount to over £100,000 spent on Apple products. Some of the devices were purchased through Research Grants. The figures came to light after Exeposé submitted a Freedom of Information (FOI) request to the University. The College of Humanities spent the
Games: Previews from the Eurogamer Expo - PAGE 35-37
least amount at £2,427 (six iPads, with covers, adaptors and two keyboards), while ‘Other Colleges and Professional Services’, which cannot be traced, spent £34,308 on 51 iPhones and 34 iPads. Academic Services splashed out on 58 iPads with covers and 26 iPhones, amounting to £34,308 spent since 2010. A spokesperson for the University has argued that it is increasingly necessary for staff to use iPhones and iPads at work: “The rise in the use of iPads, iPhones and Blackberries simply reflects the 24/7 nature of the world of work […] it has become normal for us to have to deal with queries in the evenings, at weekends and even when we are on holiday.” “As a University we do our best to secure IT hardware at the best prices and efficient buying policies are policed by our Procurement Office. However, it is often a false economy to buy the cheapest thing on the market. A number of other manufacturers have tried their hands at tablets with mixed results.” But with the cost of student living increasing, and an increased emphasis on the ‘value for money’ of university life, some students have raised concerns about the large amount of money spent on premium products for staff use. CONTINUED ON PAGE 3
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John Lewis hits the High Street
• £8.5 million shop opens • Branch Manager hails “incredible” response of local community
Editors Zoe Bulaitis & Tom Payne editors@exepose.com
Features Editors James Crouch & Megan Drewett features@exepose.com
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Phil Thomas News Editor THE long-awaited John Lewis on Sidwell Street has been opened by representatives of three local charities. St Petrock’s, FORCE and Balloons charities cut the ribbon as around 200 customers flooded into the new shop. Kate Connock, Branch Manager of Exeter John Lewis, said: “From the moment we announced we would be opening a shop in Exeter the response from the local community has been incredible and I’m thrilled to now be able
to welcome shoppers through the doors. Together with my 300-strong team of Partners I am looking forward to meeting customers over the coming weeks and months and helping them discover the full John Lewis assortment.” The £8.5 million shop, which has provided 300 jobs and has over 65,000 square feet of selling space is spread over five floors. It will sell furniture, accessories, electrical items and home technology, and also has a café with an outdoor seating area, which holds up to 120 people.
“Talented” Zara died of alcohol abuse, rules inquest Lucy Gibson THE inquest into the death of English and Classics student Zara Malone has determined the cause of death to be alcohol abuse. Miss Malone was found dead in her room by housemate Francesca Parker on 7 February 2012, along with two empty bottles of vodka. Francesca said in court: “I thought she was drinking too much. I quite often saw bottles in her room. “She didn’t go out and socialise, and I would often find her in a state in her bedroom. I tried to get her to admit she had an alcohol problem”. Coroner Elizabeth Earland said: “Miss Malone was a habitual heavy drinker and had ingested a large quantity of vodka in the hours before her demise.”
The court also heard she had anxiety problems, anorexia and insomnia. Her parents said their daughter was: “vibrant, talented and caring person, a pivotal member of the family.”
“I tried to get her to admit she had an alcohol problem” Francesca Parker Grace Hopper, VP Welfare and Community, said: “I’d urge any student who is personally suffering or knows a friend who is suffering with life at Exeter to contact Guild or University support services.” She added: “The sudden death of Zara Malone was extremely tragic and the Sabbatical team and I would like to send our deepest condolences to her family and friends.”
Derek Phillps, Vice President of Exeter Chamber of Commerce, said: “We think this is an incredibly significant event for the city. It’s been a great
“It’s tremendous news for the city” Derek Phillips,Vice President of Exeter Chamber of Commerce desire of Exeter’s retail and bussiness community for some time to have John Lewis. It’s taken a very long time, but now it’s here it’s tremendous news for the city.”
Opening hours will be Monday to Wednesday from 9am until 7pm, Thursday from 9am until 8pm, Friday and Saturday from 9am until 7pm and Sunday from 11am until 5pm. The arrival of John Lewis follows the opening of other retail outlets in recent months, including Hollister, Republic, Urban Outfitters and Cath Kidston. John Harvey, Exeter City Centre Manager, said: “There are very few cities that would be in a position to be seeing the sort of opening we are seeing at the moment.” Photo: David Rogal
Exeposé
| Week four
NEWS
www.exepose.ex.ac.uk
3
Student-made Original Sin images provoke controversy Beccy Smyth News Editor
Photo: uploaded to Original Sin Facebook page by student
staging of them is sexist because it always shows the boy in the power role and the woman being objectified. “Original Sin cannot detach themselves from these photographs as their logo is plastered all over them, and they have shared the photographs, which shows they clearly do not have a problem with women being viewed in this way even if they have not commissioned the photos themselves.”
EXEPOSÉ can reveal a rising number of student complaints in response to sexualised content featured on Original Sin Events’s Facebook page. Substantial concerns have been expressed regarding the way in which women in particular have been presented and placed in a number of the images, with some students claiming the shots condone the objectification “We are appalled by the images and I will be of women. Students photographed them- contacting Original Sin to let selves and then uploaded the sexu- them know exactly what we alised images in question onto the think. We don’t condone the Original Sin Facebook page as part objectification of women” of an online competition to promote the company’s ‘Dirty Sexy People’ Grace Hopper, VP Welfare and brand, which currently hosts Monday Community nights at Arena nightclub. The Managing Director of OrigiIn response to Original Sin’s nal Sin, Nick Jackson, stressed that comments about the stage games the company did not set up or pay during event nights being voluntary for any of the photos under scrutiny. and “light-hearted”, the second year Jackson stated: “Many students have student said: “The volunteers might embodied the ‘Dirty Sexy People’ not be aware of what they’re getting brand and in some cases have vol- themselves into. There is a definite atuntarily uploaded photos and images mosphere of peer pressure. There are showing their brand affinity.” cases where people’s friends have put Jackson has refuted claims that their names down on their behalf.” the brand is sexist, and has suggested The female student concluded: that the majority of their customers “We don’t feel that in order to have would agree, as “over 70 per cent a good night out, we have to degrade of Monday night’s attendees are fe- ourselves and be objected to sexumale.” alisation. We’re not objects and we Additional concerns have been don’t want to be treated in this way.” raised over a perceived element of Grace Hopper, VP Welfare and peer pressure associated with some Community, made clear the Guild’s of Original Sin’s promotional stage view on the sexualised images: “We games, which feature as part of event are appalled by the images and I will be contacting Original Sin to let them “All of our events are know exactly what we think. We conducted with the best taste don’t condone the objectification of and an emphasis on lightwomen, full stop.” Charlie Mackay, the Guild’s hearted fun ” Equality and Diversity RepresentaNick Jackson, Original Sin tive, reinforced Hopper’s statement. Managing Director She said: “This type of advertising is nights at Club Rococo. not something the Guild approves of. Jackson responded: “Students The objectification of women is apvoluntarily enter competitions and are palling, and certainly not something never forced to do anything outside that should be used as a means to protheir comfort zone. All of our events mote a night out.” are conducted in a professional manAs a result of steps taken by the ner with the best possible taste and an Guild, one photo, which was peremphasis on light-hearted fun.” ceived by some as “pornographic”, A group of female second year has now been removed from the Origstudents, who did not wish to be inal Sin Facebook page. named, has expressed particular conOriginal Sin explained that the cern over Original Sin’s response to company is yet to receive a complaint the sexism allegations. directly from a student regarding its One student who spoke to Ex- branding and promotion strategies, eposé, representing a number of her but has suggested that anyone who housemates, explained: “Even though feels aggrieved should get in touch. the photographs are voluntary, the Your thoughts: editors@exepose.com
>> One of the images posted on Original Sin’s Facebook page. Exeposé has censored part of the image.
Guild President says “cheaper alternatives” to Apple products could have been sourced CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1 Meg Drewett, a second year English student, believes that the products purchased for staff are “non-essential”: “It sounds like a ridiculous use of university finances. “It is offensive to students who pay a lot of money into Exeter to know that some of that money is being squandered away on non-essential technology for staff that we barely get any contact time with anyway”. Nick Davies, Guild President, has admitted that cheaper alternatives
should have been sourced, and has argued that some of the items ordered for
“Cheaper alternatives could have been purchased in order to reduce expenditure while still aiding the Green Impact” Nick Davies, Guild President staff were unnecessary. Davies said: “Cheaper alternatives could have been purchased in order to reduce expenditure while still aiding
the Green Impact and increasingly paperless environment of the University. “Additional accessories beyond the necessary (i.e a charger, which should come supplied with the product) should not be covered in this expenditure.” Despite Davies’ claims, Exeposé has found that a number of accessories, including chargers, adaptors, keyboard and covers, were purchased under this expenditure. The University receives a 5 per cent educational discount from all items brought through Apple education.
4
NEWS
PCSO back tweeting after Guild complaints
15 October 2012 |
www.exepose.ex.ac.uk
Grand Challenges project launches
Clara Plackett Arts Editor PCSO Sarah Giles is back Tweeting after being told to close her Twitter account after complaints over the nature and tone of tweets about students. These tweets mentioned the start of the “student mayhem” of Freshers Week, but the Guild, who viewed the comments as damaging to the portrayal of relations between students and the police force, complained to the police. Rory Cunningham, Community Liaison Officer: “The University of Exeter Students Guild raised its concerns about whether some of the tweets in question were appropriate.” “The University and Students’ Guild have an excellent relationship with Devon and Cornwall Constabulary and we will continue to work hard to address community issues and enhance community safety for both residents and students alike.” Despite receiving support via Twitter, the Devon and Cornwall ordered the cancellation of Giles’ Twitter account. `However, after a meeting with her supervisor, PCSO Giles is back tweeting. Giles stated on her blog that she had discussed the “pit falls” of social media with her supervisor. Devon and Cornwall Police said some officers “may need guidance” on social media.
Prison sentences for beating outside EX4 nightclub Emma Thomas TWO men have been sentenced to two years in prison after leaving an ex-soldier with 22 head stitches outside EX4 nightclub. Peter Hislop, 23, and Dean Connor, 22, sprung an attack on Carl Hicks, 34, following a conversation regarding a veteran’s badge Hicks was wearing in remembrance of his fellow servicemen. Witnesses claim Hislop and Connor verbally abused Hicks, calling him a “scumbag”, whilst punching, kicking, strangling and stamping on him. Hicks suffered numerous head wounds and severe facial bruising as a result of the violation, which has manifested in the result of post-traumatic stress disorder he was diagnosed with in the forces. In Exeter Crown Court, Judge Francis Gilbert told the offenders: “This was an attack for nothing which could have left him with permanent damage”. Hislop and Connor’s defending lawyers claim the assault was in no way founded in Hicks’ status as a former soldier. They pleaded guilty of committing grievous bodily harm.
Exeposé
National Student News
Dramatic increase in clearing spaces Dale James
Zoe Bulaitis Editor THIS year a new pioneering educational initiative within the University of Exeter will be launched. The Grand Challenges project launches in Opportunities Week (29 October – 2 November) for first year students and offers the chance to develop skills and engage in cutting edge debates. The scheme offers first year students access to some of the University’s best research, which addresses some of the biggest global challenges of the 21st century, including water security, child health, ageing, climate change, and international security.
Whilst taster sessions are running as part of the Opportunities Week programme, the week of intensive dilemma discussion takes place in June 2013. On Monday 29 October at 2pm, TV wildlife presenter Nick Baker will speak in the Alumni Auditorium for the opening of the project. This is the first in a series of lectures by leading academics and famous faces that will take place as part of the taster sessions for the project. These taster sessions for the Grand Challenges dilemmas will help first year students decide which of the key dilemmas of the 21st century they would be interested in examining in an interdisciplinary research group at the end of the term three. Professor Janice Kay, Deputy Vice-
Chancellor of Education explained: “making the most of opportunities like these is what makes Exeter students stand out from the crowd. Imogen Sanders, VP for Academic Affairs sees “Exeter as a pioneer in the sector, offering something hugely original to give students the best opportunities and make them the best graduates. “The topics and range of issues covered are seriously exciting, showing how the research done at our institution has global significance.” For non-first year students, the taster sessions are available to view online at www.exeter.ac.uk/grandchallenges and there are academic development activities scheduled during Opportunities Week within the University and the Students’ Guild.
THE number of students whom obtained places at universities this year through clearing skyrocketed as a result of a new initiative introduced by the government. This allows universities within the ‘Russell Group’ to accept as many students with ‘AAB’ A-Level grades as they want without running the risk of being fined. The Russell Group is a collection of universities which seek to maintain high standards in research, teaching, and learning experience. The group, which sports several high ranking universities such as Oxford and Cambridge only introduced Exeter, York, Durham, and Queen Mary (University of London) into its ranks around March this year in light of the implementation of higher tuition fees. The University of Exeter saw over 100 applicants offered places through clearing this year. In 2011/12, Exeter was not able to offer a single applicant a space. The amount of students gaining places through clearing is anticipated to rise again next year as the government plans to lower the minimum acceptance grade further to ‘ABB’.
Princesshay shops to extend opening hours Phil Thomas News Editor THE opening of John Lewis in Exeter has forced almost half of the shops in Princesshay to offer late-night shopping to customers every Thursday. Starting on 18 October, and in direct consequence of John Lewis opening until 8pm on Thursdays, shops will extend their hours to either 7pm
or 8pm. The shops that will stay open until 8pm include New Look, Fat Face, Cath Kidston, Topshop, JD Sports, Zara, Debenhams, The Cove, All Saints, Reiss, Pandora, Jane Norman, Apple, Saks, Hollister, River Island, Schuh and Carphone Warehouse. Staying open until 7pm will be Molton Brown, Superdry, Moss, Insideout, Swarovski and Hotel Chocolat. Wayne Pearce, Princesshay centre
director, said: “This is a positive and progressive development for Princesshay. It will be great news for shoppers as it increases their choice of when they wish to shop, and we welcome the flexibility that these extended hours will bring.” As John Lewis also opens until 5pm on Sunday, many Princesshay stores have also confirmed they will change their Sunday opening hours to 11am to 5pm.
These include Debenhams, East, LK Bennett, New Look, Molton Brown, Reiss, Pandora, Topshop, Zara, Hollister, River Island, Carphone Warehouse, Schuh, Coast, Hotel Chocolat and JD Sports. A postgraduate student, said: “I am delighted to hear about the news about the extended opening hours. I often do not finish lectures until five and now I will have time to hit the shops before tea.” Photo: Josh Irwandi
Ball sees Great Hall full of Freshers
Exeposé
| week four
NEWS
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NSS results show Exeter students are happy and satisfied Photo: University of Exeter
5
Exeter climbs in world rankings Declan Henesy
76%
of Exeter students are content with the Students’ Guild
Raj Kular Senior Reporter THE results of the 2012 National Student Survey (NSS) have shown that University of Exeter students are among the happiest in the UK with their university. Exeter students are the sixth most satisfied overall with their university experience in the UK according to the survey. Exeter has maintained its top ten position since the survey was first launched. The NSS, published by the government’s Higher Education Funding Council, asked approximately 287,000 final year students how far they agreed with the statement: ‘Overall, I am sat-
85%
of UK students are satisfied with their courses
isfied with the quality of the course’. 91 per cent of University of Exeter students agreed with this statement, the percentage representing the proportion of students who either ‘definitely’ or ‘mostly’ agreed. University of Exeter Deputy ViceChancellor Professor Janice Kay said: “We would very much like to thank our 2012 finalists for completing the National Student Survey, yet again putting us in the top ten - and even higher than in 2011. “We really value their feedback, and are closely studying not only how they scored us, but what they had to say. We hope to address their feedback and to do even better in the 2013 NSS.” In the survey, statements are put to students who then rate their institution
Ex-researcher played “doctor and nurse” games with young girls Rachel Woods LEONARD DAVEY, a former researcher for the University of Exeter, has been found guilty of historic charges of indecent sexual assault against two minors which took place during the 1960s and ‘70s. Davey, 64, who worked as a research assistant for the Centre for Rural Policy at the University, was brought to trial after being recognised on a local bus by one of his victims over 50 years after the original offense. The anonymous victim was motivated to report the abuse after they witnessed Davey staring at a young child playing naked outside the child’s house, as the bus passed by.
The trial at Exeter’s Crown Court heard that Davey had engaged in “doctor and nurse games” during the 1960s and ‘70s with two young girls below the age of consent. The court heard that one girl, who was not named by the prosecution, was repeatedly abused by Davey as he climbed into her bedroom through her window at night. The court then heard that another girl, aged nine, was also abused by Davey during visits to his home in Exeter. Davey denied all alleged assaults. He now remains in custody while he awaits formal sentencing on 1 November, on which date he is expected to receive a jail sentence.
6th
for satisfaction out of UK universities
and the course they took, answering on a five-point scale from ‘definitely disagree’ to ‘definitely agree’. The statements covered topics such as: assessment and feedback, learning resources
“Our students are some of the most satisfied in the UK. Why? Because of the fabled ‘Exeter Experience’” Nick Davies, Guild President and personal development. Guild President Nick Davies stated: “Despite three years of building works in the shape of the Forum, various student accommodation and academic upgrades, our students are some of the most satisfied in the UK. Why?
Because of the fabled ‘Exeter Experience.’ “Students at Exeter can engage with the University and Students’ Guild in ways unrivalled by other institutions. With over 180 societies, 49 AU clubs and 18,000 engaged students, Exeter is unique. “Democracy has always been at the forefront of the Guild, allowing students to effectively enact change if they so wish. This leads to a better campus, where students feel they can make a real difference to their Exeter Experience.” The NSS results also showed that overall 85 per cent of UK students are satisfied with their university courses a new high since the launch of the NSS in 2005.
THE UNIVERSITY OF EXETER has been ranked 153rd in The Times Higher Education (THE) world rankings, a jump of three places for the University from last year’s ranking. This follows on from a placement of 182 in this year’s QS Top University statistics. Both rankings position Exeter firmly in the top one per cent of higher education institutions worldwide. Phil Baty, editor of THE world rankings, warned that UK universities are at risk of falling in the table due to “austerity measures” and that this year has seen a “shift of power from the west to east”. However, this is the University’s third year in the top 200 and sees the institution continuing to climb. The University showed improvements in all five of The Times Higher Education marking categories, scoring a respectable 78.1 per cent in the citations: research influence’ category, leaving it less than ten per cent behind its Oxbridge competitors. The University scored its lowest mark in the ‘Teaching’ category with 33.2 per cent. Abi Pearson, a second year Theology student, commented: “I am glad to see the University’s move from a domestically respected institution to an international one.” She added: “It is disappointing to see Exeter’s teaching score so low, but it highlights the fact there is room for improvement.”
New sports facilities are a boost for clubs Photo: University of Exeter
Jessica Cath EXCITING new facilities at Exeter University’s Sports Park are already benefitting thousands of students, with further developments to the £8 million investment programme due for completion next year. The MUGA pitch has now been moved and surfaced with 3g of rubber crumb. The water-based Astro pitch has also been completely resurfaced and is now Olympic standard. Additionally, the outdoor tennis courts have now been covered, offering ten indoor courts. The new development makes the tennis centre one of the largest in the country. Brendan Gilson, Exeter University Tennis Club (EUTC) Captain, commented: “The Sports Park devel-
opments have been a huge boost for EUTC. This year, instead of being rained on every weekend at coaching sessions, we stay dry and never have to cancel a session due to bad weather.” The University has stated that the construction of the outdoor team changing pavillion and the viewing gallery will be completed soon.
“The Sports Park developments have been a huge boost for EUTC” Nick Brendan Gilson, Tennis Club Captain The building of the purpose-built health and fitness studio including a new 200-station gym, fitness and spinning studios and changing rooms is due for completion in summer 2013.
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Shining a light on student safety Following reports of sexual assault in the city centre, students reveal their views on personal security Photo: Josh Irwandi
Alexandra D’Sa “A woman was sexually assaulted near the church on Sidwell Street yesterday”, I said somewhat too casually to my housemate. “Again?” she replied. In late December, we made BBC headlines when a student was sexually assaulted near Streatham Campus—and again this August with a case of attempted rape. Shane Hobbs was jailed earlier this year for groping a university student. If J.K. Rowling drew her Potter inspiration from Exeter’s cobbled streets and piccolo-playing buskers, it is not too far a stretch to say that the “grimy casual sex” and “rape” featured in her new novel The Casual Vacancy was inspired by the sort of perverse social goings-on in the area, too. Safety in Exeter, especially for women, is clearly not a strong point; what’s more the local government aren’t prepared to do anything about it. A new scheme introduced by Devon County Council will see street-lights turned off between the “non-essential” hours of 12.30am and 5.30am. Apparently we will “save carbon, save money” and “see the stars”! Now I’m not sure whether the council have come across energy-saving lightbulbs before, or whether they realise that a lot of vulnerable women will be seeing plenty of stars when they are beaten and abused by an attacker, but if they haven’t taken these points into consideration, I seriously recommend they do. Okay, okay, I am picking on the local township quite a bit. That’s not
“I think of Exeter as a safe city, ”
Kathleen Marsh Only a week after I returned to Exeter, for my second year of university, there was a sexual assault in a walkway joining Sidwell Street and King William Street. At first I was shocked; I think of Exeter as a safe city, especially after a visit to the Uni-
versity of Bradford during which my friend told me she wouldn’t want to go into Bradford alone even in the middle of the day. But I think what shocked me even more was how quickly I disregarded it. I remembered, last year, similarly putting the assault on Prince of Wales Road at the back of my mind, and then out of it completely, because, living in Birks Grange, that wasn’t an area of campus I really went to. This year I have to walk along Prince of Wales Road every day to get to campus and along Sidwell Street every time I want
to go into the city, surely the occurrences of sexual assaults at these loca-
“The truth I do feel safe in Exeter. The Campus and city are well lit and the presence of campus security and police is obvious” tions should have me more worried. The truth is I do feel safe in Exeter. Both the campus and the city are well lit and the presence of security on campus and police in the city centre
is obvious and consistent, maybe even annoyingly so on occasion. Furthermore I’m confident that I can find my way around, even if I am terrible with street names. Still, if I were to walk anywhere at night alone, I would feel that I was, somehow, purposefully endangering myself. Talking with a group of other girls recently, one mentioned a habit of running home after nights out as a method of burning calories, and to get home quicker, but also because she would get scared walking alone. The rest of the group quickly agreed. This conversation,
representative of the whole of Exeter. Surely the university and its students are a lot safer, right? Wrong. I have two words for you: Timepiece Wednesdays. I haven’t met a single woman on this campus who has not been touched inappropriately, and against her will, by men in Timepiece— or any other club for that matter. I was out with friends a couple of weeks ago and one of these ‘lads’ got on his knees as we were walking past to take a picture underneath my friend’s skirt. It’s disgusting. It’s a violation. And it’s tolerated by so many women on this campus.
“As a woman, as a student, do I feel completely safe in Exeter? No. And I haven’t met a single female who does” What can we do to make it safer? Well, we can always make sure to walk in groups, but as we know from the Hobbs case, that doesn’t always help. The only way to be truly safe is to stay locked in your room watching Downton Abbey. But since that’s not everyone’s cup of tea (though I don’t understand why it wouldn’t be) I suggest that the University take a stand against the street-light proposal; that we don’t just laugh off any unwanted demonstrations of affection; that men, and women, keep their hands to themselves unless consent is given; and that people around these scenes of depravity actually speak up and do something to diffuse the situation. As a woman, as a student, do I feel completely safe in Exeter? No. And I haven’t met a single female who does.
following the recent attack on Sidwell Street highlighted to me how bizarre our cultural reaction to sexual assault is. On the one hand we are taught to practically expect it; no personal safety talk would be complete without at least three reminders to never walk home alone, but on the other, the reaction to assault is almost always shock. Even if the victim was walking alone. If I feel that I should be more worried about my safety in Exeter, that’s something that has more to do with our cultural reactions to assault than the security on campus or in the city.
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7
A night on the lash? When is enough, enough? James Dyson Alcohol, or, more specifically, the abuse of alcohol, is a topic that has not only been covered before, but positively buried under the amount of ink that has been spilled over it. It is one of those ‘issues’ (along with the rogues gallery of smoking, sex and drug use) discussed in talks during secondary school, or detailed in pamphlets found on billboards outside the local hospital.
“When I go out clubbing, not only do I know my own limits, I try with gusto to overstep them” As such it’s virtually impossible for me to write something that hasn’t already been written a hundred times before. If I were to try to be vaguely original, however, it would perhaps be best to start with trying to tackle a particularly annoying platitude that is usually bandied about when the ‘issue’ is raised, namely, the phrase ‘know your own limits’. This has always struck me as a) not particularly useful, and b) patently absurd – when I go out clubbing, for example, not only do I know my own limits, but I try with gusto to overstep them, as I imagine most people do. Then, in an astonishing display of mental gymnastics, we imagine that simply because we know these limits, and that we have overstepped them, we still have some grip on the
Grace Hopper VP Welfare and Comunity As the Vice President for Welfare and Community at Exeter, I recognise the part that drinking plays in many students’ lives.
situation, even as it becomes clear that we emphatically do not. The above complaint, however, only discredits the phrase ‘know your limit’ in a very narrow sense, when one goes out of an evening precisely to ignore it. What, it may be asked, does it say about drinking in general? When does being a fan of the sauce become being an addict of it? I am no scientist or psychologist, and would not like to venture into the precise moment this happens, but, in the brief column-inches allowed, I could offer instead another platitude to replace the one previously discussed. Namely, I would argue that drinking becomes a problem when it becomes its own teleological end – when drinking is done for drinking’s sake. When having a pint at a pub or over a meal, for example, it is generally not for the sake of it itself, but to enjoy the taste or to aid socialising. To return to the example of clubbing, I would again argue that this means-end example holds true– if I were being cynical (which I am), I would argue that that end is, in most cases, to work up enough Dutch courage to pull that night. Such a thing is fine (if a little cheap); it is when drinking becomes the sole focus, or to make up for a perceived inadequacy (very often social), thereby becoming once again an end in itself, that problems can begin to emerge.
Jonathan Jones Alcohol: Indulgence or Abuse? The overwhelming presence alcohol has in student life has long been documented and discussed in the media and there have been many examples of the severe dangers of excessive alcohol consumption. Yet as a whole, our society seems unable to distance itself from the lure of our newfound drinking culture. Tuesday and Wednesday nights in most homes around the country are relatively non-eventful; it is the middle of the week and time for a quiet evening of television soaps. In Exeter this would be sacrilege. What is the week with-
out ‘Cheesy Tuesdays’ at Arena or the slightly more intimidating Timepiece Wednesdays? Then there’s the weekend, a time when we need to let off some steam, why not go for a drink? If that’s not enough for one week, don’t worry, a friendly and inclusive society is bound to be having a social on another day. Very quickly the week becomes consumed by the idea of ‘going out’, which in-turn requires alcohol (who’d be seen sober in Arena?). This overwhelming social activity comes at a cost; it masks the problem of too much drink. We can quickly be consuming unhealthy amounts, or perhaps coming to rely on drink too heavily. Drinking becomes easier, and so more is consumed. In 2010 there were 8,790 alcoholrelated deaths in the UK. This is a shocking statistic, but one which we have become complacent towards. We
reason that there are millions of people in the country, and that proportionally
“Our society seems unable to distance itself from the lure of our newfound drinking culture” this is not major risk. Alcohol isn’t going anywhere, nor should it, there’s nothing wrong with enjoying a drink with friends. The dilemma comes in the relationship student life has with alcohol, a dilemma that is the responsibility of the individual. Try limiting the amount you drink in a night, or maybe give a social a miss if you’ve already been to a few that week. I have no way of phrasing this without seeming incredibly judgemental and middle aged (I’m not)…but BE SENSIBLE. Cartoon: Charlotte Micklewright
However, what is important is that students drink responsibly, and are not putting themselves or others at risk when they do so. This is why, in association with the local Police, the University, and The Guild, I have launched the website senseexeter.com. Here students can find out all the information they need to know about staying safe in Exeter, and who they can contact if they need further advice or support.
“Six people aged 13 to 24 get diagnosed with cancer every single day...on May 3, one of those people was me”
Sinead McDonnell Cancer is more common amongst older people. At least there’s the logic of ageing cells in that. Aged 20 and enjoying your second year at Exeter, you don’t expect it to happen to you. But an estimated six people aged 13 to 24 get diagnosed with Cancer every single day in the UK. On May 3 this year, one of those six young people was me. The medical reasons for why I contracted Hodgkins Lymphoma are not known - it isn’t genetic. It can’t be said how long I’ve had it for. I don’t smoke,
I go to the gym, I go running, I eat a balanced diet… I’ve even been part of the rowing society and been to more than a few BodySoc classes. Before my experience of cancer, I would have picked up Exeposé and glossed over this article; I wouldn’t have wanted to think about young people being seriously ill. But by not thinking about it, it becomes side lined and little understood. Only 0.6% of cancers occur in young people. Because of its rarity it is often misdiagnosed and this leads to a decreased chance of survival. The most important thing is that you know your own body, and what is and isn’t normal for you. I’d had a developing case of Eczema. This was unusual for me; previously I’d always had healthy-looking skin. I went to the campus health centre multiple times and
was told the Eczema could be because of stress. After months of discomfort I began to get night-sweats. I reasoned that it was probably the inevitable first term cold - a re-Freshers flu I was struggling through; it’s amazing what you try and rationalise to yourself. Whenever I grazed or accidentally cut myself, it wasn’t healing properly. I was tired and pale, and it was a real effort dragging myself off to lectures, seminars and the obligatory nights-out. Amidst the commotion of student life I thought I was just run-down. Finally, I took myself off to the student nurse with a swollen throat and cold symptoms, and it was suspected to be Glandular Fever. I was warned that if my symptoms persisted I should go back to the health centre, but I was just too preoccupied with term. I pushed on all the way up until the begin-
ning of the Easter holidays. By which time I had stage four Hodgkins Lymphoma. When looking in the mirror at home I saw my neck looked misshapen, and when I felt it I could feel unusual lumps. I had become anaemic because of the lymphoma, and had begun to lose weight. It was by going to my local GP that I was finally diagnosed after multiple blood tests, X-rays, biopsies and scans. The Teenage Cancer Trust recognises that 61% of young people feel that their diagnosis could have been made more quickly. Retrospectively, I know that my relatively late diagnosis was partly down to me being slow to recognise the changes in me. It’s important to look out for yourself, and each other, so that we can recognise these symptoms sooner. Don’t ignore your health, if you suspect
something to be unusual for your own body then make the effort to visit the student health centre and properly voice your concerns. It is because of The Teenage Cancer Trust that I don’t get treated like an elderly patient when I go for treatment. There are now 21 units across the UK for young people to experience care designed for them, and not their grandparents. The charity hopes to build 11 more units across the UK so that, regardless of where that young person may live, they will have access to the specialist care and support that has helped me over the last six months. With my last Chemotherapy treatment next week, I hope to be studying back in Exeter in 2013. Find out more at www.teencancertrust. org
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Exeposé
25 YEARS OF EXEPOSé
www.exepose.ex.ac.uk
Twenty-five years in the making EXEPOSÉ has been the voice of student journalism within the University of Exeter for 25 years this month. In celebration of this milestone in our history we wanted to make a commemorative issue of the newspaper. We hope that you enjoy reading the testimonials from former editors, and the words from Floella Benjamin and Steve Smith with their memories and experiences of the newspaper. Over the past quarter of a century a collaborative effort from the editorial teams and writers have ensured that the pages of print are filled with the best student news, comment and reviews around. For a long time Monday morning has been synonymous with the arrival of Exeposé on campus, and people getting to read the past week’s biggest stories. From it’s early days as a black and white A4 booklet to its full embrace of technicolor in 1995, and the adoption of real newspaper style thereafter, Exeposé has grown and developed over time. Just to look around our office location illustrates the progress that has been made. From a dark (and apparently cold) corridor at the top of Devonshire House, Exeposé now sits in a purpose built media suite at the
heart of campus. The paper is a central part of student life at Exeter and has has a bearing on the way in which the University is presented and acts on the behalf of its student body. From 1987 the student newspaper has aimed to represent its readership, and so thanks are in order to the tens of thousands of students who have chosen Exeposé as their source of news. Without your continued interest, in terms of reading and writing for the newspaper, we would not be celebrating this anniversary. It’s reputation as an established part of the university’s structure is also a testament to the hard work of the editors who have gone before us. We understand how it is no easy task to manage a degree with the simultaneous running of the newspaper and want to thank the efforts of every editor across the last 25 years, for making the work that we do a little easier with every lesson that has been learnt over time. There have been highs and lows, and we empathise with the responsibility that editing entails, and the importance in representing all students across our three campuses. It is not unfair to say that the issues of Exeposé that are in the archives form a big
part of the history of the University. In years to come, the newspaper will be a valuable resource in charting what has gone before. Exeposé took a few years to ‘find itself’ as an independent newspaper, but today, we enjoy full editorial independence from the University and The Students’ Guild - something we are truly thankful for. It is testament to the University and the Guild that a group of opinionated students are granted the chance to produce a newspaper about the issues that matter to them. And that’s what student media is all about. This special issue of the newspaper coincides with the launch of our first ever exhibition ‘Print Power: A History of Exeter through the eyes of the Student Press’. This exhibition will bring together months of archival research to document the biggest stories published in Exeposé alongside some fond memories from previous editors. The exhibtion runs from 21 October to 4 November and is to be found in the Forum Street. We want to invite all students and members of University staff to come and have a look at the history of Exeposé, and through this, the history of Exeter as reported by the student body over the past 25 years.
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In conversation with Exeposé’s founder Tom Payne, Editor, speaks to Richard Bright about the ‘posies’ and politicos of Exeposé’s earliest issues on record So you were the founder of Exeposé. weren’t very progressive. It took a few new Communications Office wanted to Was there not a student newspaper years for it to become a proper newspa- change things, so it was very difficult per. To call me an ‘Editor’ was some- to sustain consistency across the years. before that? It’s actually rather a long and com- thing of an overstatement – but I’m so We kept doing Exeposé every week, plex story. I was elected in 1987 as the pleased it has turned into the thing it which helped things. Guild Communications Officer, and at should have always have been. What was Exeter University like in that time the Students’ Guild was quite ahead of its time – it was forward look- How did you choose the name Ex- the 80s? Much the same as it is now, I’d imagine. ing, becoming increasingly more com- eposé? It fitted in very well with the branding It was quite a safe university. It seemed mercial, and starting to market itself. I remember 2 years before ’87 the of the Students’ Guild at the time. The to attract a lot of middle-class students. Guild Communication Officer was a design was also quite forward-thinking. It wasn’t class-ridden, but there was a guy called Simon Dansinger, the first We gave 30 quid to an Arts student who very precise class strata, and some peomodern Communications Officer. He then went away and designed the paper, ple were very well-off. But there was a healthy counterwas very sharp, he came up with a lot which ended in long nights spent putof concepts, and part of that was a new ting the paper together in a dingy flat culture too, and I remember there was a strong socialist union as well. My free-sheet called Hype. At the time there in Exeter. We were still regarded as a mouth- group were regarded as lads having a was another publication called Signature, which was something of a pomp- piece for the Students Guild – we bit of a laugh. We were known as the ous arts newspaper. It was quite self- weren’t particularly radical or inde- ‘posies’, never really taken seriously indulgent an¬d full of crappily-written pendent. I did try and introduce new by the politicos. I remember the University organized arts reviews and a trip to Lonpompous student for an NUS journalism. I saw “Exeter in the ‘80s was a safe place. There was a pre- don march, which we there was a gap cise class strata, but there was as a healthy counter- saw as more of a for information, day out in London and that was part culture too. It was a very exciting time” with a bit of shopof the bourgeonping and sightseeing commercial ing. areas of the Guild It was a very vibrant and exciting – again it was quite ahead of its time. elements to the paper. My Father, who was a journalist, used to send me books time. We were just coming out of the The left-wingers didn’t like it though. mid-80s and there were a lot of cultural Then, a year later someone called of A4 copy images. So every November we had images shifts going on – although obviously Cathy from Community Action, took on the role of Communications Of- of fireworks across the top banner, in Exeter was a bit slower than everyficer. She was quite left-wing, quite February it was love hearts and so on – where else. Exeter had a decent Students’ Unhippyish and her poster parodied Hype and of course there were some puns in as ‘Tripe’. So she was elected, she re- the headlines. It was quite fun, but not ion, but there were lots of class issues, really serious. I remember when one of divisions and snobbery. There was lots named Hype – and it was quite bad. That’s the environment that I can our writers started to write really good of energy around. The Students’ Guild really underout of. I was elected as a Sabbatical Of- Sports stories – I almost felt bad for ficer in ’87, and to be honest, I didn’t them! But in the end, it spawned a lot of stood the market – it was actually quite really know what I was doing. We careers in many areas. I remember eve- a big business, and there were political weren’t politically-motivated, and we ry Thursday night we were in the print industries as well. Exeposé was good didn’t necessarily have an agenda – we unit getting things ‘stuck’ and printed, because it gave students a mandate to things ended up not particularly well campaign and do things. were quite different from the rest. That’s really the beauty of student My father was a journalist, so I had proof-read because we were doing the journalism - you do make mistakes, and a basic understanding of it. I realized pages at about 3am ready for Friday. The important thing was that we those are the things that you eventually there was a gap in the market. But in all honesty, the first editors of Exeposé were establishing an identity. Every learn from.
Making a difference: your Chancellor Floella Benjamin on Exeposé WHEN I watched my son receive his degree in Exeter’s Great Hall back in 2003, I never imagined that one day I would be Chancellor of the University. That I would be meeting and greeting each graduate with open arms, imploring them is to go out and ‘make a difference - change the world’. This mantra is particularly important for our journalist graduates, because all aspects of the media have a powerful influence on society. I believe Exeter graduates are decent human beings with a moral and social conscience, which is what journalists and those who work in the media must have. Nowadays the press must demonstrate decency, honesty and morality, the qualities required for self-regulation, in order to regain the public trust. The effects of poor journalism, bias, sensationalism and invasion of privacy, undoubtably have serious negative consequences on society. So as we anxiously wait to
hear the outcome of the Leveson Report, which will have a substantial effect on the role of the press and journalism, Exeter graduates are in a good place to play their part in the future by carrying out their duties with respect, impartiality and integrity. Exeter University is known for it’s strong volunteering ethos and our student journalists are amongst those who have upheld this. They have volunteered their time and written incisively and passionately since the first publication of Exeposé in 1987, covering every type of story imaginable, both political and social. Giving independent, investigative and informative views with balanced opinions, which always make an interesting read for the students as well as those involved with the University. I personally always look forward to reading each issue because it gives me a real insight into what’s impor-
tant in our student’s lives. Our University takes great pride in knowing that many of the editors and journalists who worked on Exeposé over the years, have gone on to take prominent positions throughout the media industry, including television and the broadsheets, gaining major achievements right across the board. Which proves what a great training ground Exeposé is. Exeposé’s coverage of the visit by Her Majesty The Queen, to open our magnificent Forum, (one of the most memorable and historic days I have experienced at Exeter University) was as good as any national newspaper could have produced. It was credit to a professional team of student journalists, preparing to go out into the world to take their place where they can make a difference. And you know...I think they might do just that.
Vice Chancellor Steve Smith on the importance of student journalism at Exeter CONGRATULATIONS to Exeposé on reaching its 25th anniversary. Student journalism has been a feature of student life for as long there has been Higher Education in Exeter. The first students magazine
“I always read Exeposé as soon as it arrives [...] it provides useful feedback to me and the senior team on what’s working and what isn’t” Vice Chancellor Steve Smith was produced in 1898 for the Exeter Technical and University Extension College with the aim of providing ‘college news, solving problems,
airing grievances and suggesting improvements.’ Today Exeposé serves that purpose and is widely read by both staff and students. I always read Exeposé as soon as it arrives and , in addition to being interesting and informative in its own right, it provides useful feedback to me and the senior team on what’s working and what isn’t. Another important function for Exeposé is as a training ground for students who want to go into journalism. I often meet alumni who have gone on to excel in the media having cut their teeth on the student newspaper. So well done to all involved over the years and I wish Exeposé every success for the future.
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25 YEARS OF EXEPOSé
15 october 2012 |
www.exepose.ex.ac.uk
Exeposé
The scandals, scoops and headli
From daring drugs investigations to threats of violence from Noel Edmonds (yo special anniversary issue, Tom Payne, Editor, speaks to past Editors and contrib
‘Our team covered the big issues of the year: AU cover-ups, Guild cock-ups, the SSB “rape” scandal, fashion shoots and much more’
Henry White, Editor 11-12 (with Ellie Busby) WE followed Tristan’s and Andy’s large footsteps with the same big pictures and strong leading articles, supported by excellent interviews and reviews. But we also worked tirelessly behind the scenes to improve Exeposé’s reach,
potential, longevity and readership. We built up social media, membership and pioneered and laid the foundations for “Exeposé Online”, dragging Exeposé into the digital era at last. And, all the while, we led an exceptional team covering the big issues of the year: AU cover-ups, Guild cock-ups, the SSB “rape” scandal, fashion shoots, music gigs, and amazing sports coverage.
Whether we were being threatened with law suits from societies, effectively running the paper via Facebook when the servers failed, bickering with Sabbs, academics and administrative staff or costing the Guild legal fees, we ensured Exeter had a free press it could be proud of. We antagonised everyone, but we were there when they needed us too. And that’s what it’s all about.
‘We were first to report the identity of The Stig [...] we felt like part of something important’
Chris Erasmus, Editor 08-09 (with Rhiannon Bury) I’D like to say that the highlight of my time with Exeposé was stepping under the police cordon during our coverage of the Exeter bombing, savouring the adrenaline-spiked uncertainty among the TV crews and the bomb squad in an evacuated city centre. Exhilarating,
yes, but not enough. It was a real coup when we could report, some time ahead of the national furore, that The Stig was Ben Collins, a Ram-raiding Exeter alumnus. No, my highlight was a purer, simpler, altogether more regular occurrence: Free Domino’s pizza. It’s certainly not the taste - it was the sense of knowing that you were at the head of something important. Every Friday, elbowing my friends out of the way to seize the final slice of a Texas BBQ special. Few people get that privilege, and of that, I will always be proud.
‘What drew me to Exeposé never changed. The chance to work with a group of friends on a proper newspaper was too good to be true’ ‘Noel Edmonds threatened to smack me’
Tristan Barclay, Editor 10-11 I WAS lucky enough to be part of Exeposé throughout my time at Exeter. Although my responsibilities changed during those three years, what drew me to Exeposé did not. The chance to work with a group of friends to put together a proper newspaper that got students talking was almost too good to be true. Editing Exeposé was both a great
privilege and great fun. My team and I had the excitement of covering the 2010 General Election in our first issue with only one working computer. I would call this a baptism of fire, but my team of section editors was so talented that we overcame all such difficulties that came our way. Later on in the year, I particularly enjoyed covering the great fixtures in Exeter’s social and sporting calendars – Freshers’ Week, Varsity matches, the SSB, to name a few. 201011 was also a great year for student politics and we reported on fees protests, riots outside Conservative Party HQ, and
the cap on tuition fees rising to £9,000. Outside the news pages, we had a hugely successful winter fashion shoot, entirely organised by our Lifestyle editors. Our review sections were always buzzing with comment, building a loyal readership. We set up the Comment pages to give students a space to air their views on life at Exeter. I would encourage anyone even remotely interested in the media to start writing for our paper. You might never have an opportunity like it again. Tristan now works for The Sunday Times and Tab Media
‘A few memories stick out: performing the routine to ‘Saturday Night’ in the office with glowsticks, and our dedicated team’
Rebecca Lewis, Gemma Dye and James McMeekin Editors 09-10 HEADING home in the pouring rain well after midnight on a Friday night whilst the rest of the student population are enjoying their youth may not seem like a highlight of a university experience. By all means, those midnight walks,
eyes sore from staring at pages and computers since nine in the morning, were not a highlight. But everything before and after was memorable, for all the right reasons. A few memories stick out: dodgeball tournaments, an interview with Benjamin Zephaniah, crashing press conferences with the Labour Cabinet and then PM Gordon Brown, enraging a few societies after accusing them of student initiations, Texas BBQ Domino’s pizza, our stories appearing in The Telegraph and BBC, threats of libel, the uni hiding our negative front pages on open day, a very
drunk and teary X Media Awards, performing the routine to ‘Saturday Night’ late night in the office with the aid of (stolen) glowsticks and the pleasure with working with a dedicated team. Taking the helm of Exeposé was nerveracking but totally worth it, for one of us the experience set her on the path to become a “proper” journalist while for the other two it added something invaluable to the CV and to our experience at university. We had many ups and downs during our year but we would do it all again.
WANT TO MAKE THE HEADLINES? Remember you can still sign up to EXEPOSÉ online: exeterguild.org/societies
John Stevens, Editor 07-08 I NEVER intended to join Exepose until two girls screamed ‘join the paper’ in my face at the Freshers’ Squash. So many of my great memories at Uni came from working on Exeposé, I’m so glad I did. That buzz of knowing you had a great story and then waiting for Monday to watch people reading it in the Ram never got tired. We seemed to wind
up quite a few people. All our papers ‘mysteriously’ disappeared one week as they were not seen as positive enough to be out during an open day, Noel Edmonds threatened to smack me and one reader claimed they were going to burn my house down which did not help my popularity with my housemates. Some of our stories were picked up by national papers and TV news, but the highlight was our team winning NUS Student Publication of the Year. We also found traces of cocaine in buildings across campus including Northcote House. Whenever I meet people who were students at Exeter at the same time it’s the story they remember! John is now a reporter for the Daily Mail
‘Press days in the office were total bedlam’
Laura Harding, Editor 06-07 BEING the Editor of Exeposé made me certain I wanted to be a journalist. Doing the job by myself meant I spent more time on the paper than on my degree but it ended up being far more useful than a BA in English. More importantly, I had the most wonderful team who made it so much fun and who constantly surprised and excited me with their creativity and enthusiasm. Working on the paper meant I got to do a lot of things I wouldn’t have done otherwise as a student, such as interview-
ing bands before gigs in the Great Hall, visiting the local MP in his constituency office and, more crucially, sneaking my friends into the VIP section at balls. Production days in the office were always total bedlam but I remember loving them. I probably shouted and got stressed far more than I remember, but I think about it as a very happy time. My favourite pages were photo montages from the balls. I was always thrilled when I went to somebody’s house and saw those pages had been stuck on to their walls. The buzz of chasing stories has not changed. Seeing members of the team go on to edit the paper and then go on further to be successful hacks makes it all the better. Associated Press journalist
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ines: past Exeposé editors reflect
our guess is as good as ours), the pages of Exeposé really have seen it all. In our butors about their experiences working on Exeposé ‘Our team smuggled a fake gun into a lecture’ ‘The highlight was the Guardian Media Awards’
Nick Manners, Editor 05-06 (with Tim Paulden and Martin Vaux) MY involvement in Exeposé began from my first week at Exeter. Tired of working my way through an interminable pre-course reading list I pitched up in Devonshire house offering my services as a features writer. Two years later I was editing the paper, having spent my second year putting together the features pages.
Our year of stewardship saw the 250th issue roll off the presses, the launch of a new fashion and lifestyle section, a new entertainment pull-out, and the first viewing of the infamous ‘Exeposé gun’. Said gun ‘welcomed’ George Galloway on campus and at the time caused quite a stir in the old Exeposé offices. There was also a hue and cry over alleged malpractice at the years Guild elections - Exeposé’s coverage unearthing some dirty campaigning on campus. My time at Exeter was played out through the various scandals and shenanigans which arose from my involvement in the paper - here’s to another 25 successful years.
Jon Hicks, Deputy Editor 00-01 WE had our own office, which was great, but the tech was antique even by standards of the day. For months we had a single ZIP archive disc which we had to use to transport the paper. It wasn’t uncommon to have to redesign or rewrite the paper so that it would fit. The highlight was undoubtedly attending the Guardian Student Media
Awards in 2000. We won for Best Campaign, due to a “Cut out and sue” coupon offered to litigate against the University for reasons I’ve since forgotten. I cherish the memory not so much for the award but the ridiculous sequence of events that took place around it: an extended road trip in a near-scrap minibus which left injured team members scattered across South London. On the plus side, two of them bonded under stress to the degree that they married a few years later. Student journalism was a huge factor in getting my career off the ground, and it’s something I’ve looked for in applicants ever since. Jon is now the Editor of Official Xbox Magazine
‘We led a protest of 3,000 students on campus’ ‘Editing Exeposé isn’t easy. You end up proofreading when you should be in the Lemmy’ that people actually cared about.
Alain Desmier, Editor 04-05 (with Sean Dooley) WHEN we started our year as Editors, Sean and I were determined that we didn’t want to run another student magazine full of opinionated, badly written music reviews, that no one read. We believed that Exeposé was the only place that Exeter students could read news that was entirely focused on them and so we set about trying to investigate stories
Whether it was drug spiking of drinks in the Lemmy, campaigning against the closure of academic departments or taking ruthless lettings agents to task, we tried to report (and create) news that was focused on Exeter students. There aren’t many students newspapers that can claim to have led a protest of 3,000 students around campus! But in truth, the front page was only a small part of the paper and each week an editorial team of 28, put together a paper packed with news, opinions, features, reviews and humour and I have fond memories of everything we did that year including and especially the many late night editorial socials!
‘I met my future husband through Exeposé’
Emily Luscombe, Features Editor 00-02 WORKING as Features Editor for Exeposé would always be a labour of love. Joyful evenings in the Lemmy forsaken for long nights battling with an aged Mac, rewriting poor copy submitted by freshers whose priorities were elsewhere… Yes, it did present an opportunity to meet a sophisticated fourth year by way of Exeposé’s editor. One who drank wine from a glass, would pay for
dinner on our first date, who my mother would like and who, in the event, would end up sticking around for the next decade. Exeposé furnished me with a lifelong love of the very finest dining experiences. Okay, that may be overstating it, but it did score me free, three-course meals at Exeter’s most esteemed dining establishments for two years. It was a no brainer for them: give a student food that was Michelin-like compared to that served in Duryard, and wait for a superb write-up in a newspaper read by many students. Each week, we trotted off to experience the latest joiner to the dining scene. It was the most fantastic free loading - that’s what student newspapers are all about!
Rebecca Crosby, Editor 97-98 CAN you tell me about a time when you worked under pressure to meet a deadline? I put this bog standard interview question to a series of candidates yesterday. If any of them had ever edited a weekly student newspaper, the answer would have just tripped off their tongue. It certainly has done in any job interview I’ve ever had. It’s not easy juggling journalism and academia: you find yourself travelling to the Express & Echo in your co-editor’s clapped
out Escort when you should be in the library; proofreading on ‘top corridor’ when you should be drinking snakey-b in the Lemmy; and hosting editorial meetings in your bedroom when you should be swotting up on the second world war. Editing Exeposé is an immensely enjoyable and rewarding experience, however. If it hadn’t been for that beloved rag, I wouldn’t have got involved with the Guild, been elected to the NUS Executive, run the press office of the Commission for Racial Equality or be where I am now – managing internal communications at one of the UK’s leading children’s charities, NCH.
‘Exeposé confirmed me for life as a news junkie’
Jenn Hughes, Editor 96-97 DURING my year in the hot seat, I did everything from designing to reporting, learnt to be calm under pressure (or at least, not completely collapse) and evenmore importantly, figured out how to avoid those who, when drunk, thought Saturday night at the Lemmy was a good time to tell me what we weren’t doing right (the list was endless). I loved the drama, the camaraderie of the newsroom (well, tiny newsdesk) and the excitement of a real story. Those don’t change however big the paper. Exeposé wasn’t a shortcut to fully-fledged hack-dom (that takes years of hard-bitten cynicism) but it put me on the path and confirmed me for life as a news junkie.
‘I miss Exeposé!’
Tonya Meli, Editor 93-94 I MISS Exeposé! I was an editor at various glossies (Instyle, Red, Looks, More, Bliss, Cosmo, OK!) for most of my life. I am now the Global Talent Director for Audi. I used to present on TV shows like E! for five years and on CBBC for two years.
‘We went magic mushroom hunting in fields - that was kind of surreal’
Jared Wilson, Editor 99-00 (with Richard Thurston) I WAS Editor of Exeposé from 19992000, alongside Rich Thurston and Kat Thompson (Deputy Editor). I’d been music editor on the paper for the previous year and interviewed some seriously cool people like Cypress Hill, James Lavelle (Unkle) and Caprice. At the time there was a lot of unrest among the students about the standard
of accommodation. So we ran a campaign asking for better domestic services and ended up winning awards from The Guardian and the Independent newspapers in the ‘Best Student Campaign’ category. Working on Exeposé gave me a chance to hone my skills as both a journalist and an editor and was a great and fun environment to work in. One of the most amusing articles I was part of was when we went magic mushroom hunting in fields nearby – that was kind of surreal. I also remember writing a piece about a friend of mine in halls who kept both pet rats and used condoms loose in his room – which led to some seriously disgusting
scenes. His wedding is coming up later this year and that article will be mentioned in the best man’s speech (he’s a lot cleaner now). Since then I have written as a journalist for the NME, Hip-Hop Connection, DJ Magazine, The Big Issue, The Guardian and The Independent. I eventually moved back to Nottingham and set up a regional entertainments magazine, LeftLion. I also ended up being elected Guild President – but that’s another story for another time. Jared is now Editor of LeftLion magazine and had worked at numerous magazines and newspapers since
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Chavez celebrates Venezuelan victory
Dorothea Pease reflects on his rise to power as Hugo Chavez is re-elected the President of Venezuela IN his closest campaign to date, Chavez won the Presidency of Venezuela yet again, beating the leader of the united opposition Henrique Capriles. His victory was finalised on 8 October, when it was announced that Chavez gained 55 per cent of the vote to Capriles’ 44 per cent.
“Capriles’ promises to address the increase in violent crime were no match for the ardent army of ‘chavistas’” Many were left disappointed by the result, but it seems that Capriles’ promises to address the increase in violent crime, streamline bureaucracy and end serious corruption were no match for the ardent army of ‘chavistas’, who voted for Chavez’s familiar political system and increased emphasis on social reforms, including more building of public housing and expanding social programmes. As Chavez stood on the balcony of the Presidential Palace, waving a replica of a sword that once belonged to the famous independence hero Simon Bolivar, he promised to be a “better President”. Although this was met with wild cheers from the thousands of supporters lining the streets of Caracas, others in the international community were left unconvinced. Chavez’s political career has been
fraught with drama. He exploded onto the political scene in 1992 as the leader of a failed coup, resulting in a two year stint in prison. He won a landslide Presidential victory in 1998, however, and has been in power ever since, maintaining his popularity through championing social welfare and using the nationalization of Venezuela’s great oil industry to pour money into areas like healthcare and education. He even has a weekly TV show called ‘Alo Presidente’ (Hello President) in which he talks about his political ideas, interviews guests, sings and dances! The question on everybody’s minds is, should ‘el comandante’ (the commander), as he has come to be known, be allowed a fourth term in office? The odds are not stacked in his favour. Some have gone so far as to condemn him as an autocrat, prompted by his change of the constitution so that he could run indefinitely for President. His power has wavered several times; there was a national referendum in 2004 concerning whether he was fit for office, which he narrowly won. Also during a two day coup in 2002 he was arrested by his own soldiers for two days before his release was negotiated and his presidency reinstated. In foreign affairs, he has condemned the USA, accusing the Bush administration of ‘fighting terror with terror’ with the war in Afghanistan. As a selfproclaimed fan of Fidel Castro, he has established close ties with Cuba, and is
likely to further his relationship with rivals of the US in his coming term. He is also close to the Argentinian government and supports their fight against the British for the Falkland Islands. Furthermore, he has poured money into making education and healthcare free for all, but there is still widespread poverty in Venezuela despite the country’s massive oil wealth: he has nationalized the oil and several other key industries and is likely to further state control over the economy.
“The question on everybody’s minds is should ‘el comandante’ be allowed a fourth term in office?”
Venezuelan President Polls: The results:
Henrique Capriles
Chavez, leader of the United Socialist Party of Venezuela, was re-elected by a 55-44 margin. His lead over the main opposition candidate since 2006 had halved, suggesting his following, although still strong, had been set back. Despite this, due to a higher turnout, his actual vote count increased from 7.3 million to just over 8 million. However, the vote for a more centrist opposition has jumped up by over 2 million to 6.5 million.
Henrique Capriles was the candidate for the united opposition parties in the Venezuelan election. Himself a founding member of First Justice, a centre-right political party, Capriles succeeded in uniting Venezuela’s previously fractured opposition to stand against Chavez in the 2012 election. Formerly a lawyer, Capriles rose into politics in 2000 as the elected Mayor of Baruta, before becoming the Governor of Miranda in 2008. During his election campaign, Capriles placed a focus on education and economic policy, but suffered media attacks from state-run media who criticised his policies and personal history.
Share of Vote in 2012 Election: 60
In addition, it must be questioned whether he is physically able for the job. Diagnosed with cancer over a year ago, he had several operations from June 2011, but although he declared himself cured in August this year, many remain unconvinced, and the exact nature of his cancer was never properly explained. Despite these many controversies, Hugo Chavez has managed to gain another six year term as President. A jubilant Chavez took to Twitter to celebrate, saying: “Thank you my dear people!!! Viva Venezuela! Thank you God! Thank you to all of you!” However, whether he maintains the peaceful democracy in Venezuela remains to be seen.
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Features
15 october 2012 |
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Exeposé
25 years of iconic tragedies and triumphs in To celebrate a quarter of a century of Exeposé, we recall the events that defined the era
Gareth Browne’s Most Significant Crisis: 9/11 and the ‘al-Qaeda Delusion’ THE September 11th attacks in 2001 were the most significant event of the past 25 years, largely due to the Western reaction or should that be “mis-reaction” that followed. Yes, the world changed on 9/11, it had to change but it didn’t have to change the way in which it has. The massive wave of Islamaphobia that has engulfed what were once seen as the world’s most progressive and forward thinking states has changed our society in a way that no other event of the past 25 years can even come close to. Be it the rise of the xenophobic right throughout Europe and the USA or the frequent attempts to persecute an innocent portion of society, the real Islamists have grabbed this opportunity faster than freshers after Saturday night stamps at the Lemmy. People like Abu Hamza and Anjem Choudray are now getting regular mainstream press acknowledgment. Why is it that folks like these can get on Newsnight or in the Sunday broadsheets? It’s due to western policy in the aftermath of
Imogen Watson’s Most Significant Relationship: President Bush and Prime Minister Blair WHO would have thought that our then newly elected, charismatic Prime Minister and the presumably-charismatic but really rather ridiculous President of the United States would, between them, change the face of international politics for many years to come, if not forever. Tony Blair and George W. Bush are names that even the apathetic will not forget in a hurry. Regardless of their domestic policies, without their relationship we would not have seen a war in Iraq, the fall of the tyrant Saddam Hussein, and our continued presence in Afghanistan. Perhaps Blair was coerced by Bush, or perhaps it was genuine, but the War on Terror, a
phrase which encapsulates the military and intelligence forces of the USA, the United Kingdom and their allies in their attempts to squash terrorism for good, is definitely one of the most significant events of our lifetime, brought about by the two leaders.
“Tony Blair and George W. Bush are names even the apathetic will not forget in a hurry” Even those who are not directly affected by the death of a soldier in battle cannot help but be moved by the names of the dead reported on our daily news broadcasts, and moreover, the deaths of innocent citizens can only be considered regrettable. Although there have been fewer deaths directly due to war itself than in other recent decades, this Global War on Terror has seen more media coverage than any other conflict of which I can think, bringing
it far closer to home. This has therefore made the world seem a much scarier and more violent place. New international ties have been made and others weakened but for many worldwide there appears to be no conclusive end in sight. Withdrawal from Afghanistan by no means implies a resounding success and still the battle continues. As well as the execution of Saddam Hussein and Osama Bin Laden – and his lack of trial – there has been a massive crushing of civil liberties for the rest of the world in the process, extended periods of detention, databases, attempts to introduce identity cards, strict airline security checks and security cameras here, there and everywhere. Perhaps the governments are fans of The Police – “every move you make, every step you take, I’ll be watching you” Safety is important of course but I wouldn’t mind being al-
a tremendous kick up the backside to our society. Its because of two wars, a tidal wave of legislation and the destruction of that which we value most significantly – freedom, all of which we allow to be justified by 9/11, 7/7 and the ghost of Osama Bin Laden. One only has to look at the American political elite, in particular the “Tea Party” or the tolerance of certain types of political discourse in Britain that should be left on the shelf alongside that “Aryan Nation” ideal.
9/11 caused “the destruction of that which we value most signaficantly - freedom” It’s not only the minorities that this is hurting however, it’s all of us. Full body scanners at Heathrow airport, an obscene growth in police powers and the smothering of any attempt to fight these changes. To borrow a phrase from a well-known atheist, I put it to you that the most significant event of the past quarter-decade was 9/11 because it created the “Al-Qaeda Delusion”; a phenomenon still on-going today which is costing thousands of lives, trillions of pounds of tax payer’s money, our personal privacy and perhaps most significantly our rationality. lowed to breathe without someone noting it down. So despite your personal feelings towards Bush and Blair themselves and what they may have done at home, you have to hand it to them; the dynamic duo really set the world on fire.
Dom Madar’s Most Significant Creation: The World Wide Web BEFORE writing an article on the greatest phenomenon of the last 25 years I had a quick look on Wikipedia to check when exactly the internet was created. 30 seconds later and satisfied with my findings I could proceed with the task in hand. Can you imagine life without the web? In the grand scheme of the things for something to revolutionise the way we live in such a short space of time owes a lot to the boundless potential of the virtual world. From shopping to education, entertainment, gaming and even pornography the internet has changed the way we do things and opened up a whole new world of culture, information and art forms previously inaccessible or at least very dear and difficult to get hold of for those whose curiosity knows no limits. Lecture slides miraculously appear on ELE – in the process relieving me of those unpleasant early morning lectures following rather heavy nights out. Many of those would of course would have been organised through societies of groups of friends via Facebook and other vices of social networking. Freshers in particular might at first be unfamiliar as to the location of certain venues and meeting spots, but obviously there’s always Google Maps. Once busy socialising much of my conversation revolves around current political issues, sport, music or popular culture –all sourced of course from various political journals, online sports websites and my personal favourite YouTube. It seems that even when temporarily removed from cyber space all I can do is talk about things I’ve seen or read there. It’s truly bizarre to contemplate the earth inhabited by my parents at university, a time not so long ago, yet utterly removed from the possibilities of today. The World Wide Web has stamped an irreversible instantaneous impression on the globe and the fundamental way society works today. To see even more events that rocked the world Exeposé’s grown up in see Exesposé Online
Exeposé
| week FOUR
a changing world Emma Brisdion’s Most Significant Development: World population hits seven billion THIS time last year, thanks to a global media hype, everyone was well aware of the worlds population skyrocketing. So when an Exeter lecturer called his seminar to a halt, at 2.35pm on October 31st 2011, to announce that as of that moment according to the United Nations Population Fund, the world population had reached seven billion, was anybody really that impressed? Did anybody really think about the significance of this piece of information? Or did they just absorb it as yet another statistic the news throws at us daily. M a n y however, did pay attention, and the predictions sparked off many debates across the globe about the distribu-
Arthur DeWudewen’s Most Significant Event: Fall of the Berlin Wall IF I look back twenty five years, into the obscurity that took place before my birth, I would immediately see the fall of the Berlin Wall. As a student of history, I am inclined to look beyond my own experiences, and rely on reading, research, and other people’s research to get anywhere. Therefore I would regard
“The fall was the most important event of the last quarter-century, the one striking event that seemingly changed our world” the fall as the most important event of the last quarter-century, the one striking event that seemingly changed our world and its nature.
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tion of the Earth’s resources, from land space and food scarcity, to energy resources combined with growing demand in rapidly developing countries. How is the world going to sustain such an extensive human population at its current rate of growth and consumption? If usage trends continue, the UN predicts the equivalent of 2 Earths will be needed to maintain the human race. This one statistic saw the world sit up and take notice, prompting the Rio+20 UN conference on sustainable development, connecting many governments and countries, to come up with solutions.
“If usage trends continue, the UN predicts the equivalent of two Earths will be needed to maintain the human race” The Population Division calculated that it only took 12 years for the population to go from six to seven billion; the world grew by over a million in less than our lifetimes. It’s now a year later, and in just 12 months another 72,000,000 people have joined our community, leaving you to wonder what the next 12 months, or even 25 years, have in store for the Earth. The fall of the Berlin Wall ruptured the tradition of waging politics that had started in ’45. For well over four decades, the fate of the world, in terms of economics, social change, war, and technological innovation, had been driven by the existence of the CCCP and its rivals in China and the West. The fall of the wall effectively ended this rivalry – it marked its downfall in the most symbolic manner. The wall had fallen. The regime had ended. Better was to come. And this makes the fall even more iconic. Germany was reunited. Eastern Europe had been liberated. Countless new, independent, democratic states erupted from the ground upwards. The incredible optimism circulating throughout the West, combined with what I like to term ‘democratic-expansionism’ by the United States of America, heralded a new era. But alas, the world seemed to remain stuck after the fall. So many new changes took place, certainly in terms of worldwide politics and economics, but
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The future’s in your hands: 25 years to come Dale James predicts the end of nationality WOW, I wish I had a Delorean nearby so I could say for sure… but if I had to hazard a guess, I think that the biggest development on the horizon, despite how insane it sounds, is that the definition of nationality is going to be heavily challenged in the coming decades. What I mean by that is that the flow of immigration/migration between countries is going to reach such a state that it will become hard to identify members of your own ‘nationality’ and ‘culture’. Whilst those two concepts might be synonymous at the moment I seriously doubt they will be in the near future and I think this is for the best. Historically, ‘nationality’ and ‘culture’ were concepts born in the medieval world and developed since then to what we call the ‘modern age’. They are old concepts not fit for the world as it is now; the map has been filled in, the limits of society’s development has arguably been reached, and thanks to in-
novations in travel people are no longer restricted to living in their homelands. While it is good to some people having a sense of attachment to a country too often ‘patriotism’ has become ‘hatriotism’ with really bad results (Nazi Germany, The Cold War, and The War on Terror). Think about it, how many times have the members of ‘hatriotism’ groups such as the British National Party (BNP) been people who have never lived overseas or even left the UK for that matter? Blind national pride in today’s world is dangerous and should be consigned to the scrapheap of history – the old concept of ‘nationality’ is redundant and the sooner it is cast aside the sooner we can start moving ahead as a species. The process will be painful but inevitable, letting go of something like national identity is never easy but is something I managed to do many years ago. Fair enough, I have a British passport
with both Australian and New Zealand residency visas. However, when people ask me what nationality I identify myself with I reply with my tried and true: “I’m not British, I’m not a Kiwi, and I’m not an Aussie. I don’t belong to any single nation – I am a human being”.
“Migration between countries is going to reach such a state that it will become hard to identy members of your own ‘nationality’” I’ll wrap this up with a quote from the great George Carlin which I feel bears resonance here: “Pride should be reserved for something you achieve on your own, not something that happens as an accident of birth.”
Liz Moore predicts environmental disaster CLIMATE change is happening. You can debate the causes, but there’s no denying it. Recent projections have claimed that we have around 50 months to prevent the 2°C rise in temperature, which could lead to a rise in sea levels between two and nine metres over the next century. In 25 years’ time, we could see extensive flooding of low level and coastal areas which could lead to extensive damage and the endangering of hundreds of millions of lives, forcing them to abandon their homes. The question now is how to proceed. Do all we can to prevent disaster? Or simply adapt to the situation? Currently, it seems like the latter is most likely, with climate change rapidly slipping down the political agenda, and David Cameron’s promises of the “greenest government ever” disappearing into the ether. Our consumer lifestyles are unsustainable, and yet the political sphere has lost its impetus, the fate of the world has not been revolutionised. And that’s what so important about the fall in Berlin. The optimism, the joy, the opportunities: the world lost them afterwards, and instead of
and the general public seem to be perfectly complacent. This year, the IPCC published Managing the Risks of Extreme Events and Disasters to Advance Climate Change Adaptation, claiming that “mitigation is not the focus of the report” and instead describes ways of dealing with disasters when they occur. With a leading group weakening its stance, can we ever expect an environmental overhaul? Speaking at the University Debating Society, journal-
“Do we do all we can to prevent disaster? Or simply adapt to the situation? At current, it seems like the latter is most likely” ist Patrick Hayes commented that “We have not poisoned the planet, we have humanised it.” But there are still voices calling out trying to create something new, a fresh wall was built. A wall of capitalism, thieving banks, terrorism, expansionist invasion and genocide. Did these occur before? Yes they did. But when one focuses, everything else drifts out of focus. The wall was that focus. And after the wall was gone,
for a change. Also speaking at the debate, founding member of the Green Party, David Taylor said that “If we begin now... we can manage a change towards a sustainable economy”, claiming he was “flabbergasted” by the arguments made by pro-consumerists. The fact is we are burning through resources at an alarming rate, our abuse of them in developed countries has a devastating effect on poorer nations and we need to deal with this injustice. The recent campaigns to prevent Arctic oil drilling prove that people do still care about what happens to our planet, and so the battle between protection and development continues. In effect, the next 50 months will be the last stand against what environmentalists have been “fear mongering” about for such a long time. In 25 years, our planet will be altered; it is simply up to us to decide what and how much we are willing to sacrifice. the focus shifted, and not necessarily for the better. In conclusion, even the largest, most iconic, seemingly teleological events that take place within, before, or after our lives, change very little. And that’s a nice lesson from history as well.
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LIFESTYLe
15 OCTOBER 2012 |
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Lifestyle FOLLOW US ON TWITTER @ExeposeLStyle
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Did technology kill off rom@nce?
Vanessa Tracey examines how texting, Twitter and Facebook stalking have changed our relationships forever Photo: Alex Nabaum/ The Times
SO we’ve all been there, adding a few more wink faces in a text, scrutinising the amount of kisses a potential date has sent or given that certain someone a cheeky retweet. We all love a good flirt, and picking up hints and signals in our digital age has never been easier. Technology has made us more competent in the art of getting laid, but has arguably converted our definition of romance by making it cheap, quick and effortless. Behind the mask of a computer screen, people who lack the confidence to say “grab your coat love, you’ve pulled,” can send a quick message online without the need to break out in a sweat. A considered rejection through Facebook Chat is much easier to bear than someone in front of you avoiding eye contact and mumbling something about an emergency dentist appointment. And if that person simply doesn’t poke you back? Then just add one of their friends. There are an infinite amount of single people online who are much more approachable than those you see in clubs or bars, who are usually followed by an intimidatingly large group of friends.
“We all love a good flirt and picking up hints and signals in our digital age has never been easier” The way we now communicate through technology means that you can quickly discover whether that hot guy on your course is actually a psychopath. Through instant messengers like BBM, we can now get a real sense of what people are like in the space of a few hours. Of course, this would have to be followed by some Facebook stalking,
of a wet fish and it has been shown that a third of online dating website users lie on their profiles. The internet provides a magic shield where you can wake up and say “tonight Matthew, I’m going to be… tall, dark and handsome!” Unfortunately for those who are looking for a potential liaison, they might get quite a nasty shock once meeting Mr LovesTravellingHatesFish outside the virtual world. Due to social networking sites, everything is public and the opportunity to decipher someone’s every move seems to be accompanied with intense paranoia. Who is that girl he just added? They’re following who? This infinite amount of accessible information can’t be healthy, as a fixation on your other half means a harmless uploaded photo can be blown out of proportion with truly damaging consequences.
“Your grandma would say that romance is dead, and she wouldn’t be so wrong”
consisting of looking through tagged photos and statuses from May 2010. It’s also much easier to sound witty, intelligent or interesting over a text than hopelessly trying to crack unfunny jokes face to face. Armed with the knowledge of what @JoeBloggs has been doing since the age of 12, there is now no excuse for awkward conversational pauses and the first official rendez-vous can be uncomplicated and much less daunting.
25 years of fashion, food, tech and sex
Yet constant communication has the potential to kill off a spark between two people. Where is the sense of anticipation or excitement when someone is texting you every two minutes about what they’re having for lunch? Your grandma would say that romance is dead, and she wouldn’t be so wrong. Sending a text or email is fast and effortless, unlike sending an elaborate letter which is well thought out and takes time. Frankly, I’ve
MEET YOUR MATCH. COM 1993
The internet steps in to sort out our flailing love lives, sparking the start of a new dating era
got better things to do than stare at my phone all day, and having someone contact you 24/7 can feel like their hands are slowly closing around your neck. Not only is there a risk of accidentlally ‘sexting’ your dad, but typed meanings can become distorted due to spelling mistakes, autocorrect and sarcastic comments which come across as serious. That witty boy you follow on twitter may actually have the personality
But for those who are always pressed for time, technology has become indispensable. Getting the work/shagging balance has never been simpler thanks to instant communication, and long-distance relationships have more chance of survival thanks to Skype. Technology has arguably replaced romance with an emotionless approach to flirting, as we can be more confident and get to know someone without having to make too much effort. Courting and romancing will never go back to the way they were, we now flirt through electronic devices - but I don’t hear any of us complaining.
COOKING GETS STRIPPED BACK TO BASICS 1998
‘MARK ZUCKERBURG HAS JOINED FACEBOOK’ 2004
Jamie Oliver’s The Naked Chef marks the beginning of simple cooking and a long line of TV chefs (but sadly no nudity)
The definitive moment for social networking starts in a college room at Harvard
1987 THE RAMPANT RABBIT FILLS A HOLE IN THE MARKET 1990s
California Exotic Novelties responds to women’s demands for more efficient orgasms, producing the world’s first clitoral and vaginal stimulation toy
RACHEL’S HAIR MAKES THE CUT 1994 Women everywhere covet the bouncy, layered cut of Jennifer Aniston’s character Rachel in Friends
APPLES RELEASES FIRST CORE PRODUCT 1998 Apple declares total war on Microsoft with its first generation of iMacs, bringing design to the forefront of computing
NOKIA 3310 SIGNALS MOBILE PHONE MANIA 2000
The friendly brick snakes its way from Finland to 126 million people across the globe
Illustrations by Rhys Mills
Exeposé
| WEEK FOUR
lifestyle
www.exepose.ex.ac.uk
17
Faecal opportunities How to survive... Marcus Beard, Games Editor, shares his nuggets of wisdom on the best and worst lavatory experiences on campus SOMETIMES, unloading your greasy, bean-filled log into just any old water closet doesn’t cut it. Grind some beef, unbuckle your belt and place your cheeks upon this tour of Exeter’s lavatories, from the lavish to the lackluster. Check out the toilet roll ranking out of five!
THE LEMMY
Only a handful of students have seen these poop-chutes while sober. For good reason, too. The thrones and sinks appear to have been lifted from cheap porta potties. Even in the middle of the day, fresh from cleaning, the aroma of vomit is overwhelming. Avoid at all costs, unless trying to buy condoms without anyone noticing. Not for me though, I purchase with pride.
THE RAM & FORUM
Almost impossible to tell apart, these two excrement halls share the same trough-style sinks and warped mirrors. The inability to deal with any stool larger than a squirrel is forgiven by the spaciousness of each commode. Expect to find vomit in every cubicle Thursday - Saturday.
PETER CHALK
Extraordinarily busy during peak times, every student will have used this at some point in their excretion career. A small room with a surprisingly high number of urinals, the PCC toilets allow for some very inter-personal experiences. A touchless flush system keeps occupants hygienic for when that burrito was a little too heavy on the salsa. Cramped and gimmicky, use only in desperation.
QUEEN’S
After chowing down on a baked treat or filled baguette, this bog-hole is a smart choice to unload your bowels into the bowl before a lecture. It has a faux-
TWITTER #onthescene 2006
Social networking evolved to ensure we never miss out on important events, like what our friend’s having for dinner. Today Twitter has 500 million active users with 340 million tweets generated daily.
luxury feel, like something you’d find in a budget business hotel or an airport lounge. Some may enjoy this familiarity, but I felt like I was being somewhat lied to, particularly as the lack of a coat hook risked my coat being soaked in day-old effluent.
In her debut column, Kate Gray, dishes out her advice for choosing a student house and more importantly, surviving in it
KNIGHTLEY
As a building that requires a £15 music card for entry, you might feel as if you’re checking into an exclusive high-class gentlemen’s club as you enter the large lounge with a grand wooden staircase. This music department building has the feel of the rural prep school and the toilets are no different. A collection of out of use noticeboards and a paint-stained, chipped mirrors decorate the room. A delightfully vintage raised tank makes you feel like you could be shitting in the 50s, and the spine-shiveringly cold seat create a visceral, if not particularly comfortable, experience.
AMORY
The expansive toilet Mecca that should have been in the Forum. six sinks, seven cubicles and countless urinals. Perhaps I caught it just after cleaning, but the entire space was spotless. With a simple white and blue colour scheme, Amory doesn’t try to be anything it’s not - as Queens does. It’s a place where you shit, and it’s as comfortable as it can be. A must-poo for those who appreciate toilet design.
CORNWALL HOUSE (CHANGING ROOMS)
Don’t think you can only use these cans if you’re taking a dip in the oncampus pool. These are a spacious, outof-the-way alternative to the shithole shit holes of the Lemmy. Each orange stall is covered with unique and sometimes profound graffiti. I won’t spoil it here, but if you’re interested in student bathroom culture, you must visit this feculence grotto at some point in your degree.
Photos: Joshua Irwandi
Even those with a short attention span can’t help but notice Lady Gaga’s medium-rare choice of outfit at the MTV Movie Video Awards.
Kate Moss and Sienna Miller launch the timeless pump and skinnies combo, showing the power of fashion off the catwalk in shaping mainstream trends.
Fashion mourns the death of French designer Yves Saint Laurent; the first to use ethnic models on his runway.
WHEN buying a house, one must bear three things in mind: firstly, its location; secondly, its price; thirdly, whether or not people are likely to be sick through your letterbox. Yes, these are the things that matter most for student housing, and none more so than the haven of late-night stomach evacuation that is Vic Street. “We’ll be so close to campus,” you cry to your potential housemates, “and we can wake up five minutes before lectures!” How right you are, precious child, but never forget that those are also the arguments used to justify living in Lafrowda. The realm of student housing is inevitably filled with more obstacles than a sack race run by narcoleptics. If you manage to get past the awkward social situation of telling a relatively new friend that you can’t live with them because they permanently smell of potatoes, then you’re faced with the next hurdle of trying to find a house where you don’t have to cohabit with slugs, or where the walls aren’t so thin that you can hear the guy next door blinking. And whatever you do, don’t let your first experience of house buying consist of a landlord desperately trying to reassure you that the dead pigeon in the sink is an original period feature. While searching for a house that doesn’t leave you feeling slightly nauseous, you may hear a few horror stories from older students, battle-scarred and jaded from months of living with more chaos than a hedgehog in a condom factory. My particular favourite is the story of my friend coming back from his summer holiday to find a squatter in his house; not only was this completely terrifying for everyone involved, but it wasn’t exactly how he had envisioned his first time sharing a bed with someone. Don’t let these stories put you off – you could live in the nicest house in Exeter, with walls made of chocolate and
GAGA’S DRESS STEAKS A CLAIM IN THE NEWS 2010
BALLET PUMPS AND SKINNY JEANS 2007
YSL DIES 2008
Student Housing
iPAD 2010
84.1 million people swallow apple’s first generation of tablets.
CRACKERS FOR CAKES
The Great British Bake Off graces our screens and makes baking sexy.
vodka on tap, but you’d still end up with a story about that one time you accidentally opened a portal to Hell in the bathroom cabinet. Take these experiences as something to learn from, as well as to make hilarious dinner party anecdotes out of when you’re a real adult. If there is one thing I could warn you about before you skip merrily off to sign away your entire student loan, it is that social awkwardness is your enemy. Social awkwardness leads to worse situations than drinking five double Jagerbombs, and this is coming from a person who was once found lying on a park bench wearing a traffic cone having declared myself Queen of the Squirrels. In my first year, I found myself agreeing to live with people that would clearly rather have seen me ‘accidentally’ drown in raw sewage than spend five minutes in my company. But when the awkward situation of housing creeps up on you, you’ll inevitably find your British instinct to be polite kick in, offering to live with people left, right and center, with no regard for the fact they consider toenails a light snack, or like to lick you while you sleep. So how have I managed to survive two years of student housing? Three incredibly important reasons: firstly, a dishwasher. Let’s all appreciate the deity of dirty dishes, our soapy saviour that will diffuse domestic disputes and save you from eating curry from a saucepan with a comb like all the other plebs. Secondly, locks. You don’t have to be a rampant sex pest to need privacy. If you’re a fan of danger, then by all means, go ahead and leave your door unlocked, you kinky thing, but it’s best to have that choice. Thirdly, and most importantly, I developed an infinite amount of respect for parents, who put up with the worst housemates ever. Who else would love a housemate that is likely to defecate itself within five minutes of moving in?
FIFTY SHADES OF GREY 2012
Sex becomes a hot topic after E.L. James’ steamy novel sells 40 million copies worldwide.
APPLE LAUNCHES iPHONE 5
The sixth generation of the iPhone becomes the world’s fastest selling phone.
2012
HAT IN THE HEADLINES 2011
Princess Eugenie’s ‘fashionable’ headgear steals the limelight at the Royal Wedding, along with a Royally good bottom.
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Exeposé
| Week FOUR
Music
FOLLOW US ON TWITTER @ExeposeMusic
Listings Mon 15 Oct Hot Chip o2 Academy Bristol Tues 16 Oct Thick as Thieves w/ Alphabet Pony Cellar Door
Music
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19
MUSIC EDITORS
Callum McLean & Anthony Prodromou music@exepose.com JOIN THE FACEBOOK GROUP Exeposé Music
25 years of Music: 1987 to 2012
To open our anniversary special, in which we look at music’s progression since Exeposé began, Tom Oberst explains why he’s never gonna give up 2012 to its throwback naysayers. Nor let it down.
Feature
Thu 18 Oct Bloc Party o2 Academy Bristol Fri 19 Oct Krafty Kuts + The Freestylers Phoenix Sat 20th Oct The Bollywood Brass Band Phoenix Sat 20th Oct Newton Faulkner Great Hall Tu 23 Oct The Tallest Man On Earth Colston Hall Thu 25 Oct Fossil Collective Phoenix
1987
2012
Rick Astley Whitney Houston ‘La Bamba’ Pet Shop Boys U2
David Guetta Flo Rida ‘We Are Young’ Gotye
Sun 21 Oct Lianne La Havas o2 Academy Bristol Fri 9th Nov Mr Scruff Great Hall
Fortnightly Freebie
Destiny’s Child Say My Name (Cyril Hahn Remix) www.tinyurl.com/saycyrilsname Beyonce & co. pitch shifted to a groove lusher than the Amazon
Tracing the Past... N.W.A. kickstart gangsta rap from Straight Outta Compton, frightening white, middle class collars with their blunt verse about gang violence and, err, fucking the police.
1988
A RECENT trend which has taken Facebook by storm has been the comparison between hard rock lyrics from the ‘70s, say Led Zeppelin, and modern day pop lyrics, a-la Nicki Minaj. This self-congratulatory, gnostic idea that cherry-picked lyrics from an older band are more intricate than modern lyrics and that this is any indication that modern music is rubbish, is ridiculous. (Incidentally, the Nicki Minaj song ‘Stupid Hoe’ is pretty lyrically detailed, well thought out and the chorus quoted is deliberately obnoxious and ironic). This is the same dull conservative thinking that tells us that young people are more stupid than they used to be, or more sexualised, or the general schtick that ‘things were bloody better in the old days am I right?!’ I’m here to challenge that idea. Modern music is great. Take a close look at the top five tracks from 1987 and 2012 (so far). The same inner music snob, at first glance, will point out U2, Whitney Houston and the Pet Shop Boys as highly successful,
John Major’s government pass the Criminal Justice & Public Order Act, banning the outdoors playing of ‘repetitive beats’ in numbers, so effectively killing the UK rave scene.
1992
lasting acts which indeed they are - I doubt Carly Rae Jepsen will have such a long and successful career, though I wish her the best of luck. Yet are we to judge music’s devolution on the longevity of a few artist’s careers? Have you heard U2’s latest releases? If anything it’s proof that longevity is a bad thing, something the Rolling Stones and Aerosmith have also confirmed.
“The idea that cherrypicked lyrics from an older band are more intricate is ridiculous”
Admittedly two out of the five top songs of 2012 have pretty banal lyrics, but it’s hard to claim that ‘La Bamba’ is metaphor ridden, with lyrics such as “I’m not a sailor, I’m not a sailor, I’m a captain, I’m a captain, I’m a captain.” That it’s a traditional Spanish song does not detract from those lyrics being awful, but that’s not the point, the point is that the song, the drums and the melody are fun.
Kurt Cobain pops his clogs (and his head), joining the 27 club that will later claim Amy Winehouse in 2011. In Canada, the skies darken and moose flee as Justin Bieber is spawned.
1994
And this is just the same with ‘Call Me Maybe’ and ‘Wild Ones’. Detailed lyrics and virtuoso instrumentation are not important to pop - if you feel this is missing from modern music listen to Ana Calvi or Three Trapped Tigers. For those leaning to the less poppy end of the spectrum this year has brought a huge deal of exciting music, Death Grips released their second and third instalments of brash noise hop, Swans brought out the critically fitted about The Seer which has received 10/10 ratings across the board. Actress, Blonds, Frank Ocean and Flying Lotus have also brought out incredibly progressive and influential albums. Tame Impala have just put out a brilliant psychedelic throwback record in the form of Lonerism, and The xx’s new record is a beautiful blend between their original minimal indie
pop and Jamie XX’s forward-thinking post-dubstep musings. Whilst the charts may not be as awash with the experimentation which past decades have seen (Gary Numan, David Bowie et al.) the explosion of music which the internet and the increase in available music technology has brought about means that the music market is full to bursting with every type of music imaginable. At the end of the day it’s impossible to make people like music that they’re predisposed to hate. I can’t persuade you that the staccato orchestra stabs, and skipping hi-hats of “Call Me Maybe” are perfectly arranged, but I am a firm believer that music in 2012 is vibrant, exciting, progressive, catchy and just as good if not better than anything from 1987.
Read more ‘25 years...’ content online, including pieces on Westlife, Smashing Pumpkins and Dave Grohl
Alongside chaos in Iraq and Bosnia, The Battle of Britpop rages. Britain divided.
1995
The Spice Girls enter in a new era of bubb l e g u m pop and girl power.
1996
Napster launched, epitomising a cornerstone for the industry, revolving around the internet.
1999
20
MUSIC
15 October 2012 |
www.exepose.ex.ac.uk
Still a Biggie deal
If you could pair up any two artists from the past 25 years who would it be?
Rhys Mills discusses why The Notorious B.I.G still packs a meaty hip-hop punch over 15 years since his death.
CHRISTOPHER Latore Wallace, aka The Notorious B.I.G, or ‘Biggie’, is a hip-hop titan. Part punchy staccato spit, part rolling luxury, Biggie’s bass flow delivers lyrics born in apathy with the anger they evoke. In his diatribes on decency: nothing is sacred, and expletives are common currency. He is a capitalist, a hedonist, a man of violence, but also of humour and hyperbole, a man who is lyrically intelligent: a narrator. His metaphors resound, as does his dark humour; relationships are characterised by faithlessness and betrayal, crime-jobs are botched, and the only person he can believe in is himself. Biggie’s ego is monolithic; he lauds his own success, showcasing his pride in getting there under his own steam. He brags of material wealth, seemingly owning a fleet of luxury cars and a barracks’ worth of automatic weaponry, contrasted with his humble origins: adolescence
spent dealing crack, a permanent fog of fear and paranoia. Much of his music is a testament to this ‘Rags to Riches’ ethos. Unapologetically, he covers in great detail his potent sexuality, and muses on his bleak culture of gang violence, extending to his hyper-masculine ambivalence towards death: hence ‘Ready to Die’. And yet, he is also candid in his insecurities - epitomised in the self-explanatory ending track ‘Suicidal Thoughts’. As always, ‘Ready to Die’ has a duality of meaning, not only serving as a motto of his fearless attitude, but also as an admission of his self-destructive nature. Biggie deals with death in his album titles and through the content of his lyrics. Perhaps fittingly, his death is as vivid a part of his legacy as his own musical catalogue. His warring feud with Tupac ‘2pac’ Shakur borders on the stuff of urban myth: representing the ongoing rivalry between East Coast and West
No fairytales here
Harrison Ward talks about the seminal Come on Pilgrim, incest and masturbation - it can only be Pixies.
DAVID Bowie once said that like the Velvet Underground, the Pixies never
sold a lot of albums – but everyone that bought one started a band. High praise indeed when you consider that one of those people was a young Kurt Cobain. Let’s be honest, you know you’ve hit gold when David Bowie and Kurt Cobain are your biggest fans – and it doesn’t hurt to have a bass player so effortlessly cool that The Dandy Warhols wrote a song about that very fact. Pixies’ legacy speaks for itself, and Come On Pilgrim is the album that started it all. ‘Caribou’ is perhaps the archetypal
Kung-fu hip hop
Dom Ford chats about his own rap credentials, martial arts and the masterpiece Enter the Wu-Tang (36 Chambers)
AS laughable as the image of a white middle class boy shamelessly rapping along to Wu-Tang Clan is, Enter the Wu-Tang (36 Chambers) is undeniably a genre-defining hip hop classic – one
The iPod is first realeased. Little does Steve Jobs know that this clunky little white cube would revolutionise the way we listen to music forever.
2001
that I proudly hold amongst my favourite albums of the past 25 years. I couldn’t be further from the lifestyle depicted in the album, so I couldn’t attest to its accuracy. Nonetheless, the WuTang Clan paint a vivid lyrical picture of early 90s New York. It’s gritty, violent, tough and ruled by money. This atmosphere is portrayed most clearly through the beats and production. Employing a real ‘less is more’ approach when compared with much of today’s production-saturated hip-hop, raw, sparse beats and somewhat disconcerting (and often out of tune, to good effect) piano samples support the nine distinctive vocal personalities that
The birthing pool that was the precursor to The X Factor, Pop Idol changed the face of pop music and reality TV, alongside one particularly smug face .
Exeposé
The Cure with Rebecca Black. That would be some horrific fusion with the only common factor being a penchant for Fridays. ZOE BULATIS
MJ and Justin Bieber - it would get messy ANTHONY PRODROMOU
Coast rap. 2pac and Biggie were killed at the ages of 25 and 24 respectively, by unknown assailants in drive-by shootings, with the perpetrators never found. Sixteen days after his death, The Notorious B.I.G’s second album - fittingly titled Life after Death - would be released posthumously to critical acclaim. His legacy is tainted with gang
violence and his subject matters are unapologetically grim, but Biggie’s story is woven into the history of music. His decisive interjections into early ‘Mafioso’ rap shaped the path of mainstream rap artists today, whether or not these subsequent additions to the genre have lacked, as I believe, Biggie’s lyrical talent and vocal passion.
Pixies song. A quiet/loud dynamic underlined characteristically by Black Francis’ captivating juxtaposition of soothing croons and primal yelps is a solid indicator of things to come. The
combine a darkly suggestive sense of humour with deceptively catchy pop melodies. Sonically, Come On Pilgrim is as diverse and intriguing as anything the band has produced, and frankly more intriguing than almost anything their peers were doing at the time. Drawing simultaneously from surf, avant-garde and underground punk genres, this is an album widely recognized as a trailblazer for both grunge and mainstream indie-rock.
“This is the sound of a band just beginning to realise their own worth” pseudo-Spanish vocals of ‘Vamos’ and ‘Isla De Encanta’ are the first examples of Francis’ trademark bilingual songwriting, while ‘The Holiday Song’ and ‘Nimrod’s Son’ are evidence of his bizarre and often disturbing lyrical style spanning everything from religion to masturbation to incest. ‘Ed Is Dead’ and ‘I’ve Been Tired’ on the other hand showcase the Pixies’ unique ability to make up the Clan. Wu-Tang Clan take inspiration for their name and style from Gordon Liu’s martial arts film Shaolin and Wu-Tang (1983), and the production pays homage to this in samples and sound effects. Martial arts speeches, sounds of fighting and Asian melodies fuel the aura of violence that surrounds the album. But what stops this extremely aggressive tone from being simply disturbing and off-putting is a certain element of playfulness in the way they approach it. The discussion about torture at the beginning of ‘M.E.T.H.O.D. Man’ is accompanied by laughing; we know
“Wu-Tang Clan paint a vivid lyrical picture of early 90s New York” that the Wu-Tang Clan aren’t the martial arts masters they proclaim to be, so a distance is created between them and the
Razorlight release their third album, thus piling the indie landfill to breaking point and singlehandedly making room for David Guetta and Calvin Harris in the UK charts.
2008
“You know you’ve hit gold when David Bowie and Kurt Cobain are your biggest fans”
Meatloaf with Morrissey. Ironic vegan banter. BEN WINSOR
Mash My Bloody Valentine’s brilliant music and Grateful Dead’s ridiculously prolific output and touring, I’d be Bloody Grateful for that. HUGH DIGNAN Despite that, Come On Pilgrim is often seen as the ugly-duckling of the Pixies’ back catalogue; it’s arguably not as well-known and sadly not as well-loved as Surfer Rosa or Doolittle, and with a running time of a mere 20 minutes, it’s easily overlooked. The truth is, Come On Pilgrim is beautiful in its own right, but there’s something even more dazzling just below the surface waiting to be discovered. In essence, this is the sound of a band just beginning to realise their own worth – and let’s not undersell that; it’s impossible to overestimate the influence this album has had in the 25 years since its release, and after hearing it for the first time, it’s also impossible to forget.
It’s got to be a testament of some kind lyrics that makes it more digestible. That said, the most important that someone like me, who couldn’t be aspect of the album for me has to be the further from the lifestyle or culture of the incredibly distinctive styles each member collective, can enjoy this album so much. Not only is it lyrically vivid brings to the table. Most of Enjoy and sonically distinctive, the songs on the album our musical it’s truly a defining feature MCs lending musings? Be sure to moment in hip-hop. one or two verses The influence of each, but in no way check out our show on Wu-Tang Clan and, does this become Xpression FM next Monday 6-7. more specifically, confusing. It sounds Join the discussion and listen 36 Chambers is natural. The late boundless. They Ol’ Dirty Bastard’s again on facebook.com created popular hipcrazy half off-key /XmediaMusicShow hop slang like ‘cream’ singing, half rapping is (‘Cash Rules Everything as enjoyable to listen to Around Me’), and launched the in its own way as Ghostface Killah’s higher-pitched battle raps. This successful careers of countless rappers approach and the distinctiveness of each and groups. Hip hop artists and listeners member’s style ensures that the album who can truly say they owe nothing to never becomes boring or repetitive, and Wu-Tang and 36 Chambers are few and in my opinion sets it apart from the vast far between. majority of other hip-hop releases.
One of the biggest names in popular culture and the King of Pop, Michael Jackson, dies of an overdose in his L.A. home.
2009
Everybody’s favourite gangly gangsta Snoop Dogg apparently now channels the spirit of Bob Marley. He’s called Snoop Lion now. The future? Rihanna’s latest album became the worst selling no. 1 album ever, shifting less than 10,000 copies. Think what you will.
2012
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Exeposé
| WEEK FOUR
Screen FOLLOW US ON TWITTER @ExeposeScreen
Newsreel
Screen
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23
SCREEN EDITORS
Louis Doré & Owen Keating screen@exepose.com JOIN THE FACEBOOK GROUP Exeposé Screen
Spin doctors and policy shockers
Louis Doré and Owen Keating, Screen Editors, talk to Armando Iannucci about Satan, swearing, and everything in-between
Taken 2 tops US box office Liam Neeson’s brusque, titanium-fisted Bryan Mills has led Taken 2 to the top of the box office charts; the film took over $50million in its first week.
Toy Story sequel in the pipeline? Childhood-defining series Toy Story is set to return for a third sequel, according to a series of internet rumours. Woody, Buzz and the gang are Pixar’s most successful series, with the trilogy taking nearly $2billion at the box office over the years.
Sascha Baron Cohen to make lesbian film The man behind the mankini is planning a movie about Cecil Chao, the man who offered $65 million to the man who could “turn” his lesbian daughter straight. Gigi Chao, who is rumoured to have recently married her long term girlfriend, is said to be unperturbed by the rumours. Cohen is currently making a James Bond spoof, which focuses on 007’s football hooligan brother.
Kelly Marcel to write 50 Shades of Grey screenplay Much to the chagrin of Bret Easton Ellis, Kelly Marcel, the Terra Nova screenwriter, has been revealed as the lucky lady chosen to adapt E.L James’ erotic cult sensation 50 Shades of Grey for the big screen. Easton Ellis had been pushing for the role on Twitter, but Universal Studios chose Marcel for her “flawless structural technique and passionate commitment to emotion, humour, and depth of character”.
The Thick of It Created by: Armando Ianucci Cast: Peter Capaldi, Chris Addison, Joanna Scanlan ON the whole, I am impressed with how well Armando Iannucci’s comedy has adjusted to the changes in politics since the last series. Tucker continues
CONSIDERING the massive impact that Armando Iannucci’s characters have had on British comedy over the last fifteen years, it’s easy to imagine that the man behind such a comedy revolution might be overshadowed by their unavoidable relevance to him, or by the fact that he’s responsible for their projection into the public’s conscience. Thankfully, it would be impossible for anything to overshadow our interviewee. Gregarious, quick to engage and quicker to quip, Armando Iannucci is supremely interesting. It takes a certain intelligence to find oneself studying for a PhD on the works of Milton at Cambridge, and an even greater degree of self-confidence to drop such an eminent qualification to pursue a career in the cutthroat world of comedy. However, listening to Iannucci discussing his education, you’d think it simple to make such a big decision. He simply says of his PhD, “I just realised I’d never finish, so I stopped.” That’s that, then. Not quite. Despite abandoning academia to write jokes, he’s quick to stress the benefits of his prestigious education. He admits to a “fascination” with Satan in Paradise Lost, simply because he’s overwhelmingly charismatic, with “the best speeches, the best vocabulary”. Iannucci also draws parallels between Satan and the political machine which he now so fluidly comments upon, and as we later find out, influences.
similarity between the two? Thankfully, Armando reassures us that he is nothing like his monstrous creation. For a start, he’s not that sweary; he finds mindless expletives a bit overpowering. “The trick”, he says, “is to make the swearing feel real”; the Blair years were laden with testosteroneridden swagger, and as such, characters critiquing modern politics need a suitably vibrant lexicon.
“F*ck this, f*ck that can be a bit relentless”
He’s particularly effusive about our society’s fascination with the villain, and their methods of control and manipulation. Unsurprisingly for such a political comedian, Iannucci professes a fascination for Satan’s use of spin to tell us what we all already knew: “heaven’s overrated”. This fascination manifests itself nowhere more so than in Malcolm Tucker, the abuse-spitting spin doctor at the heart of The Thick of It. Tucker is fantastically nasty, threatening colleagues with everything from diabetes to disembowelment, all in a Scottish brogue not dissimilar to Iannucci’s own. Could there be any more than a passing
Iannucci says that it’s the words around the swearing, the “baroque threat” of Malcolm’s aggression, that create the comedy. “F*ck this f*ck that can be a bit relentless”, he says, highlighting the impact of the physical violence which underpins so much of Tucker’s diatribe. In this most recent series of The Thick of It, Tucker exudes evil like never before. He’s in opposition, interminably frustrated, and struggling with “conflicting and contradictory” party relations, according to his creator. Is this frustration indicative of a tougher political arena than previous series? Iannucci certainly thinks so. While The Thick of It retains its lack of overt party specifics, it still offers “a snapshot of what’s really going on”, to the extent that recent episodes have actually foreshadowed the real news to startlingly prescient levels; Jimmy Savile, anyone? In this latest series, the coalition is new, unmanageable territory for all sides of the political spectrum. In both reality and fiction, the honeymoon period has been replaced with a seething cauldron of personal agendas and voter apathy, with young, inexperienced staff tasked with managing vast, difficult projects. Iannucci is typically opinionated about the shortcomings of the current system. His show, like the system it critiques, is more concerned with the pressures exerted on politicians than the people
to be terrifying and manipulative, despite his party no longer being in power and poor Nicola Murray seems to have become only slightly more useless. It’s great to see more of the opposition – now in power – and the coalition between a world-weary Peter Mannion and the enthusiastic, tech-savvy Fergus and Adam (also known as ‘The Inbetweeners’) makes for a pleasantly horrific ‘team’ with,
if possible, even more backstabbing and deceit than before. Another refreshing element is Mannion’s calm spin doctor, Stewart, whose hippieesque methods of planning make Tucker’s shouting and swearing seem very straightforward and somehow less stressful. Nicola Murray’s hurried resignation at the end of Episode Four hints at a change of tone, as Dan Miller presents new hope for the opposition. There have been few moments in
“Heaven is overrated”
themselves. The media, Iannucci says, has created a constantly vicious cycle where if a politician “looks a bit gawky, or falls over, then he’s finished”. The sky’s no longer the limit, it’s the channel that broadcasts the demise of our politicians. Our interviewee is undoubtedly sympathetic to their plight; helpless ministers are abused by self-interested, incompetent advisors, trapped in a system that has, in real life, capitalised on widespread confusion about who actually does what to legislate vast, previously undiscussed changes to our country. Oddly enough, the real politicians love Iannucci’s take on their world. Ed Miliband has used ‘omnishambles’, one of Malcolm Tucker’s pre-watershed soundbites in policy speeches, and, according to Iannucci, Ed and his peers “seem to be embracing” the image of politicians and the pressures they face that The Thick of It portrays. Well, most of them do, anyway. Alastair Campbell, former accomplice of Tony Blair, criticised Iannucci for “going against the values of Malcolm Tucker” in accepting an OBE. “But Malcolm Tucker is horrible!”,
Iannucci chuckles in response. He doesn’t endorse the bile-spewing values of his creation, who “fundamentally represents an abuse of politicians”. Indeed, he says, it’s more worrying that Alastair Campbell places Tucker on such a pedestal, and sees him as someone whose values are there to be strived for. It’s people like Tucker, Iannucci says, who help create “a recipe for paranoia and confusion” which leaves politicians at best exposed, and at worst, helplessly vilified. Despite all of this, Iannucci firmly describes himself as “pro-politics”; he just wants to change the system. He doesn’t see his work as judgmental, but as a portrayal of “where I think we are at the moment”. Characters like Chris Addison’s Ollie Reeder show an overdependence on inexperienced youth, something Iannucci would counter by placing an emphasis on recruiting “older, better qualified MP’s”. He yearns for the days when politics was something you did after a successful career in another field, rather than just another career ladder to climb, and, presumably, fall off. Armando Iannucci is a once -in-a-generation kind of comedian; his intelligent, far-reaching work permeates the very fabric of our society, from politicos to Partridge. His work is as universal as it is necessary, and talking to him was a genuine privilege. For more from Armando Iannucci, visit Exeposé’s new website at www.exepose.ex.ac.uk to read the second half of our interview with him!
The Thick of It where I actually care about the plot, as usually I’m just swept along with the hilarious, foul-mouthed confusion, but at the moment I am intrigued to see how it will all play out (I imagine fairly badly for most of the characters, as is standard). I’m keeping my fingers crossed that Tucker’s archenemy Julius (or ‘Baldemort’) will make a reappearance, to offer some softer, quieter tones to the stressed shouting. And I’ll be impressed and
slightly sickened if Terri and Glenn both last another series; neither of them seem to be getting much done. Ever. The Thick of It might make you lose (even more) faith in politics, depending on how accurate you choose to believe it is, but I’m just glad we’re getting some satirical humour out of the current going-ons. FRANCESCA MOROSINI
24
SCREEN
15 OCTOBER 2012 |
www.exepose.ex.ac.uk
years of Cinema
Exeposé
We asked, you answered. Exeposé reveals the results from our 25th anniversary film survey
Most Iconic Actor: Tom Hanks
We asked, you said: The most iconic actor of the last 25 acclaim across several genres, and it beyears? Brad Pitt. Who else has taken comes impossible to remove Stone from the very zeitgeist of cinematic culsuch diverse roles and excelled so routure. tinely? A modern-day Marlon OWEN KEATING Screen Brando? Quite possibly. He SCREEN EDITOR readers said has that same magnetism and effortless charisma, that their favourite he has that subtle hint of cinemas were Odeon If there’s one thing darkness. and Picturehouse, more impressive than HUGH DIGNAN Cameron Crowe’s which took 30.6% of knack for combining a the vote each heartfelt storyline with I cannot emphasize just lovable characters and how much respect I have for unashamedly spectacular visSamuel L. Jackson. He built his career from the ground up taking any and uals, then it’s his seemingly immeasurall roles that came his way, eventually able talent for soundtracking a film; the going from minor TV roles to starring in music in Almost Famous and Elizabethmovies such as Pulp Fiction and Jackie town is sublime. HARRISON WARD Brown. He has an immensely professional work ethic and the fact that he has over 100 roles to his name is testament to this. The Matrix, in all its thrilling, mindDALE JAMES melting glory, brought bullet time, cyberpunk, and the Wachowski siblings to our collective attention, with an unThe film of the quarter-century? The believable soundtrack to boot. The high Truman Show. What other film heralded point of Reeves’ career, it also brought the rise of reality television? What other sci-fi out of the shadows and into the film has drawn so much from Jim Car- mainstream, paving the way for Equilibrey? What other film can match it for rium, and the biggie, Inception. those key three E’s of film: entertainSHEFALI SRIVASTAVA ment, enlightenment and emotion? A perfect mix of scope and substance. In the generation of Pixar masterpieces, HUGH DIGNAN A Bug’s Life’s rabble of hilarious insects provide warmth and, through Kevin I love Woody Allen’s movies. His Spacey’s grasshopper, real menace, neurotic, death-fearing, adultery-com- which have stood the test of my passing mitting, senselessly philosophizing to (some form of) adulthood. Also, the characters are pure genius. His dialogue: fat German caterpillar’s transformation unbeatable. I believe he has been one of into a ‘beautiful butterfly’ is possibly the the best auteurs in cinema for more than funniest moment in cinema. the past 40 years. MATT BUGLER ANNA VARADI James Cameron is without a shadow of Nolan’s Memento is an intelligent a doubt one of the greatest directors in thriller revolving around the central cinema today; he’s made some of the character’s short-term memory loss. biggest blockbusters ever seen. What I find so brilliant about his The charm here is found in work are the underlying themes the meticulous structur52.6% he injects into his stories; ing of the plot, and of Screen Aliens has a cleverly conthe gradual tying of readers chose cealed statement about the loose-ends. the cinema as their Vietnam War, the referencRHYS MILLS preferred method of es Titanic makes to Romeo & Juliet are searingly overt, watching and the anti-colonial theme films of Avatar speaks volumes to Whilst not necesan aspiring historian such as mysarily iconic (yet), Emma self. Stone will be a star. Easy A is the best teen movie since those of John DALE JAMES Hughes, and Stone is central to its success. Add to this a burgeoning career that, despite its infancy, has won critical
SINCE 1987, he has brought us the likes of Forrest Gump, Philadelphia, Apollo 13, Saving Private Ryan, The Polar Express, The Green Mile and most importantly, Toy Story 1, 2 and 3. His films speak for themselves. The best actor in the last 25 years can only be Tom Hanks. Simple as. MEG DREWETT FEATURES EDITOR IT’S hard to think of a more recognisable face in film. The star of countless
box office hits, Hanks is practically unrivalled in his ability to enthrall an audience with the sheer emotion he invests in his characters. From You’ve Got Mail to Saving Private Ryan, he creates compelling personas that drag you in with their depth, their vitality, and the way in which he makes the audience feel that they NEED to see what happens next. He is wholly deserving of being described as an icon; his films help define a generation. OWEN KEATING SCREEN EDITOR
Most Iconic Actress: Meryl Streep IN the 21st century, it is incredibly difficult to find a talent that doesn’t just reside in the beauty of one’s face, the size of one’s breasts, or the ability to portray oneself on screen without actually altering any aspect of ones own character and physical movements. Meryl Streep is a chameleon on the screen as she completely absorbs herself in a character and fluctuates between various roles which are highly diverse from one another KATE ATKINSON MY appreciation (some would say obsession) with Ms. Streep started with
Mamma Mia. Yes, not one of her best, but good enough to pique my interest. And then I found Sophie’s Choice, Silkwood, A Cry in the Dark, and Doubt, amongst others. Without fail, Meryl embodies, fills, and fleshes out every character she chooses to tackle. The mother lioness of Cry in the Dark could not be more different from the frail ethereal Sophie, and then she goes on to produce a flawless comedic performance such as in The Devil Wears Prada… simply aweinspiring! TIMOTHY BRADBEER
Best Director: Steven Spielberg THERE was only ever going to be one winner to this category. Ignore for a second his monstrous fame, and look at the films he has made and the cultural impact he’s had. Imagine a film world without the trembling water in a glass as the T-Rex comes closer. Try, if you can, to comprehend the vista of modern war films without the beach scene in Saving Private Ryan. Which other director could possibly make such a terrifying monster as Jaws with as little screen time? He has an unparallelled eye for an iconic image: think of the “When di-
nosaurs ruled The Earth” banner falling in ripples in front of the roaring T-Rex. Think of Tom Hanks sat wounded and dying, telling a young private Ryan to “earn it”. E.T. touching Elliot’s heart with one frail glowing fingertip. Who else can capture humanity in such tenderness as Schindler’s List and retain the scope of such epic proportions as Jurassic Park. He is Empire’s greatest director ever by right, and he’s certainly ours. LOUIS DORÉ SCREEN EDITOR
Best Film: The Lord of the Rings Trilogy/Pulp Fiction IS The Lord of The Rings the greatest film trilogy of all time? Maybe. It’s still stunning to think that a series of books punctuated by songs, riddles and rhymes has become one of the most entertaining action adventures in film history. It’s equally startling to think how perfectly conceived they were when so much could have gone wrong; Gollum could have been a disaster but remains the pinnacle of CGI characterisation; the whole narrative could have been overwrought and mercilessly dull but instead zips along at lightning pace, every casting choice a flawlessly executed tightrope walk, every expectation exceeded. Even watching them now I’m still overwhelmed at the scope and majesty of them; watched with family, friends or strangers in a packed cinema, Peter Jackson’s masterpieces always entertain. HUGH DIGNAN
I am willing to admit that I was a very late addition to the Tarantino fanclub. Hit after hit passed me by and I thought nothing of it, but after I was sat down and forced to watch Pulp Fiction; I realised that I had been missing out on what was quite possibly the best film in recent memory. Its pithy dialogue, eccentric characters and unrivalled level of style has cemented it a place in movie history, and if you are yet to indulge in Tarantino’s magnum opus you are frankly only cheating yourself. ROBERT J HARRIS An effortlessly stylish, deliciously shot blend of whimsical humour and sheer badassery, Pulp Fiction is a gem that gives more with every viewing. In burger terms, it’s a royale with cheese.
LOUIS DORÉ SCREEN EDITOR
Exeposé
| Week FOUR
Looper Director: Rian Johnson Cast: Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Bruce Willis, Emily Blunt 118 mins (15) IN 2072 a cleaner alternative to murder is used by the criminal underworld; sending victims back in time 30 years to be killed without a trace by Loopers. This is a very apt title for the futuristic hitmen played by Joseph GordonLevitt, Bruce Willis and Paul Dano in Rian Johnson’s third feature film. Their lives are spent in a repetitive, soul-destroying routine of drugs and casual murder, like hamsters stuck in their wheels. Although Joe (GordonLevitt) is planning for a future outside the loop we never see any hope or ambition from his character, only his eventual salvation as Old Joe (Willis), too far in the future to really resonate. Instead the detached brutality of his job corrupts Joe’s every response, making violence the automatic answer to any problem. The most ironic thing is that he is fighting to cling onto his present life, a life that the audience sees, and Old Joe knows, is much bleaker and emptier than the one he could have in
The Campaign Director: Jay Roach Cast: Will Ferrell, Zach Galifianakis, Jason Sudeikis 15 mins (15) WHEN a long serving but increasingly sloppy deputy of North Carolina, Cam Brady (Will Ferrell), makes a monumental public blunder, some local wealthy businessmen decide to take advantage of the situation by submitting their own candidate as a challenger Enter the altogether clueless Marty Huggins (Zac Galifianakis), who challenges Brady as their respective campaigns descend into crass, hilarious farce.
“This film crudely satirises politics, warts and all” The Campaign is for sure what you expect from a good American comedy; belly laughs, not too much tact, and an overt message. This film crudely satirises politics, warts and all, as the ego-driven, calamity-filled perma-crisis that it shows itself to be. Despite lacking the
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the future. Johnson’s writing and directing do a superb job of presenting very clearly what is an insanely complex narrative and the film is littered with plenty of ingenious shots and slick conversations. It also contains several gutpunch moments that genuinely leave you breathless and take the film to new darker depths. Looper is almost tragic in its chronicling of a despairing dystopia but touches of lightness and hope are offered with powerful performances from Emily Blunt and Willis. The pair of them easily overshadow Gordon-Levitt who is perhaps trying too hard to impersonate Willis instead of imbuing Joe with any sympathy. Despite some small flaws, Looper is an uncompromising film that pulls no punches with either its director’s vision or its moral questions. You’ll be replaying key moments in your mind for days to come and that kind of audience engagement is a rare achievement. In a world of bankable blockbusters, reboots and remakes, Looper is inventive, original and most importantly of all, unforgettable. TOM BOND BOOKS EDITOR nuance of The Thick of It, the comedic powerhouses of Ferrell and Galifianakis drive the plot. Subversive, imbued with great timing, and blessed with the ability to send an audience into fits of laughter with merely the raise of a manicured eyebrow, the pair rock all the jokes and gags written by the also talented Jay Roach (Austin Powers, Meet the Parents). What this film lacks in intelligent satire, it surely makes up for in sheer enjoyability.
“The comedic powerhouses of Ferrell and Galafianakis drive the plot” So if you are a fan of brash, gleefully exuberant Hollywood comedy, The Campaign is for you; if political subtlety is more your thing, then the comedic strength of the films’ two protagonists should still make this film more than worthwhile.
EMMA BLANCHARD
Taken 2 Director: Olivier Megaton Cast: Liam Neeson, Famke Janssen, Maggie Grace 91 mins (12A) TAKEN 2 was always likely to tread a similar path to that of the first film: family member goes missing, Liam Neeson tries to reunite family and bearded Eastern Europeans are massacred. While Neeson’s latest outing is entertaining enough, it lacks the spark needed to set it apart from its predecessor. When Bryan Mills (Neeson), his daughter Kim (Maggie Grace), and his ex-wife Lenore (Famke Janssen) go on vacation to that most family-friendly of holiday destinations, Istanbul, they soon find themselves tracked down by the antagonists of Taken (2008), who are seeking revenge for the (many) deaths that Mills caused four years ago. Regrettably, this sequel is plagued by nuisances that take away from the gritty realism that drove the first film. Mills’s daughter Kim, having twice failed her driving test, seems remarkably capable of executing handbrake
The Perks of Being a Wallflower
Director: Stephen Chbosky Cast: Logan Lerman, Emma Watson, Ezra Miller 103 mins (12A) A POWERFUL and sincere film, Stephen Chboskys’ self-directed adaptation of The Perks of Being a Wallflower is a strong vision of his cult teenage book of the same name. Despite mixed reviews, I think the film manages to capture the inner turmoil and thoughts of the characters very successfully. The story follows Charlie, the eponymous wallflower in his first year of high school. More than a little bit damaged following the suicide of his best friend, as well as problems from his childhood, Charlie befriends Sam and Patrick, step-siblings that open him up to the world of relationships, mix-tapes and The Rocky Horror Picture Show. The cast is well put together, with Emma Watson a likeable Sam with very few Anne Hathaway typeaccent problems, whilst Logan Lerman
turns around corners at 90mph in a taxi, and by the film’s conclusion, Mills manages to kill attackers by stroking their faces with his sleeve, leaving the audience wondering if the fight choreography department had run out of money – or simply given in. Another problem was the film’s 12A rating, which meant that even in the darker moments, there was an underlying feeling that everything would work out in the end, as the film lacked the shock factor that
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would have truly gripped the viewer. Taken 2 is a predictable thriller, with enough compelling action set-pieces to keep the viewer engaged. The film thrives off Neeson’s interactions with Grace and Janssen, both of whom succeed in portraying characters who are out of depth in a hostile environment. However, while it isn’t a complete flop as is so often the case with action sequels, it lacks the twists and turns that would have breathed fresh air into a film that was always likely to have a linear plot. Worth seeing, but only once.
TIMOTHY HELLYER
is sufficiently dorky and endearing to capture Charlie’s innocence and sensitivity. Ezra Miller as Patrick is particularly fantastic, with the rest of the cast trailing a little behind him in his main scenes. He portrays Patrick with brazen confidence, yet also displays a startling vulnerability that is true to the heart of the story.
“This is definitely a film that will mainly appeal to teenagers” Whilst the movie lacks the same heart-tugging pull of the novel, with a little too much focus on the relationship between Sam and Charlie (something which is subtly dealt with and loose in the book), all the best bits of the book are kept in, with the ‘we are infinite’ scene realised particularly well. However, this is definitely a film that will mainly appeal to teenagers or those that have already read the book and possess the emotional connections to the characters that are needed for the film to pull the audience into its narrative. As a long-time lover of the novel, I came out of the cinema genuinely touched by the story I had just seen. MEGAN FURBOROUGH
As Hot As... the hot or nots of this week’s film news JUSTIN LEE COLLINS - Bearded bad boy ‘JLC’ has been sentenced to 140 hours of community service for physically and mentally abusing his exgirlfriend. Sounds more painful than watching The Friday Night Project.
Nicola Murray
JACK FROM TITANIC - Mythbusters, beacon of televisual truth that it is, has shown that Jack could have survived the sinking of the Titanic. Undone by his own chivalry, he freezes to death instead. Unfortunate.
ANDREW GARFIELD - Rising star Andrew Garfield is locked into Spiderman 2, along with director Marc Webb. The sequel is set to land in May 2014.
SETH MCFARLANE – Family Guy creator and sometime soul singer McFarlane has been confirmed as the host of the next Oscars. Ricky Gervais is probably livid.
ADELE – Flame-haired songstress Adele has topped the charts with ‘Skyfall’, the eponymous theme tune for the upcoming James Bond film.
Bill Murray
Exeposé
| Week FOUR
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We pick our 5 favourite writers connected to Exeter 1. J. K. ROWLING Gandy Street, The Firehouse; Diagon Alley, The Leaky Cauldron: welcome to the home of Harry Potter. Rowling may have moved onto bigger things, but she is still Exeter’s most famous daughter. She studied French and Classics, graduating in 1986 with a 2.2 and a £50 library fine, a reassuring thought for all of us. 2. TED HUGHES Hughes never attended the University but he spent much of his life living in North Tawton, a mere half hour drive from campus. He bought the house with Sylvia Plath, but they only lived there together a short while before separating. Hughes continued to live in the house until his death in 1998, and was buried in Devon. 3. PHILIP HENSHER A prolific and highly-respected reviewer, he has written for The Guardian and The Independent amongst others. A prolific novelist, his novel The Northern Clemency was nominated for the Booker. Recently he taught creative writing at the University, but is now on sabbatical. His time here has been typically inflammatory; we await the return of the bowler-hatted academic, and ensuing campus drama. 4. HILARY MANTEL Mantel has been awarded the title of Honorary Visiting Professor in the College of Humanities at the University. She now resides in Budleigh Salterton, Devon. 5. DAPHNE DU MAURIER An English author and playwright, Du Maurier is best known for her novel Rebecca. For several decades she was the most popular author for library book borrowings. She lived and died in Cornwall, the setting for many of her books. The University holds the largest publicly accessible archive of her literary papers.
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BOOKS EDITORS
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Mantel back for the Booker
Photo: Joshua Irwandi
Tom Bond and Emily Lunn, Books Editors, interview Man Booker prize winner Hilary Mantel FOR someone so focused on the twists and turns of history it is somehow fitting that Hilary Mantel is on the brink of making it herself. A winner of the Man Booker prize for her 2009 novel Wolf Hall, tomorrow she will find out if she has become the first woman and first Briton to win the award twice.
“I’m not a Priory clinic for dead Tudors”
Last week she visited Exeter to talk about her acclaimed trilogy, following the life of Henry VIII’s right-hand man, Thomas Cromwell. Writing historical fiction, especially about an era as gossip-laden as this, takes a certain leap of the imagination. Hilary Mantel is a writer who takes this responsibility seriously, choosing to start her trilogy at the point when Thomas Cromwell’s public life emerged, “as the first 35 years of his life are virtually off the record.” Cromwell seems to have been a private man, leaving little information about his personal life, “which some writers of historical fiction would love, because it’s an open invitation.” Mantel doesn’t choose to take such liberties. She explained that “what I prefer to do is to have a lot of facts, and negotiate in the spaces between, filling the gaps with educated guesses.” This is a particular challenge when it comes to her female characters, as “women and women’s bodies are really the es-
sence of the story,” yet women barely made the records in the Tudor era. In Bring Up The Bodies, Mantel said that she felt “morally contaminated” by recreating the political intrigue surrounding Anne Boleyn’s downfall. Political scheming and manoeuvring are still with us today, and she agrees that, “because these people are laying the foundations for the modern world, there are bound to be some parallels.” Such parallels aren’t deliberate, but a modern reader would definitely be able to identify with elements of Tudor society, as “sometimes you get the feeling that history’s going round in circles.” Mantel is wary of forcing comparisons though, suggesting that “I don’t think the past was a rehearsal for the present, they have to be respected for their difference from us.”
“I’ll tell you the problem with sex, drugs and rock and roll. I moved to Budleigh Salterton” To fictionalise historical events can create problems for a writer, as it inevitably entails a fairly large cast, and complex narrative. Mantel skilfully handles such difficulties with a strong omniscient narrator to guide the reader. She aims to “find clever ways of narrating coolly and camly, while
creating the illusion that mayhem is breaking out in the background.” Other writers may have felt pressure after the success of Wolf Hall, the biggest-selling Booker winner ever, but Mantel calmly continued with her next book, taking it as “a huge boost to my confidence.” She was even relaxed enough to joke about spending her winnings on “sex, drugs and rock and roll”, a challenge since she “moved to Budleigh Salterton.” However, if she does the double and Bring Up The Bodies wins the Booker, she admits that “it would heap tremendous expectation onto the last book.” If it isn’t shortlisted, “some people would see it as a failure, but I’m judging by my own standards.” Critics and prizes don’t affect her when she’s writing, as “every day with writing is like the first day you did it.” When Mantel’s Cromwell trilogy concludes she will have spent a daunting decade of her life in the company of the Tudor court and its memorable characters. She has fully immersed herself in the series, saying that “the only way to do it was to live it,” so the reader can empathise when she says “you never let go. You put the full stop, but then it goes out and becomes the property of other people.” At the risk of sounding like a onetrick pony, Mantel astutely acknowledges that “from the career point of view, a big historical novel would be a
very good idea”, but her talents aren’t restricted to this genre. She has written a memoir and novels about Saudia Arabia and 70s University life, with possible future projects including a modern novel and a work of nonfiction. As Mantel herself says, she is more than just a “Priory clinic for dead Tudors.”
“After the trilogy it might be time to stand back and make an assessmenton all sorts of things” The last book in the trilogy, The Mirror and the Light, will be released in 2014, with both BBC and RSC adaptations of the first two books in the works. The title comes from “a phrase Cromwell used himself, saying that Henry’s kingship was the mirror, and the light to other Kings. The more you think about that phrase, the more mysterious it becomes, because what is reflected in the mirror, and where is the light? What I hope is that the light will be cast in the third book on events in the first two books.” Somewhat ominously, after that Mantel says “it might be time to stand back and make an assessment - on all sorts of things.” Let’s hope that after all the adaptations and awards she can keep the modern classics coming.
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15 october 2012 |
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Exeter alumnus Luke Kennard’s escape fantasies
Exeposé
Man Booker
William O’Rourke interviews the acclaimed poet and author of Holophin, a satiric new novella, and A Lost Expression, a new poetry collection LUKE KENNARD is an acclaimed poet, prose writer, critic and academic. He read English at the University of Exeter and now lectures in creative writing at the University of Birmingham. In 2007 his second poetry collection, The Harbour Beyond the Movie, led him at age 26 to become the youngest ever poet to be short-listed for the Forward Poetry Prize. A Lost Expression, his fourth collection is published on 15 October. Luke Kennard has recently published his first novella, Holophin; in the future, the latest gadget, the eponymous Holophin, is a dolphin-shaped device placed behind the ear to cure you of your more negative traits. What follows is a highly original take on the dystopian genre. He is not to be mistaken for the young up-and-coming US basketball player of the same name. What did you enjoy studying at university? I studied English, but felt most drawn to American fiction and European poetry in translation. Working with Dr Andy Brown in a creative writing module was probably the moment when I started to take my writing seriously he made me realise what was possible, and he was a great teacher and editor, which is why I stayed on to do an MA. Then I spent some time unemployed or working various office jobs and writing in the evenings. After three years of that I got funding to do a PhD, partly thanks to having just won an Eric Gregory Award for my first collection of poems. You have described your poetry as “absurdist and satirical… [using] a fairytale-like structure to comment on society.” Is Holophin similar?
Yeah - in fact that’s a more accurate description of Holophin than my poetry, now that you mention it. The folktale stuff, and the overall structure, and the fact that it’s more openly satirical, in a traditional, speculative fiction kind of a sense. My friends who aren’t poets vastly prefer it to anything I’ve published so far, I think just because it has a story and the ideas are less covert. I would describe Holophin as a dystopian science-fiction satire on the effects of complete submission to technology and its invasion into our private lives. Would you agree? That’s it! I wanted to take the classic sci-fi trope of the ‘robots taking over’ and reframe it as something internal, and something we openly and gladly invite into our minds. It’s also a book about storytelling as a human necessity - all the Vladimir Propp stuff. There’s a kind of heavy-handed satire of the pharmaceutical industry, but the basic “twist” at the end is that the main characters are actually just working 16 hour shifts in a factory and living in grinding poverty, which they’re only able to deal with because the Holophins are feeding them a fake narrative about industrial espionage, personal integrity and individual empowerment.
“My fear is that the two are like oil and water and that people are going to find it a curdled sequence of poems” That also has a contemporary resonance for me - the way a government can present anything as a positive even the insane stuff of the last few years, attacks on the most vulnerable
in the name of saving the economy. As if any system with such a disregard for basic human dignity is worth saving. Does A Lost Expression differ from your previous collections? There’s some fairly odd imagery so it’s pretty in-keeping with the last three, in some ways. But I also wanted to include some more personal stuff and to shade it a little darker. My fear, I guess, is that the two are like oil and water and that people are going to find it a curdled sequence of poems. I think it’s a good book - better than the last one. You kind of have to say that.
“That also has a contemporary resonance for me - the way a government can present anything as a positive” What have you enjoyed reading recently? Ben Lerner’s Leaving the Atocha Station is so good I couldn’t write for a week after finishing it. Michael Robbins’ poetry collection Alien Vs. Predator is one of the most badly behaved, enjoyable poetry collections I’ve ever read. Often in an interview, the most pertinent question is the one that is never asked. For you, what would the answer be to that question? That rather implies that I should fashion you with the question first, or give an answer so obscure the question is indiscernible. I think the question should be “Why do you care so much whether complete strangers like you or not?” And in answer I’d just stare crossly into the middle distance.
Our writers take a look at their favourites of this year winner will be announced on Tuesday 16 October The Lighthouse
Umbrella
Alison Moore
Will Self
ALISON MOORE’s The Lighthouse is one of two debut novels to have made the shortlist. It is a slim book that tells the slow-burning story of a middleaged man, Futh, who takes a walking holiday in Germany to recover from the breakdown of his marriage. It soon becomes clear that Futh has not recovered from his mother’s abandonment of him as a child, and that he is a man who stumbles painfully and inadequately through life, never quite attaining maturity and constantly hurting. Moore has won first prize in the novella category of The New Writer Prose and Poetry Prizes and has been shortlisted in several other prestigious competitions, and in The Lighthouse she uses her masterful skills of storytelling to great effect. The narrative is spare and simple but brims with recurring images powerfully evoked, and the lingering impression is of a book both richly textured and almost unbearably bleak. Published by Salt, a small independent press, some consider The Lighthouse to be an underdog in the competition, but the technical assurance and vivid imagination of this haunting entry are not to be underestimated.
WILL SELF’s ninth novel, Umbrella, is described as an antidote to Downton Abbey. Self has had a turbulent life: he started using drugs and drinking heavily in his teens, then attended Oxford where he read PPE. Self became a cartoonist for the New Statesman, tried stand-up comedy, then ran a small publishing company, from which his writing career took off. Self’s career has not been smooth, and includes an episode of notoriety when he was caught using heroin on Prime Minister John Major’s jet. He has since abstained from drugs except caffeine and nicotine. Self has been a panelist on Have I Got News for You and Shooting Stars, in which he once dressed up as Britney Spears, a moment which he emphasizes he doesn’t regret. Self rejects social mediums such as Twitter, excusing himself as a ‘not very sociable’ person. He is a regular contributor to publications such as The New York Times, but also to Playboy. Self treasures above all else his periods of solitude and poverty, living in small dingy rooms with only plants and dampness for company. He believes that seclusion and literature have given him a higher power to experience and describe life.
Sophie BECKETT
ESmeralda castrillo
Exeposé
| WEEK FOUR
books
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r Prize 2012
The Casual Vacancy J. K. Rowling AS an unashamedly nerdy Harry Potter fan, I began J.K. Rowling’s first book for adults with both excitement and optimism. Despite almost universally appalling reviews, I was not put off; clinging instead to the idea that, like the Potter series, The Casual Vacancy was Rowling writing for her readers, not the critics. However, by the end of the second chapter it felt as though Rowling had written this book for herself, such is the indulgent moralistic tone she often thrusts upon the reader.
“J.K. Rowling has fulfilled her aim in proclaiming what is good and just in British society”
ar’s Man Booker prize shortlist, for which the r Bring Up The Bodies
Narcopolis Jeet Thayil
Hilary Mantel
A FIRM favourite in the Man Booker prize shortlist, Jeet Thayil seems set to follow in the successful footsteps of Arundhati Roy, with his debut novel Narcopolis. Set in opium-induced Bombay in the 1970s and 1980s, this novel explores a degenerate underworld of drug addiction and crime. Eclectic in its style, the novel stretches across three decades, with a brief spell in Mao’s China. Thayil evokes genre after genre, as we experience motifs of the grotesque, crime and fantasy, amongst many others - an eclecticism perhaps reflecting Thayil’s roots as a poet performer, musician and author. As with many of the Booker nominees, perhaps proving Emerson’s adage that substance can aid the author, Thayil has been open about how his own days of addiction and intoxication have had a heavy influence in shaping the novel. Claiming the novel is ‘born out of empathy’ for addicts, this novel is neither supporting nor damning of addiction, instead encouraging us to view it with an open mind. However, what is certain is that Thayil has delivered an electric and fresh novel that undoubtedly deserves its place on the Booker shortlist.
AS an author of literary fiction there is the danger of falsely embroidering history: a certain craft is needed to engage the reader whilst avoiding a fabrication of the truth. Hilary Mantel appears to do just this, constructing her newest novel with immense ease and testing the boundaries of narrative by exploring the destruction of Anne Boleyn and the rise of Thomas Cromwell during Henry VIII’s reign. The prequel, Wolf Hall, was met with critical acclaim and won the prestigious Man Booker Prize three years ago and it appears Mantel may have done it again. Should Bring up the Bodies (the second in the trilogy) find favour with the critics, she will become the first female author and first Briton to win the award twice. Indeed, this seems all the more possible after the book reached number one in the hardback sellers a mere three days after its official release. Though the award has previously been given to new and unfamiliar authors, this novel appears to have all the qualities of fine historical literature and may just earn Mantel the second award she deserves.
Mhairi cosgriff
EMMA SUDDERICKstrillo
The novel is centred around Barry Fairbrother, a member of the parish council, whose death creates the eponymous ‘casual vacancy’. The ensuing battle over who will fill the seat leads us to examine the lives of approximately twenty characters that Rowling uses to illustrate the social hierarchy within the small village of Pagford. Upon his death, the future of the Fields, a local council estate, is put into doubt as members of the council fight over who should bear responsibility for it. A contradiction lies at the heart of this book. Rowling encourages the reader to “accept the reality of other people” and at the Cheltenham Literature Festival, she argued that despite the “vacancy” within the lives of her characters that inform and condemn them, all are redeemable. However, she also marked two unforgivable exceptions in Simon and Obbo. Both men are truly abhorrent; yet Fats, the character she identified as her “favourite”, is quickly forgiven for his vicious cyber bullying, despite caus-
ing equal harm to his victim as the two “amoral” characters did to theirs. Rowling creates a very clear line between what is acceptable, and what is indefensible: a distinction that at the Festival she paradoxically argued could not be made. The essential character to represent the “immense mutability of human nature” is 16-year-old Krystal Weedon, who, having been brought up by an incompetent and drugged up mother is forced to look after her family. She is labelled throughout Pagford as a trouble-maker and bully because of the way her home life informs her behaviour at school. Rowling urges the reader not to demonise Krystal on the basis of our own prejudices by giving a stern write up to all characters that do so in the book. At the Festival, Rowling went to great lengths to ensure that her reader saw the characters as real, complex people, and she sets herself up as an experienced social commentator, telling readers how to perceive these characters. Despite these noble intentions, one must ask how well qualified Rowling is to lecture us on such issues. In The Casual Vacancy the reader is given access to the lives of a Sikh family, as well as a family dealing with addictions. Neither, Rowling admitted, are areas into which she has real life experience, and her views are a result of research at a library, and a lengthy lunch with a Sikh acquaintance. Her advice, therefore, on how to promote successful relation-
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ships with members of a different culture, or from a different background, appears rather one-dimensional. Rowling’s novel offers a very readable portrait of life in rural England. However, it lacks a degree of originality; The Casual Vacancy was Rowling’s attempt to “imitate” a nineteenth century novel. The message behind her work also lacks innovation: Barry takes over from Harry in fighting for good over evil (Rowling claimed the rhyming was purely coincidental, although I’m not sure I entirely believe her). J.K. Rowling has fulfilled her aim in proclaiming what is good and just in British society, and instructing us upon where we need to try harder. Perhaps, after all, by forcing her moral judgements upon us, she really is writing for the reader. Sophie lock
Any Last Words? We asked for your favourite book from the last 25 years The Amber Spyglass. By the end of the book, you feel that deep hole within you when you know you have read something incredibly deep. Its themes on religion and companionship were brilliant at the time, and still are today. THOMAS FFISKE Ken Follett’s The Pillars of the Earth. Who’d have thought over 800 pages of building a cathedral could be such an addictive read? DOM FORD A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius by Dave Eggers. It’s got it all: humour, tragedy, drama; all wrapped up in a breathtaking package powered by inspiring feats of imagination. TOM BOND
Game of Thrones. There are no words to describe Cersei Lannister that don’t end with me washing my mouth out. KATE GRAY Haruki Murakami’s Blind Willow, Sleeping Woman. This collection of short stories is so piercingly evocative, and downright bizarre, it’s dangerous material to start if you plan to stop before daybreak. CHARLOTTE BLACK American Psycho - Easton Ellis’ textual battering of consumerist, yuppie America is augmented by his protagonist, a gleefully constructed Patrick Bateman, who seems as languid as he is destructive. OWEN KEATING
Haruki Murakami’s The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle. A totally different style of mystery that engages from the beginning. Beautifully written and intoxicatingly surreal, it twists and turns its way to a truly astonishing conclusion. LIZ MOORE Markus Zusak’s The Book Thief. Being told from the perspective of the sarcastic yet likeable figure of Death this heart wrenching book was quite unlike anything I’ve read before. Zusak manages to take a huge event and look at it on an intimate and new level, focusing on strange yet believable characters. EMMA HOLIFIELD
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Arts Diary Our regular Arts Diary column shows you all the important events going on in Exeter...
Art Exeter Contemporary Open @ Phoenix 13 September - 1 November John Court @ Spacex Gallery 29th September – 24th November
Comedy Danny Bhoy @ Phoenix: 22 October Simon Evans @ Barnfiled 26 October
Drama Mansfield Park @ Northcott Theatre 16-20 October Napoleon: A Defence @ Bikeshed Theatre 16,18,20 October
Dance Classic Cut @ Northcott: 11-12 October
Opera The Lighthouse @ Northcott 24 October
Art Attack
TO celebrate 25 years of the Arts this week Art Attack asked you who is your favourite person from the world of arts and why? We wanted to hear about why your favourite comedian makes you cry with laughter, which visual artist has changed the face of modern art and why certain dancers have revitalised a traditional form. Here are your favourites of the past 25 years...
ARTS
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Clara Plackett & Emily Tanner arts@exepose.com JOIN THE FACEBOOK GROUP Exeposé Arts
25 Years: A Masterpiece? Emily Tanner, Arts Editor, looks at the last twenty-five years of visual art, comedy, theatre and dance 25 YEARS ago there was no such thing as The Tate, Nicholas Hynter was working at Manchester’s Royal Exchange and Michael McIntyre was still at school. 25 years later the many Tates nationwide house our country’s largest collections of art, Hynter is probably the country’s most renowned director and McIntyre is selling out arenas on a yearly basis. But have the art forms in which these figures now play such an integral part changed as much as they have in the last 25 years? Theatre has tackled topical issues and satirised society since long before 1987 so the material playwrights deal with today seems little different from that of the late eighties. However, the ways in which theatre is staged and the form that theatre can now take has surely progressed since then. Quite often the audience are invited, far more forcibly than they may previously have been, to participate in the theatrical experience, blurring the lines between theatre and reality and using space and situation to the greatest extent. I recently heard of a show called Office Party; a staged party in which actors were
dispersed throughout the room, situations planted to progress the plot and in which audience members became a cast without a script. Meanwhile at this year’s Edinburgh Fringe a show called Peep invited you to sit alone in seedy booths - made from black PVC and lit from above by a red light - and watch 20 minute scenes concerning sex, love and relationships. It was voyeurism to the extreme and a theatrical experience in which an audience are no longer passive observers but in some way deeply involved. Dance too has progressed in similar ways. In 2010 Sadler’s Wells put on a show called the Electric Hotel, a site specific piece which involved dancers acting out scenes within the purpose built ‘Electric Hotel’ whilst the audience watched on wearing headphones,
“Across the board the recurring theme appears to be the fact the arts are no longer a passive experience” simply peering in on these mysterious lives. With physical theatre pieces such as this, dance does not stand alone as a genre any longer but often combines elements of the theatrical or poses itself as visual art of some variety whilst the technique displayed does not suffer. Whilst traditional forms such as ballet still have a strong presence in the arts world, the desire to experiment and to develop is more noticeable than ever in today’s world of dance. Over in the world of visual art, the last 25 years have been incredibly fruitful and have undeniably pushed boundaries to the extreme. Emin’s in-
famous My Bed, is one piece which stands out as questioning the nature of modern art, inviting the audience into a truly personal space and also pushing towards a more conceptual idea of art. Installation art too has become more popular and interesting than ever. With the opening of the Tate Modern at the turn of the millennium London got the Turbine Hall and yearly commissions purely for installation artists to exhibit in the space, with a variety of exciting results. Perhaps the art form to have changed most drastically in the last 25 years is comedy. With the advent of panel shows and TV stand up slots this art form has never been more accessible. In becoming so, much of the content has undoubtedly become more mundanely observational, pleasing many with universal themes. However, whilst exposure to the masses may appear to have made comedy the least experimental of all art forms, you only have to turn to look at this year’s Edinburgh Comedy Award winners to see that on the live circuit this isn’t necessarily the case. This year’s overall winner was Doctor Brown, a silent clown act who uses the audience in much of his show, whilst the ‘best newcomer’ was surreal Norwegian Daniel Simonsen. Finally the ‘panel prize’ went to the wonderful Boy With Tape on His Face, another silent act who proves that comedy doesn’t have to be
dark or dirty to make people laugh and that a bit of childish silliness will do just as well! Across the board the recurring theme appears to be the fact that the arts are no longer a passive experience. In walking around the Turbine Hall a visitor is forced to experience the art work to the full whilst audience members at many comedy shows are never safe from being pulled up to join in on stage. We can no longer view any of the arts as static spectators but must throw ourselves in, allow our views to be challenged and make the most of the experience.
ZOE BULAITIS: For me it’s Grayson Perry. His subject matter is fragile whilst at same time potentially challenging, his work is immaculately finished and he dresses up as a female alter-ego when in the public eye.
OWEN KEATING: I’m a big fan of Milton Jones. Despite permanently looking like he’s lost on his way to the shops, he’s blessed with impeccable comic timing and a genuinely wonderful taste in shirts. What’s not to like?
EMILY TANNER: I’m also a huge fan
ELLI CHRISTIE: Definitely Dara
of Grayson Perry. His recent tapestries about the British class system were insightful and such vibrant pieces of work.
O’Briain. Just because his show is called Craic Dealer and no matter how many times you repeat the jokes still they make me cry with laughter...
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Shakespeare: Staging The World British Museum until 25 November 2012 TRYING to compress the seminal author of the English language into one hour-long stroll-through exhibition is a hard task; but one which the British Museum handles with aplomb. For the first time the British Museum offers a fresh new perspective on Shakespeare; not simply showcasing props and context as a vague spray-on, enabling you to become a pseudo-historian, but explicitly matching the author’s universal themes with the relevant artefacts and documents. An engaging way to bring Eng-
Much Ado About Nothing Noel Coward Theatre until 27 October 2012 THIS season’s plethora of RSC productions is enough to excite theatre lovers across the country, from the West End’s newest musical Matilda, to an inspired interpretation of The Merry Wives of Winsor. However, Iqbal Khan’s production of Much Ado about Nothing was the only Shakespeare to be renewed after the Summer Season and it is storming the box office this October. Inkeeping with the current style of the RSC productions, the play comes with a twist, as the characters are transported to a vibrant Bollywood setting. The twists and tangles of the relationship between Hero and Claudio alludes to the arranged marriage tradition in some Hindu societies; whilst accredited actress and writer Meera Syal brings a new dimension to Beatrice as she embarks on a typical Bollywood romance, drawing parallel to Ashwaria Rai’s performance in Bollywood themed Bride and Prejudice. The colour and noise of India enhances the anticipated humour in the original
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land as he knew it to life, put simply: the only way to do justice to an author who so vividly littered his texts with so many topographical references. The exhibition is methodically curated, chronologically progressing through Shakespeare’s plays whilst elucidating them with revitalizing information. The exhibition begins with the crux of Shakespeare’s works: showcasing an original First Folio, before cyclically ending with the ‘Robben Island Bible’, thus highlighting his transcending truths. The text is ominously opened on Nelson Mandela’s signature in the margin of Julius Caesar’s infamous quote: ‘Cowards die many times before their deaths, / The valiant never taste of death but once.’
lines as Beatrice and Benedict’s verbal jousting is delivered with wit and ferocity. Yet the comedic aspects are brought to life through the dim-witted Dogberry cycling around the stage through the dust, wearing only his underwear, exclaiming ‘I am an ass’, which is soon followed by Borachio urinating on the stage and receiving a chorus of laughter. The play is at its best when it makes imaginative use of Indian Culture, particularly in Hero’s wedding scene. The stage is transformed into an Indian temple as colourful drapes are released into the auditorium to create a lavish setting for a celebration of outlandish traditional dancing, accompanied by buoyant music and live singing; in which some of the audience members were even invited on stage to participate in. This innovative interpretation is without a doubt one of the highlights of Shakespearian theatre this year, bringing the 16th century play to life, making it humorous, easy to follow and yet also hinting at some more serious feminist issues. SOPHY COOMBS-ROBERTS
MEGAN FURBOROUGH: One of my favourite playwrights of the last 25 years has to be Sarah Kane, who was one of the main British playwrights of the 1990s ‘In-Yer-Face’ movement. I saw ‘4:48 Psychosis’ performed a few years ago and it was absolutely incredible. It was the last play she wrote before her suicide in 2000. The way that Kane writes adds such a sense of beauty. Making so so compelling to watch. I just think she’s just totally underrated.
Curator Dora Thornton and consultant Jonathan Bate preserve Shakespeare’s legacy by tying in the backdrop of Shakespeare’s Britain to the very linguistic essence of his plays. The telling title Cymbeline: King Of Britain is set against the backdrop of James’ desired role as the unifier of Great Britain: inscribed on medallions
“The Museum brilliantly manages to encapsulate such a transitional London” and coins on show, exhibited next to the proposed British flags drawn up in 1606 and promoted by royal proclamation. What though is Shakespeare without language? RSC Actors from past and present enable the innate vitality of the language to echo and overpower the atmosphere: Sir Anthony Sher is seen performing Shylock’s ‘Hath not a Jew eyes?’ alongside
The Pattern is New in Every Movement Exeter Forum until 21 November 2012 IN the Forum is a tank of bubbling water lit by coloured lights with plastic tubes rising to form a range of towers and gentle waterfalls. Behind this contraption is a collection of high impact glossy acrylic prints. It is not until you inspect the prints closely that you become aware that the plastic tubes are responsible, at least in part, for the vibrant and other-wordly prints in the rest of the show. Pery Burge is the artist responsible for these creations, fulfilled during her time as the University of Exeter’s artist-in-residence. She comments that “Working at the University has given me the opportunity to develop some exciting new techniques, with some surprising results. University technicians have helped me with using some wonderful equipment and I have enjoyed fruitful discussions with scientists and engineers.” Her works use the surface patterns and flows of the water to create abstract forms. The rainbow spectrum of
EMILY LUNN: Lucian Freud. Yes, he’s
divisive, and I probably wouldn’t have been that keen on him as a person....but I love his style of painting..
a 1573 scroll of The Book Of Esther: commissioned by a wealthy Jew, for a Christian, clearly attempting to bridge the Judeo-Christian divide. Next to it a plaque states how Edward I’s expulsion of the Jews meant that Shakespeare would have only come across forcibly converted Jews and therefore gained most of his knowledge of them from the Geneva Bible: a potent fact when considering almost one two hundredth of London’s population was black yet a Jew would have been, to him, by comparison, somewhat of an enigma. The Museum brilliantly manages to encapsulate such a transitional London by juxtaposing panoramas of the relatively unconstructed landscape that
“For the first time the British Museum offers a fresh perspective on Shakespeare” earmarks English civilisation, with the savagery of bear-bating: so prevalent in fact that Bears such as Sackerson, who performed in The Merry Wives of Windsor, assumed a cult of celebrity. It is an all-encompassing exhibicolours is made all the more vivid in contrast to the deep black of the acrylic prints and whilst naturally forming, the images have an ethereal feel to them. It is nice to see the tank of water in contrast to the finished product, as it is a rare treat to have a glimpse at the process of the artist in the final exhibition. Each image is unique and occurring in a specific moment; however the overall effect of the exhibition was about the flow and rhythm naturally occurring in life. ‘Rainbow Scape’ evokes this sense of motion well, with its pulsing heights flowing right across the print, and extending beyond the chosen snapshot of colour. The image
CLARA PLACKETT: Carlos Acosta grew up in poverty in Cuba, and was sent to ballet school just to stop him misbehaving. Now, he has won numerous awards and danced with some of the world’s most prestigious ballet companies. For me, he defies all the stereotypes that are attached to ballet, and he lets his Latin roots bring a fresh sense of excitement to all of his dancing. Also, he’s a beautiful man!
Exeposé
tion which manages to seamlessly navigate its way through a contemporaneous world-view so crucial to framing Shakespeare’s plays. A world view so pervasive that the obsessions of; mapping, in the aftermath of Sir Francis Drake’s circumnavigation; attempting to reconcile with a fixed Catholic or Protestant calendar; and rights to the throne in the wake of Elizabeth’s Treason Act which made it illegal to discuss succession, are not simply ingrained in Shakespeare’s plays, from The Tempest to King Lear and Julius Caesar, but in turn are bred into new fantasy which permeates fiction back into English history: a 1578 genealogical line on display shows James I traced his ancestry and claim to the throne back to Shakespeare’s legendary Banquo. Only such a masterful linguist could so subtly conjure an illusion capable of ubiquitously moulding the English self-conscious that it shapes both our history and the foundations of our language, and only such a meticulously laid out exhibition could truly expose the cultural heritage to which he alludes. LOUIS WAKEFIELD seems to capture vibrations and motion otherwise unseen by the human eye, and is an uplifting and engaging piece. The technical aspect of this exhibition would be completely lost without the water tank at the beginning and I think it is a wise choice to have left the materials to produce the art on display. The final prints look like scenes from science fiction so it is interesting to see that the methods were very much manmade. It is great to see an artist working alongside a team of scientists; the end result is beautiful and the methodology is fascinating. ZOE BULAITIS EDITOR
HALLOWEEN UV PAINT PARTY BEST COSTUME WINS FREE ENTRY!
WEDNESDAY 31ST OCTOBER / THE LEMON GROVE DOORS: 9PM-2AM ADVANCED TICKETS £3 / ON THE DOOR £5 ZOMBIE WALK
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Exeposé
| Week FOUR
GAMES
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Games Eurogamer 2012
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GAMES EDITORS
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Marcus Beard, Jon Jenner, Kate Gray and Hernán Romero preview the hottest titles
Halo 4 343 Industries Xbox 360 November 6th, 2012 ONCE I got to the Halo 4 area, it was already packed with “COD is always the same. Halo FTW!” players. Three game types were on offer: Flood, Infinity Team Slayer and Infinity Free-forall Slayer. It felt different to the other Halo games as soon as I got hold of the controller. The HUD was well improved; the movements of the Spartan were faster and more agile, although you could still feel the weight of the armour; and the graphics looked beautiful, with the sun radiating and hitting the glass of the helmet. It was noticeably different, but familiar at the same time. The first gametype I played was Flood and I started as a survivor in a map called Complex. Flood works in a very similar way to the original Infection gametype, with ten players consisting of two Flood, hunting down eight survivors. If you are killed you will respawn as a Flood. The game ends when all players are converted to Flood or a player survives for three minutes. So there I was, as a survivor, in a vast and arid map with quite a few tall
man-made structures. I attempted to scale one to get a view of the whole map and see where the danger was.
“The graphics looked beautiful, with the sun radiating and hitting the glass of the helmet” However, I wasn’t fast enough and after one minute of playing I was slashed and infected by a bloodcurdling Floodhuman hybrid. Everyone in the Infection gametype in Halo Reach would’ve been like “Oh crap, now it’s going to be impossible to kill the survivors”, but in Flood it is more like “Oh wow, now I’m gonna kill all of you!” In Flood, the new thruster pack, the speed, the height of the jumps and the fast melee attack (not to mention their intimidating appearance) make the Flood players more unpredictable and harder to kill, therefore bringing into balance the survivor and Flood experience. It redresses a lot of the problems of Infection. Next up was Infinity Team Slayer and Infinity FFA Slayer. For both of them I was in a map called Solace, where I found myself in a dark Forerunner structure. Team Slayer is a red vs. blue team battle that, unlike the original Team Slayer, has an emphasis on a point scoring system rather than
the typical kill/death score. Points are awarded based on how skilfully you perform certain tasks as well as kills. The point scoring system is also good because it has a function: to fill up your ordnance meter. Every time I performed well and filled up my ordnance meter, I had the option to call for an ordnance drop which rewarded me in the form of three randomised power weapons, grenades, or power-ups. I remember calling for the ordnance, moving back and waiting for someone to attempt to steal it in order for me to perform a spectacular-looking assassination. Also, the Hard-Light Shield proved to be well designed. Less powerful than the Armour Lock from Halo Reach, it can be moved, another example of balancing previous issues with online gameplay.
“Flood players are unpredictable” There are doubts surrounding a Halo game which Bungie, Halo’s previous developer, was not directly involved in developing, but I can assure you that 343 Industries have pleased its longtime Halo fanbase, whilst innovating at the same time. My fellow Spartans, I can first-handedly say that the Halo 4 multiplayer will be a success.
Assassin’s Creed III Ubisoft Montreal PS3, Xbox 360, Wii U, PC October 30th, 2012 AFTER a good hour with the fellow, Connor Kenway comes across as a rather serious young man. It’s hard not to feel a little wistful thinking back to Ezio’s sexy swagger, but after five minutes of Assassin’s Creed 3, you’ll probably forget all about him. This game does everything its predecessors did, but with more style, fluidity, grace and ultimately, more like an assassin. The demo started with a sweeping shot of a fort on a cliff, overlooking the sea. Colours are bright and visuals eyepoppingly crisp, and it’s instantly clear that the game is running on a brand new engine. Once in control of Connor, scaling the side of the cliff shows off some of the new climbing animations, and a slightly subtler approach to the visual cues that highlight your path up the cliff. Tasked with not being seen, we edge around the outer perimeter of the fort before making our way inside. The fort is made up of narrow corridors and high ceilings, which allow room for Connor’s smoother range of acrobatics to avoid being detected. Hiding around a corner and whistling to draw a guard’s attention is a lot of fun; it’s hard not to chuckle as the dullwitted Brit advances down the corridor
towards his inevitable death. Due to the close quarters and need for stealth, we stuck to the series staple, the hidden blades – still an efficient murder weapon. As the demo neared its end and we recovered… something (narrative exposition is rarely great in demos) and our ship – yes, Connor is captain of a warship, keep up – blasts a hole in the side of the fort. This is where the real fun started, as we whacked out the pistol, the tomahawk, and had three minutes to escape the collapsing fort. Naturally, the dastardly British did their best to prevent our heroic escape, which gave us a chance to really get a feel of the new combat mechanics. Even when surrounded by five Redcoats, Connor is constantly on the move, rolling around hits, deflecting blows and delivering brutally animated finishing blows to everyone around him. We escape the fort with seconds to spare, diving into the sea and swimming out to the waiting ship. The demo ended up having the bombastic feel of Uncharted, with a certain cinematic thrill to the action. We’re itching to roam around the cities and the wilderness, but thankfully, the game’s due out in a couple of weeks. With improvements in seemingly every area of the gameplay and design, it’s almost guaranteed to be one of the biggest games of the year.
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1. Call of Duty: Black Ops 2 (PS3, 360, PC)
Fast-paced. Loud. Fun. For a long time now, all synonymous bywords for Call of Duty multiplayer. But accessible? Not so much. Black Ops 2 doesn’t reinvent the wheel when it comes to online multiplayer, but what it does do is give the brave souls stepping into the warzone for the first time a chance at success in establishing themselves in a world of screaming 10-year-old veterans. Weapons and load-outs are customisable to the extent you’d expect, and this time there are options that seem targeted at new players. The new Target Finder sight highlights enemies with a red diamond regardless of whether you’re aiming at them. It helps you react that little bit quicker to the target, which can only be a good thing for new players. Generally, the multiplayer is set entirely in 2025, giving the maps, guns and tactical options a slightly futuristic sheen. Team Deathmatch can now be played between four teams, and games are still suitably frantic. Fundamentally, it’s still a game that appeals to people’s basic evolutionary instincts of running, killing and surviving, and people are still going to buy it in their droves. But if you were one of the few that weren’t planning to for fear of the COD elitists spoiling your fun, perhaps
you should reconsider – you’re guaranteed a fair few kills this time out.
2. Dishonored (PS3, 360, PC)
An original IP in a sea of sequels, Dishonored is set to be the real deal. In my short time with the game I teleported through a heavily guarded building, slit throats, disabled alarms, set swarms of rats on people and possessed unsuspecting maids (no innuendo). The amount of choices Dishonored offers the player in almost every situation is mindblowing, with a myriad of weapons and supernatural abilities available to the character. Levels are selfcontained but sprawling, with various potential paths to each objective. Set in the fictional city of Dunwall (part Victorian London, part steam-punk, and all darkly interesting) Dishonored has the potential to be huge – if enough people actually go out and buy the bloody thing.
3. Metal Gear Rising: Revengence (PS3, 360)
Now in the able hands of Platinum games, Raiden’s solo outing is far from the balls-to-the-wall slash-‘em-up the studio usually produces, and does maintain the series’ stealth routes. Whether you choose to maim your enemies with pinpoint precision, or use button-based combo attacks, you’ll be sure to exeperience cyborg-ninja ba-
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dassery. Going into the game with a gung-ho attitude will land you in deep metaphorical shit, so even while the game promises ‘lightning bolt action’, be sure to bear in mind Snake’s tactical stealth espionage while facing off with familiar enemies.
4. New Super Mario Bros U (Wii U)
The game follows the usual Mario Bros. formula: wear dungarees, walk to the right, jump on things, repeat. The twist lies in the co-operative mode, where the player with the Game Pad - the incredibly large hunk of technology that has been designed with neither hands nor social situations in mind - has to create blocks for their fellow players to jump on to reach the goal. The more sadistic of you (myself most definitely included) are free to abuse this power to irritate the hell out of whoever else is playing by ‘accidentally’ putting a block in the approximate position of where Mario was hoping to be in one second. This makes for fun gameplay up until the point where you realise that you’re not actually playing with your friends as much as being the little kid who sticks crayons in people’s ears while they’re trying to do their homework. Moreover, you’re doing this while sitting in the corner being completely antisocial. None of this makes up for
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the fact that Nintendo has essentially cleaned up, re-animated and expanded on a game that’s had the same core gameplay for years, without even bothering to change the title.
researched their demographic? If we all wanted to hurl abuse at the people we’re playing with whilst simultaneously trying to ruin their fun, we’d all be playing Call of Duty right now.
5. Nintendoland (Wii U)
6. Dust 514 (PS3, PS VITA)
Self-indulgent title aside, Nintendoland, the Wii U’s flagship launch title, is essentially a re-branded Mario Party, if Mario Party were a brightly coloured rehab for Nintendo’s most obscure games. The innovation that people may have been expecting from Nintendo’s newest console is lacking here, and unfortunately it’s made even more obvious because you can see how darn hard they tried. The premise of the mini-games available at Eurogamer is that several people team up against one person who makes it their mission to bugger up everyone else’s gameplay, thus excluding themselves from any social events in the near future. Are you having fun yet? In Nintendoland, the person using the Game Pad is able to see a different screen to that of the rest of the players. This usually means that they are the ‘bad guys’ trying to chase/hit/kill everyone else, but it also means that one person will spend the entire game looking at a separate screen, huddled alone in a corner so no one else can see what they’re doing. Have Nintendo even
EVE Online is a MMORPG in which players take control of futuristic corporations competing to colonise different planets. Dust 514 is what happens on those planets. The players of Dust 514 are mercenaries of the players of EVE Online. When two corporations are fighting for a planet, a battle is started in the form of a MMOFPS in Dust 514, where the result of such battles determine if the player of EVE Online gains more territory. Resembling the Halo multiplayer gameplay, it also includes MMO-style objectives; a big interconnected community being loyal to their corporation’s CEO, who is watching the fight through EVE Online. The controls and the graphics are smooth, the weapons gorgeous and the maps are humongous. Even though I hate EVE Online, I really enjoyed Dust 514. I think this is exactly what EVE Online needs; to gather those who aren’t really keen on playing MMORPG to play MMOFPS. We’ll see if it works for them when it comes free-to-play for PS3 later this year.
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7. Little Big Planet Karting (PS3)
So Sony worked out that this is what they should have called Modnation Racers in the first place. A karting game featuring Playstation’s biggest mascot, the demo didn’t offer anything that Mario Kart hasn’t been offering since the dawn of time. Visually uninteresting tracks and generic weapons don’t help, and though there are occasional franchisespecific touches throughout the game, it doesn’t do enough to make it fun. When the game is released, it will live and die on the capability of its creation tools, the key reason why Little Big Planet has such an enormous community supporting it.
8. Tomb Raider (PS3, 360, PC)
Injured, alone, and covered in blood and brain matter – that’s where this demo starts for a young Lara Croft, a gorgeous graduate on her first ever adventure, and definitely not enjoying herself. Looking beyond the sway of her walk, the game’s visuals are gorgeous, and it’s still six months from release. Over the course of the demo, she nearly falls to her death numerous times, recovers a bow from a corpse in a tree, and brings down her first deer, still poignantly, desperately alive as Lara moves in to slit its throat. Gameplay, though heavily scripted, is entertaining; it’s visceral, it’s gritty, and a decidedly new approach for a fran-
chise that people have been writing off for a decade.
9. ZombiU (Wii U)
In a pitch-dark room, and not having the remotest idea of what to do, I was told that the Wii U Game Pad was known in the game as the ZombiU Survival Kit and that it was key for my survival. I was able to see dark environments through the scanner of the Survival Kit. Interesting. Scanning boxes for weapons, ammo and health kits, the tension began to build up as soon as I heard some zombie clamours. “Where the heck are they?” I asked. Cleverly enough, I was able to tag the zombies through the radar of the Survival Kit and managed to kill them with my pistol. A tough ordeal, I was impressed by the anxiety it added to the experience. The height of the tension occurred when inserting a code into the number pad of a door. As I typed on the Wii U’s screen, on the TV screen I could see zombies creeping closer and closer towards me. Intense, and an inventive creation of tension.
10. Hitman: Absolution (PS3, 360, PC)
The aim of my mission: kill the selfacclaimed ‘King of China Town’, a major drug dealer. How? Well, it’s your choice! It depends on how much you
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want to risk. It’s amazing how much experimentation was involved in a single objective. Having played the same objective five times, each felt like a different mission. My first attempt saw me shooting a rope, causing my target to be crushed by construction material. Secondly, I went for a sniper kill. After some exploration, I was able to steal some poisonous fugu from a fish market, then go to the dealer’s apartment, sprinkle some poison on the cocaine, and then wait for the dealer to give some cocaine to the King for a try as I saw him die. Assassin’s Creed has come to dominate stealth/action genre, whilst Hitman has remained in the shadows. Here’s hoping IO Interactive produce a strong comeback for Agent 47.
11. Crysis 3 (PS3, 360, PC)
After the disappointment of its predecessor, Crysis 3 is probably the best Crysis yet. A perfect blend between the tropical jungle of Crysis 1 and the newer concrete jungle create a highly alluring game. The tension in this multiplayer gametype – Hunter Mode - is like nothing I’ve experienced in multiplayer before. The game starts with two ‘Hunters’ that have to follow their opponents and kill them with the Compound Bow. The invisible Hunters, detected only by the bleeping of your radar, are frightening opponents. The rest of the players have
survive, each victim becoming another Hunter. If there are any survivors at the end of the time limit, the surviving team wins. With a dark and mesmerising map, it was hard to survive. Yet, the tension and tactics involved made for a thoroughly entertaining experience. Crytek has been able to deliver a stellar sequel with help of the feedback from its customers.
12. Professor Layton and the Miracle Mask (3DS)
I buy Professor Layton because it’s one of the only games that makes me feel superior without forcing me to chainsaw off someone’s leg or question the chastity of a 12-year-old’s mum. I have no issue with the logic puzzles being hard, but the learning curve on this newest version must be steeper than Cardiac Hill, because the first puzzle didn’t even make sense. I had to untie a clown who’d got tangled up in some string. Scissors, for some bizarre reason, were not an option. Not to mention that the 15-minute demo was approximately 14 minutes of cutscene that varied between the gorgeous animation that the game is known for and some god-awful 3D animation not unlike drawing faces on melons and using them as hand puppets. I really hope this game lives up to its predecessors, since there are very few games that don’t dumb themselves down to a certain extent, and the visuals in this game are some of the
most stunning I’ve seen. Nintendo is becoming somewhat stagnant, with most of their new releases being sequels or Mario re-releases, and to lose unique games like Professor Layton to this lazy lack of originality would be a great shame for those of us who aren’t so keen on fat plumbers.
13. Playstation All-Stars Battle Royale (PS3, PS VITA)
Yes. Yes, it is essentially Super Smash Bros with Sony characters. But that isn’t a reason to write it off. All-Stars borrows the formula of Nintendo’s franchise and refines it. You’re no longer inflicting as much damage as you can to make booting characters off the screen easier; instead, attacks build up a meter for your characters’ special moves, which, when unleashed, destroy the other characters and grab you a point. This makes for a more tactical affair than Smash Bros, as your special move meter is split into three levels of progressively more powerful moves. So as well as bashing the granny out of the opponents on screen, you wage a private war against your nerve – do you go now, or wait for your Level 3 move? The game runs smoothly despite the frantic action, and characters are both varied and well balanced, with a fairly even split between ranged and melee moves across the rosta. Chuck in a free copy of the game on the PS Vita when you buy the PS3 version and this could be one to watch.
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15 OCTOBER 2012 |
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Exeposé
Football Varsity 2012: Sport, Snakey and Suspect Streakers Mike Stanton, Sports Editor, examines the extra-curricular
Photo: Josh Creek
activities at the Football Varsity TOWN vs Gown: an event renowned for its de-robing, alcohol fuelled chanting and of course, the football. I am not here to write about this last highlight. I am looking back on the moments that make the Football Varsity the special occasion it is for those who may not be there for the football. Unfortunately, after what was a promising first half, the University lost touch with the game shortly after the start of the second half. I will not mention the moment which caused the floodgates to open as I am sure the culprit has been named, shamed, and ‘seen many things off’ enough by now. Due to the second half becoming such a one sided affair, in favour of the side that the majority of supporters were not there to see, it was clear that the crowd were beginning to get restless. This was a time when one person needed to step up to the plate and provide a spark that would kick the crowd off again. And such a hero did rise to the challenge, an unexpected hero, a hero that the varsity did not deserve but one the varsity needed. I can only assume, a fresher, who had clearly had one too many shandys in the EUAFC mascot kit. He relentlessly prowled the touchline, kicking off chants, getting the crowd going again, shamelessly insulting City supporters, and nailing a cheeky penalty against the City keeper. Unfortunately this was the only time the keeper was tested throughout the evening. Who knows, if this man had dusted
off his boots and pulled on the green jersey the score line could have been different!
“With a record seven and half streakers before the end of the first half the AU supporters definitely out performed themselves this year” The atmosphere of the Varsity is always impressive with the majority of the noise coming from the Big Bank end and the AU contingent. The Varsity generally turns into an annual shouting match, usually with the strongest numbers on show from the Men’s Rugby Union, Netball and Men’s Football. This year was no different, five minutes into the game the sea of blue shirts, chinos and chanting surged into the ground from the bar ready to verbally abuse City and see who can make the most noise. This rowdy bunch provide a reason to watch the Varsity even if the football does not. With heckles and insults too rude for print being shamelessly thrown about, and the Netball girls receiving the brunt of the abuse they provide entertainment throughout before their early departures to Timepiece. This year especially, they also supplied the most exciting pieces of action on the pitch. With a record seven and
half streakers before the end of the first half the AU supporters definitely out performed themselves this year. Well, almost. As you may have noticed I only counted seven and a half rather than the reported eight. After full-length pitch efforts by male and female members, sliding across the centre spot and receiving some serious bosh from the security team the streakers were on top form up until about half-way through the first half. When one failure of a streaker, and of a man, stepped up. Hopping over the barrier as keen as mustard all was going well, until everyone realised that their eyes were not deceiving them and that yes, he was still in his boxers. Clearly this guy had not got the memo on what it takes to be a streaker. Still, he could save this situation; he could have been keeping the grand reveal for a centre of this pitch spectacular, pulling off some Magic Mike-esque moves. However, despite us not jumping to conclusions on what was really nestled in those tight grey boxers, our assumptions turned out to be correct as what can only be described as a depressing 30 metre dash down the touchline before hopping back over the barrier and re-joining his friends. Such an effort let down his teammate’s performance, the streakers had been on top form all night providing some magical moments, however, I can only hope management drops this player for their next outing after what can only be considered a shoddy display. As always the varsity was an excep-
tional event, in some people’s opinions the match in the second half may have been a bit of an anti-climax. But luckily, efforts by the mascots and fans, as always, proved the occasion to be a great evening; with the ‘Unay’ spirit on show in all aspects, whether it was ‘binning’ pints, chanting ‘your dad works for my
dad’ at the City supporters or streaking to such a high standard that it risked the second half to not go ahead. If you missed it this year, it is a must see event. So make sure you make it next year for what will hopefully be another amazing highlight of the University’s social calendar.
Twenty-five years of Exeter University Sport
Exeposé is twenty five years young and to celebrate this great achievement Will Kelleher, Sports Editor, thought it would be fitting to have a peek down memory lane at the sporting developments since 1987
Photo: The AU
Sport has, for many years, been at the forefront of life at University but at the University of Exeter sport only really started to kick-off after the 1977/78 merger with St Luke’s. The quality of the Lukies’ sportsmen and women greatly improved sport at the Uni and formed the basis of the continuing success over the last 25 years. Bruce Coleman, Senior Lecturer in Modern History and current Sports Advisor who has been involved with Uni sport since the 60s, commented that our Athletic Union is now very highly regarded and is seen as “one of the best in the country”. He credits the expansion of University Sport at Exeter to the improvement of facilities at private school level and celebrates the “mix of professionalism and genuine amateurs” on campus. It seems that hockey has always been at the forefront of Exeter Uni’s sport since the 80s. Pictured are the University’s Athletic Union (UAUwhich is now BUCS) Champions from 1983. Before the days of your student newspaper the men in green beat
Loughborough 2-0 at Lilleshall. At the time Tim Ireland, then captain of the 2s side, commented how “the crowd were in full song, as you might imagine, both during and after the game!” Compare this with our 1st XI’s marvellous BUCS Gold win of 2012 and you can draw many comparisons. According to Bruce Coleman, 1999 was perhaps the most important year for Uni sport in the last 25 years: “There seemed to be a culture change with the creation of the Sports Office under the guidance of Phil Atwell. The University has definitely embraced sport much more since then. There is lots of drive and ambition now.” Ian Powell, who was integral to the sale of the sports fields at Grass Lane and the purchase of the Topsham Sports Facility, ensured the future of our University’s Sport in the late 80s and early 90s by making sure the money gained from the Grass Lane sale was ring fenced for sport and not used in other areas. This money was utilised to establish a proper gym, an Astro-turf
hockey pitch and other facilities still in use today. “The facilities the University have now are just mind-blowing” stated Coleman.
“Back in the 1950s and 60s a man called Deryk Fairclough had a vision of turning the University owned Hoopern Valley farmland into fully functioning sports fields” So what about the future? Bruce Coleman thinks that we would do well to look into the past when thinking about the forthcoming years. Back in the 1950s and 60s a man called Deryck Fairclough had a vision of turning the University owned Hoopern Valley farmland, next to Prince of Wales Road,into fully functioning sports fields. Who knows, his dream may well be realised in the next 25 years!
Exeposé
| WEEK FOUR
EURFC start BUCS with a bang Photo: Chris Mastris
to the line to wrap the game up. Former Exeter University student and now Exeter Chiefs starting second row, James Hanks believed that the boys in green “played with intensity that Glamorgan couldn’t cope with” and “played every opportunity and have been really energetic.”
Men’s Rugby Union James Tapp Reporter
EURFC 1st XV thrashed Glamorgan 80-5 in their first BUCS encounter of the season. This completed a Wednesday clean-sweep for the club with all five teams running out winners. After two days of constant rain the pitch was well watered as Exeter welcomed travelling side Glamorgan. Fly Half Fraser Gillies started proceedings by making the most of an early penalty gaining 3 points for the home side. Gillies would continue with kicking duties throughout the afternoon. Points came in steadily for Exeter
Adam Lax
EUMHC Publicity Officer
A WEEKEND of mixed fortunes for Men’s Hockey saw the 4th XI emerge as the only side with their 100% winning record intact as the West of England Hockey league gets underway. Whilst the 2nd and 3rd XIs found the going much tougher in the Premiership, falling to defeat against Plymouth Marjon and Cardiff University respectively, a 5-2 victory over Swansea City in the region’s second tier ensured Adam Lax’s men held on to their spot at the top of the Championship. Following some sloppy defending in the opening stages, Swansea secured an early lead. However, a trademark penalty corner strike from Matt Marshall gave Exeter real scope to assert their dominance as the first half progressed. The dynamic forward line led by the tireless Andrew Gale provided talisman Scott Woolley with the support he needed to open his account for the season. Woolley went on to complete his hat trick, earning the Man of the Match award, before Tom Grimes completed the rout from a wellexecuted corner routine. Nevertheless, it is the start of a landmark year for the club, as the top four tiers of regional hockey are covered by sides from Exeter for the very first time. The 1st XI look to bounce back into the National Premier League at the first time of asking, having come agonisingly close in the play offs last Easter. A brace from Josh Godfrey put Exeter firmly in control in front of a hundred -strong crowd at the Sports
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Crossword No. 37 by Raucous
“The final try was finished by Mike Pope, starting his run at the half way line, to wrap up the game.” as they put 17 unanswered points on the board relatively easily. After a fumbling from both sides, blind-side flanker Tom Dowding ran over the line for a try only to be disallowed for an incomplete grounding. Justice for Dowding came swiftly as he ran in a break-away try soon after. Glamorgan’s only points of the game came from their second rower after a short line out caught Exeter’s defence off guard. The try was left unconverted and the score stood at 365 at half time. The second period saw EURFC rain down tries over the tired Glamorgan side. The final try was finished by Mike Pope, starting his run at the half way line, ducking and diving his way
EUMHC 4th XI Fly the Flag Men’s Hockey
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Park, however a dramatic comeback from an equaliser in the game’s dying embers saw Exeter’s hopes of victory vanish into the cool atumnal breeze. Exeter now sit two points off the pace, behind local rival team Bath, our next visitors to the Sports Park, in what should be an electrifying encounter. EUMHC can also now lay claim to some of the best hockey facilities in the country, with the £8m Sports Park investment including a newly re-laid water based astro to the same standard as was used at the 2012 Olympics,
Exeter played the game to the last minute and were professional throughout. Through great team work and understanding of the game they gave Glamorgan nothing and kept them out of the game from start to finish. Try scorer Tom Dowding congratulated his team mates as the “whole team put in a great effort.” The tricky part of the afternoon was the final score. I recorded Exeter having 75, the referee stated 77 and the RFU official added it up to 78. After consulting each other’s notes the final score was deemed to be 80 - 5, a very convincing but well-deserved win for the 1st XV.
along with a changing pavilion and grandstand set to be completed by the end of October. However, as double BUCS Gold Medallists, and the most successful University sports club in the country last year with an eye watering 234 BUCS points, Director of Hockey Chris McInroy is aware it would be foolish to rest on our laurels. “After giving up a 2-1 lead in the last minute of the game against a well drilled Cheltenham side, we need to put in the hard work now and above all maintain our discipline on the field. ”
60 seconds with... Patrick Wall
Tom Samuel
EUMHC 6s
EUMHC 1s
What position do you play? Left wing or left midfield but I’ve even covered as a goalkeeper in an injury crisis!
What position do you play? Anywhere in Midfield.
Best sporting moment? Scoring a drag-flick to win against Radley in the final minute at school. Ambitions for the Season? I would love to play at a high a level as possible, I want to win with the team. What are your pre-game preparations? I prepare for a big game by getting as relaxed as possible then psych myself with some music before I leave.
Best sporting moment? Scoring twice for Ireland, to beat England 2-1 to win the Four Nations Championship. Ambitions for the Season? To win the National Leauge and retain our BUCS Gold. What are your pre-game preparations? I have no superstitions but I triple Check that I have all my kit, pray that I would honour God and then I put Ed Sheeran or John Mayer on my iPod.
Across
1. Convivial (5) 4. European capital (6) 7. Natal day (8) 8. Came down in 4. Across in 1989 (4) 9. 2008 NUS Student Publication of the Year (7) 11. Clear (5) 14.Tired on a Monday morning? (8) 19. A long way to go for a jazz trumpeter (5) 21. Statesman had something like a trek for liberty (7) 23. US magazine (4) 24.You have to do this to the clue to solve it (8) 25. Except (6) 26. Lives (anag.) (5)
Down 1. Political philosopher; Calvin’s partner (6) 2. Irish nationalist politician (7) 3. Enables swift search for Swift character? (5) 4. Chivalrous (5) 5. Father of Jacob and motion laws (5) 6. Fail to attain (5) 10. London and Manhattan area (4) 12. Submachine gun (3) 13. Piece of music for a solo voice (4) 15. Links Private, London and Mind’s (3) 16. Russian writer (7) 17. Heavenly strike (5) 18. John Lennon claimed to be one? (6) 20. Links Jack, Keith and -ade (5) 21. Joins (5) 22. Loud sound; Public Enemy brought it (5)
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Town 3 - 0 Gown
COMMENT: Mike Stanton’s ‘Sport, Snakey and Suspect Streakers’ Page 40
Football
Will Kelleher Sports Editor
EXETER CITY ran out 3-0 winners in this year’s ‘Town v Gown’ Football Varsity against the University of Exeter AFC in front of a raucous, record 3,932 crowd at St James’ Park on Wednesday 3 October. After an even first period, with neither side creating any guilded chances, ‘Town’ pulled away in the second half with a calamitous own goal from Uni’s Andy Higgins and strikes from Jagger-Cane and substitute Watkins. City have now extended their run to five wins from five in the fixture. This is the first time in the history of this fixture that the University have failed to score. Despite the 3-0 score line the ‘Gown’ can be pleased with their efforts against their professional counterparts. The University started the match brightly but despite enjoying a larger
share of possession could not fashion any chances on goal. Matt Langely had a shot blocked from just inside the box after 20 minutes and Mattheus Marriott was looking lively down the left side. City produced the first proper effort of the game, striking the post just after the 22 minute mark. They seemed to take confidence from this and started to gain more a foothold in the midfield. City were unable to silence the crowd however, especially the boisterous Athletic Union members in the Big Bank end. Uni were by no means outclassed in the first 45 minutes and put together a couple of free flowing moves, the final pass just evading them on more than one occasion. Both defences worked very hard in this first half to deny the strikers the chance to put their team in front. The game needed a goal to break the building tension but the defences stayed strong until half time. If the University were happy with their first half display they would have been very disappointed with the manner in which they conceded their
“There can be no faulting the effort the Uni put in but City’s superior fitness and technique proved pivotal in the end” first goal after 49 minutes. A low cross from the left was just missed by ‘keeper Wilson and in his attempts to put the ball behind, Uni substitute Higgins managed to turn the ball into his own net. It was a bitter blow to the Uni who were coping with everything City threw at them up until this point. City began to gain more confidence and Uni’s bubble seemed to have burst with the hosts winning the ongoing midfield battle. Uni kept pushing hard but still could not create any real goal-scoring opportunities. The men in green were frustrated further as City then doubled their lead on 75 minutes; the Grecians’ JaggerCane neatly turning in another low cross into the box. EUAFC’s confidence was now
shot and mistakes were creeping in with City’s fitness proving vital. Pete Beadle continued to work tirelessly in the centre of midfield and ran himself into the ground, having to limp off with a tight hamstring late on. City took full advantage of a tired University XI, creating chances at will. In the 78th minute the hosts made it 3-0 with youngster Oli Watkins chipping substitute goalkeeper Ryan Pardo after a goalmouth scramble.
“We looked to take positives from this fixture into our next few SW peninsula league games and BUCS” With the game won City now created a hatful of chances, if it was not for a few fantastic saves from Pardo the margin could have been much greater. There can be no faulting the effort the Uni boys put in over the course of the game but City’s superior fitness and technique proved pivotal in the end.
Photo: Josh Irwandi
The University’s winger Magnus Assmundson commented; “We started very strongly in the first half, our good shape in defence and midfield allowed us to win the ball back and create some well worked moves, although there was a lack of threat against the City goal. “The second half was a different story; our tired legs were no match for city’s quality and composure on the ball. “As for the rest of the season we look to take the positives from this fixture into our next few SW peninsula league games, in preparation for the upcoming BUCS season which begins on the 17 October. “I believe with the squad’s strength in depth we have a good chance of promotion back into the BUCS Premier South.” The Football Varsity is in aid of The Cardiomyopathy Association and The Adam Stansfield Foundation. Its inception followed the tragic death of Mike Polden, a popular footballer at the University in 2001.