The Submarine
Notes from the editors After a disrupted last term we are happy to bring you this (slightly late) edition of The Submarine. We would like to thank Mr Jameson and Ms Kent-Sutton as we are new editors and they have been very helpful. A big thank you to all the pupils who submitted pieces. I’m really happy we finally got to work on this edition, and we hope to bring you better editions in the future.
Tabitha Larke Form II Cover artwork by Alexia Fantacci Form V
Interview with Mr Duffy ●
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What is your favourite rock? Please go into heavy detail. Em, that’s quite a question. I mean, wow, ok, I’m stumped. Let’s go for, um, granite, due to its clear beauty. You started off with a tough question. Can you give us some candle recommendations? Very good, very good. Em, you can say, right.. I’ll tell you what. There’s a particular brand I have… I’m joking. Let’s just go, Celtic Candles are my favourite. Strong brand. What’s your favourite flag of the world? I’ve got a lot of my favourite flags in this room, but… God, cutting question. Let’s go, Sri Lanka. What’s your favourite movie? Okay, em, wow, yeah. I’ll probably say Into the Wild. What’s your favourite Christmas movie and why? Die Hard. It’s a classic film but it’s kind of a Christmas movie, and also very action-packed. It’s very Christmassy. What’s your favourite class to teach? Oh no. That’s… ooh. That’s too close to the bone, I think. I don't think I can answer that question. (long silence)
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Is Mr Finn and Mr McDonald’s group your favourite band in the world? The Keynotes, they’re good, well… clearly. Hmm. It’s a random question. These are absolutely bizarre. They’re my second favourite. My first is the Arctic Monkeys. Who is your favourite teacher? Similar to the question of who’s your favourite class. (long consideration) (more silence) Oh right, ok, Mr Swift for his Swiftisms. When did your rivalry start with Mr Finn? C. 2014 Who’s the better Geography teacher? Oh my God, you’re ridiculous. Don’t be a politician… Mr O’ Hurlihy. Do you prefer tea or coffee? That’s a boring question. Either, as long as it involves chocolate. What’s your favourite hand lotion brand? Ah, come on. There. Are. Many… Clarins What is your zodiac sign? Oh, I couldn’t care less. I think I’m on the cusp between two. Leo or Cancer. Why is Leeds your favourite football team? Em, yeah. Hm, a great appreciation for an Irish player called Gary Kelly. The Irish connection in the mid 90s. Also I love the misery. How many languages do you speak? Oh, come on. One, shamefully.
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What is your favourite word and why is it ballpark? Third form asked that? Gits. That’s just such a random question. Remove that one. Who do you think will be prefect next year? Can I check the green book? Slim pickings. What is your favourite restaurant? OOOH. Just say, Variety Jones
Safia Walker Form II
What if Mars was made out of a Mars Bar? What if the moon were made of cheese? Or Neptune made of soap? Pick a celestial object, reimagine its material composition, and explore the implications. Feel free to explore the realms of physics, philosophy, fantasy…the sky is the limit! —Inspired by Tate Flicker, Class of 2025 What if Mars was made out of a Mars bar? The core of the planet is the soft gooey nougat. Likely piping hot, just like the Earth’s core. Then it would have another layer of caramel, just like the Earth’s mantle. The caramel would flow due to the heat of the nougat inner core. As the caramel mantle shifted, the chocolate crust would collide and move due to the currents of caramel below. The world above would be covered in mountains of chocolate that have peaked, a deep rich brown jagged skyline. In those sweet ranges, you could find scorching hot caramel spewing from pressure points in the chocolate crust. The caramel would erupt into the dim sky, sending burnt sugar across the mountains. Across the planet you’d also find lakes of melted chocolate flowing, some so big they could be deemed oceans. They would ebb and flow. However those smaller bodies when the planet turned away from the sun, would solidify into hard chocolate. If there were any life in those lakes, they wouldn’t survive.
Chocolate holds oxygen so perhaps a small bacteria could survive. Bacteria survives anything. Our search for alien life might be fruitless but would the search for life really matter if we found a planet made out of sweet sugar in many forms? Could we even land a rocket on it, or would the heat of its fuel melt away any chance of landing? I don’t believe Mars could even survive as it’s too close to the sun. Would Galileo have thought the planet was something sweet, or assumed it was a watery rock-like earth? The church would still have persecuted him, or maybe not. Perhaps Mars would not have lasted until Galileo’s time and would have already melted away. I think religion could be affected as well, if Mars was the only planet so sweet, then why would the grand creator make one planet so different from the others? If science couldn’t explain its sweet state would more people become religious? Cults in Mars’ name would appear, worshipping its sweet glory. Or maybe we wouldn’t even know about it. Governments would hide away the chocolate planet, say Mars was just like the rest due to the panic the truth could cause. Then that could lead to further censorship of space with only government-approved operations permitted in space and a ban on telescopes so that no one could view the sweet orb. Then conspiracy theories would erupt, claiming aliens are real and that’s why we can’t view space. If Mars bars actually existed as well, what if it was a secret way to tell society that it was the planet’s actual composition?
A planet that differs slightly would change our worldview completely, so the implications would be massive. It’s a hypothetical which could shift the entirety of what our society is built on. Unfortunately, I don't think a planet made out of chocolate would be possible.
Edna Johnston Form VI
Alexia Fantacci Form V
Artist Profile: Iona Chavasse by Zining Wang Iona MY IDOL!!! Her artworks are all over our school, from the science block to the art rooms, you can always find her works. I have to admit, I fell In love with her works from the first time I saw them. Iona herself describes her style as conceptual, so every single one of her paintings and linos start at one simple idea, and she expands it to a bigger, more practical, idea. Iona also claims that she hasn't always been so certain about her style, and she doesn’t think that she will ever fit into one style forever. Her style changes as she grows. The theme of her current project is heritage and identity. The crab claw is a symbol of cancer which is the month that Iona herself was born, the same as the ruby stone of cancer. Iona said during working on this project she had a deeper understanding of her identity, and had more time to do research on the place where her name came from —— the Iona island, a small island in the inner Hebrides on the west coast of Scotland.
The special thing about this island is that St Columba visited this island which created a connection between Ireland and Scotland. Iona was named after this island, because her mom is from Scotland and her dad is from Ireland. Iona identifies herself as a person who relates to both two countries. At the end of the interview, Iona told me that she thinks art is a privilege to express ourselves, our feelings and it’s a process of finding the true you. It’s a privilege and we need to cherish it. ‘Art should never be made to sell, to please others. It’s only about yourself. Be happy with what you created.’
Zining Wang Form IV
Iona Chavasse Form VI
Interview with Richie Conroy, author of Dialann Emily Porter: An Jailtacht ●
What inspired you to become a writer? (long silence) Emmm I think when I was in college I was reading stories of the Fíanna and I was reading text written in the 12th century, and I was thinking that this would make an amazing film or tv show. I knew there were heaps of untapped stuff as Gaeilge or as Bearla, and I was thinking, like Star Wars, ok, maybe the Druids speak Irish to the heroes or whatever. At the same time there was a show called Father Ted that just came out, but that showed Irish people. It’s really important to see people like yourself on tv, so you can think, oh I could do that too. It was the first time I saw something Irish on TV that was actually good, like Derry Girls..
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What made you want to write a book in Irish? When I was younger there weren't any books for me so... Here’s a bit of advice, write the book you want to read. There was a lack of, there still is, so we need new writers, especially as Gaeilge.
Who was your favourite character to write? I’d say Emily, definitely Emily. She's … I’ve three sisters, and each one thought Emily was the other, but I was like, actually she's a combination of all three of yous. It’s funny because Emily sometimes gets things completely wrong, but she's so sure of herself. And a lot of the things that happened to her happened to me, I just tweaked a bit. I shouldn't be encouraging this sort of behaviour, but we definitely snuck out one night. There was a kid there who bought shandy with 0.001% alcohol, and he drank like twenty of those to see if he could get drunk. He just got diabetes. Yeah, the teachers were… you definitely use your own experiences, but embellish and hide them, so you don't get sued. ●
● Who was your least favourite character to write? Ehhhhh. Now… I don't know. Do you know actually, I have to say, there are no characters I didn't like. But Olivia, especially in the second book, I loved writing her, because she's so mean. The second book is kind of about a toxic friendship, you know these friends you have who are like your ‘best friend’ but they
Daniel Moran Form I
don't actually do anything for you. It’s about Emily realising, wondering whether Olivia is a good friend and whether she should ‘divorce’ Olivia. ●
What was your favourite scene to write? In the book, probably, I did love writing her first fight with Keith,that was kinda fun because that actually happened in real life. This teacher organised this football group so that girls couldn’t play and everyone was like ‘that’s sexist’. He did it so they’d argue with each other, because when they argued , ‘bhI siad ag labhairt Gaeilge.’ He did it to amuse himself, I guess.
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Why did you write about a pregnancy scandal? Oh yeah, yeah, good question. That's, well, not really an easter egg, but it's planted in the first book and gets paid off in the second book. In the second book, that gets answered… early in the book too so you only have to read the first bit. But it's never quite said that there is a pregnancy, Emily never quite gets it.
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Why did you write from the perspective of a teenage girl? I did talk about that in the presentation, but when i was writing the boy it felt like a bit of a rip off of Adrian Mole, and you always want to do something original, and Adrian Mole was written by a woman, Sue Townsend, so I thought well I'm a man, maybe i could write about a girl. I've also got two daughters, and I remember showing one of them Winnie the Pooh, and she was like’ where are all the girls?’, and I was like ‘piglets a girl?’ And she was like NO. and then I realised, you know, and in Star Wars there was just Princess Leia. As a male writer, you have to make sure you're not just writing men.
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Do you ever think that you could have written a show better? Yeah all the time. Absolutely, 100%. That's sort of progress, when you go ‘Hmm, I wouldn't have done that.’ It takes a year usually for a show to be made, so you have a year of experience, and sometimes as a writer you're not in control. So the actors say it, like when there's a joke and it doesn't get delivered the way you want. If you don't feel like that, that's when you should stop. I think it's the journey of the writer.
Race Talk by Clint Wokocha In 2020, as Covid-19 began to make its way through Europe, the Black Lives Matter movement re-exploded after the murder of George Floyd by Derek Chauvin. This movement led to mass protests worldwide and encouraged many people of colour to call out racism they had experienced. St Columba’s College was no exception to this powerful movement, and was accused of racism by former pupils. Despite the rules imposed by lockdown, the school began to create a response to these allegations to try and improve that school. We had speakers, who spoke (online) to pupils about systemic racism that exists everywhere. The school then hired an outside body to create a race survey to evaluate the schools body attitude towards racism. Our attitude, our response and our action. This survey came back with a positive, but far from perfect response. The main points that arose from the survey included: - We do not not have a school culture that is comfortable talking about the difficult issues, such as racism. - There is still banter and joking about racism, particularly in the junior years. - There is an unawareness of the right responses to racism and bullying. This led to the school bringing in Clinton Wokocha to talk to the pupil body, first at a junior assembly, then at a senior assembly. Clinton is a former pupil of Kings Hospital, and studied at Maynooth and Trinity.
He has worked in King’s Hospital as an ambassador for diversity and inclusion for around 2 years. He came to school to try and teach us how to go from being bystanders to upstanders, to teach us from being passive to active in our response to racism. Clinton gave the pupils scenarios that involved racial discrimination in one shape or an other and asked what they would do in that situation. He concluded that in racial abuse situations we should get involved, intervene, but not confrontationally. Never make your defence personal or aggressive, but rather educate the person on their mistakes. Once Clinton finished his talk, he opened the floor to questions, he was responsive and engaging over all and took questions very well, no matter how challenging they were. Overall he concluded that we need to have reconstructive justice, allow for second chances, educate on the issues and sanctions put in place when needed.
Avi Johnston Form VI
Isabel Warnock Form V
Alison Wang Form III
Antonia Ladanyi Form V
Untitled The weight of it in my hands, The feeling of the hard cover pressing into The inside of my palms, The bright colours brushing against my skin. The soft flutter of the pages Indented with ink As I turn them over Like butterflies’ wings. The words march on Like soldiers in line, The ends of pages stamped with numbers Counting progress, The amount of time until victory. Words flow into pages, Pages sprint into chapters, Hours pass on, my mind trapped in The stories being told. The sky stretches for miles across The fictional villages they populate, The stories ranging from fantasy to historical And everything in between. Anna Rose MacManus, Form II