Student Life
How places are made: A meditation in the City of Love
Springtime bloomed around me, pink and bright. Soft white petals were adrift on the warm afternoon breeze, slanted April sunlight glanced off my cheek. The city, too, was magnificent. Looming buildings decorated with artifice and care, streets paved with stone – the greenery only added to the majesty. The botanical gardens unfurled before me, rolling with colour and life. A man was humming quietly to himself on a nearby bench. It sounded romantic, sort of high and yellow like those sweet, bright tulips. I lost myself in the sprawl of Paris for a time, eyes permanently glued upwards. My latte was perfectly rich and sweet, the air was warm and clear. It was an idyllic day.
Still, there was something missing. Even amidst all its splendorous sights, the city held no memory. The echoes of a previous trip came to me in moments: that distinctive intersection, a particular building, or the crêpe shop on Île Saint-Louis. But mostly the streets felt empty. They didn’t evoke much feeling at all. It took me time to understand the vacant feeling in my chest. I was awestruck, certainly. Yet the lack of memory felt striking. I began to think, how can I feel nothing for a city as beautiful as Paris? What is it that really makes a place?
At some point, I wandered into a ceramics shop, packed with a zorn palette of creatures large and small: frogs with gazes turned towards the sky, cats in raincoats standing in terrified anticipation. Reds, yellows, whites, and greens; they clinked and rattled as my steps shook the floor. There was something warm and deep about this room – I felt their eyes upon me as I ran my hand across their glazed and sculpted forms. Cluttered and cramped, it felt a bit like home. The shopkeeper told me that they made the pieces just upstairs, and that it had been her passion project for the past decade. There was character to that room. The bright colours and careless arrangement; everything was exactly where it should have been.
I think that places are made. Natural beauty, grand architecture – they’re all important, but they only go so far. Places are formed from memories etched into streets, from ghosts which dwell in between moments. They’re shaped by the dreams and aspirations which have been poured into quiet, hidden hollows, like that shop in Paris. I think of cities I’ve called home: Philadelphia, Providence, Oxford. Each holds a different version of myself.
In Philadelphia, passing through the square by the fountain conjures our laughing voices in the dark – eyes straining towards the starry sky, trying to catch a glimpse of Jupiter. I remember lying down in the early dawn light, laughing at Perry’s blue van, and the telescope he could never seem to place just right. I feel full and warm, lingering in that park where I had my first date. For me, that was the essence of springtime: eating iced treats, just nervous enough to be unsure of where to put our hands. The eventual clasp of his fingers in mine, his shining brown eyes and the cherry blossoms which were just beginning to flower.
In Providence, the walk to our café was always carefree; sunlit pilgrimages to warm pastries full of flashcards and gossip. The main green usually ripples in the autumn light – full of familiar faces, music, and games. I picture lying on a blanket among people I care for deeply, and watching the afternoon slip by. The pool holds my highest highs and the depths of my sadness: each emotion picked through relentlessly in between sets. His apartment – learning one esoteric ancient language or another, in between trips to the pizza shop next door. We must have talked until the store closed. Each building holds a different subject I studied in the early hours of the morning, a different coffee which carried me through the term.
Even Oxford holds memories, now. Walks from Lincoln, Brasenose, or Balliol accommodation at 3 a.m. after a particularly spirited afters, tracing the well-worn path to my room down by the river. Drawing ridiculous caricatures on menus, somehow turning a Wetherspoons into a site of great sacredness. Debriefs in our coffee shop, sipping lavender-infused drinks and refusing to get any revision done. Then there’s the late nights in the Schwarzmann, spinning on stools underneath that unblinking eye, and telling secrets in the dark.
It hit me when I walked down Cornmarket for the first time since the vac: the weight of all of these memories. Oxford has always had grand architecture, peaceful paths down by the river, and whispering meadows. But in the beginning, it had not been made yet. Not for me, at least. It felt empty. Full of possibility, sure, but vacant. Now, going into Trinity, I feel the strength of each emotion, each recollection. To be made is to be remembered, filled with personhood and character. That shop in Paris was made, shaped from the weight of passion and care. Philadelphia and Providence were made by the people and places which matter to me. Oxford has been made by all of these things, good and bad. I feel every moment as if I am living it again. Perhaps that is what it means to make a place.
The MP for Oxford East, Dame Anneliese Dodds, raised the ongoing campaign to save the Ultimate Picture Palace (UPP) on Jeune Street in parliament last Monday, urging the government to “go further” to protect “community assets like the UPP”.
The independent cinema is struggling to go ahead with renovations to the premises on account of uncertainty over the length of its tenancy. Its landlord, Oriel College, has so far refused to extend its lease beyond 2037, citing plans to create a “Fifth Quad” to accommodate graduate students.
“Too often, as in the case of the UPP, we see a David and Goliath situation for communities that want to control local assets”, Dodds told the House of Commons in an adjournment debate last Monday. She argued that the challenges faced by the UPP reflect wider difficulties experienced by community-owned assets across the UK. The dispute has also raised broader concerns over the University’s gradual encroachment into the town of Oxford.
The UPP’s management told Cherwell: “We very much welcome Anneliese Dodds raising the situation facing the Ultimate Picture Palace in Parliament, and we are hugely grateful for her support as her comments are an important recognition of the serious challenge we face. Without a longer lease … our community-owned cinema – recognised nationally as a leader in cultural cinema for its programme, access, and audience engagement – cannot unlock the investment it needs to survive.”
The lack of long-term security has already prevented the cinema from accessing major grant funding, raising concerns that it could become financially unviable before its current lease expires. Executive director of the UPP, Micaela Tuckwell, told Cherwell that she hopes both the College and Picturehouse can “collaborate” and incorporate the cinema “within their Fifth Quad plans”.
Dodds echoed this in Parliament: “There are some brilliant examples of higher education institutions working with arts organisations in the UK, and such co-operation could make the UPP an even more special place. So far, Oriel College appears not to have recognised the potential benefits of engaging with the Ultimate Picture Palace in this way. I urge it to reconsider, and to grant the UPP its long-term lease.”
In response to Dodds’ comments, Oriel College told Cherwell it had “no plans to extend the lease at this early stage in the tenancy.” The College added: “We are very proud of our heritage cinema and are in dialogue with the new managers about how to ensure it remains open to the wider public.”
Founded in 1911, the UPP is the oldest picture house in Oxford. It is currently owned by over 1,200 stakeholders in the local community and is a registered Asset of Community Value (ACV) by Oxford City Council, which recognises places of social or cultural significance to a local area. The petition to keep the cinema open surpassed 20,000 signatures this week.
Dodd’s appeal comes amidst the government’s proposal for an English Devolution and Community Empowerment Bill, which aims to introduce stronger protections for ACVs such as the UPP. The bill would create a ‘Community Right to Buy’ provision, giving local groups the first opportunity to purchase such assets, alongside a fair market valuation and additional time to raise funds. However, as currently drafted, the policy would apply only if the asset were to be put up for sale by its owner, meaning the UPP, which is facing an unrenewed lease, would not be protected under the Bill.
Speaking in support of the measures, Dodds told the House of Commons: “The community right to buy will mark a landmark shift”, but added, “we need to go further”.
For £5 (and a 42p booking fee), I found myself in a room full of theatre kids who had finally attained that cherished jewel of our modern world: a job. I first heard about Work.txt when I was asked by a friend (or coworker?) if I was free Saturday night. Being instinctively adverse to clubbing, I was, indeed, free. Unemployed, even. And this was a gilt-edged proposition I just couldn’t turn down. At the mention of the name Ted Fussell, I threw £5 (plus the emphasised 42p booking fee) of my student loan at Ticketsource, completely unaware of what I was getting myself into. All I knew was that I was expected at ‘The Place of Work’ (Lecture Room Six at New College) at 8pm that Saturday. Since punctuality is one of the traits that makes me such a team player, I met Teddy Farrand (or the receptionist?) outside the lodge ten minutes early, presented him with my ticket, and announced that I was clocking in for my shift.
Upon entry, I followed the instructions on the screen, placing the book that I was asked to bring with me onto the growing pile in the centre of the stage. I struck up a conversation with my fellow audience members, or coworkers, as we began to immerse ourselves into this bit to which we had already committed £5 plus (say it with me) a 42p booking fee. “It feels like we’re talking around a water cooler”, Rebecca Harper remarked before she mimed holding a little paper cone. We speculated about whether this would count as work experience on LinkedIn. The audience was already taking the “play performed entirely by its audience” pitch very seriously.
The show centred around a script-cum-PowerPoint presentation. Yellow text flashed on a black screen, encouraging either the whole audience to speak or only a specific group who had something in common. The categories ranged in specificity, from “runners” to “people who don’t sleep well”. This technique was rather revealing: you never knew whether your voice was going to be part of a chorus or if you would be reading a line alone. You could learn a lot about how your fellow audience members characterised themselves through their silences and their responses with this technique, and you shared a lot about yourself in return.
Work.txt often works metatheatrically and draws attention to its scripted nature. The stage manager’s digression about Gilmore Girls, for example, then diverged into something along the lines of “I haven’t even watched Gilmore Girls. This is just what the screen is telling me to say”. The screen could also edit your perceptions of a character trait with which you had already aligned, gradually revealing information after you had already committed to reciting the assigned script. For example, I took on the role of “a person who hasn’t said very much yet” and was caught off guard when this character then spiralled into one spouting criticism against the show. I found myself complaining that this wasn’t real theatre, that it wasn’t Mamma Mia the Musical, regardless of the fact that I (the individual, not the character) was having a great time.
The show emphasised the £5.42 ticket price as a way of pointing out the peculiarity of the fact that we had paid someone else to let us do work for them. This was likened to the structure of university; we get loans to do work that will eventually help us do more work and pay back the loans until we are sixty years old. For now, though, that £9,535 a year is only a number on a webpage, and we can forget that the drudgery of our degrees is not only self-inflicted, but something we pay for.
These more bleak illuminations were mingled alongside other excellent comedic moments, executed successfully thanks to the energy of the audience. This article would not do the show justice without a nod to the single best moment of student theatre I have ever experienced, as either cast, crew, or audience. The screen flashed up with these words on separate lines: Every. Night. In. My. Dreams.
The melancholic whistling of the opening notes radiated from the screen before us, and the slide changed into a karaoke video of Celine Dion’s ‘My Heart Will Go On’. We sang all 4 minutes and 40 seconds. Arms swayed. I turned to the others in my row and began to dedicate my performance to Maggie Kerson, who likewise responded with a dramatic air grab, as she informed me her heart will, in fact, go on. We turned our phone torches on and waved them in the air. It was a live concert on a small scale, but the energy could have filled Wembley Stadium. I choose to believe that this was an accurate reflection of the corporate world, that each working day is punctuated by the collective belting of 90s pop classics.
At the end of the play, the humour melded with an unsettling bitterness. It jumped from the subtle commentary on the working world and our place within it, not as human beings, but as employees, and shifted to a more blunt, bleak outlook of the world. Our main character and fellow audience member, Holly, lay on the floor and told us all the reasons she wanted to “stop”. The printer, which had been inconspicuously set on a table in the corner of the room for the duration of the play, then took over as the narrator, providing an epilogue. This speech moves beyond the end of the working day and blends cosmic existentialism with meaningless corporate speak. It tells us about the destruction of the natural world, the death of the human race, yet the persistence of work nonetheless. “God tries lateral thinking”, the audience is told. “Sound gets put on a zero-hour contract.” It was bizarre yet depressing to hear this workplace jargon being applied to the world beyond humanity. The universe became a workplace, striving towards nothing in particular. It was a reminder of how far we have come from where we started as part of the natural world, how we have produced our own prisons in the form of deadlines, networking, and contracts.
While my heart will go on, so will the corporate cesspools we have built for ourselves, but Celine Dion has only sung a power ballad about one of these things. Still, Work.txt provides something of a solution to the horrors of the modern workplace in its call to inaction in a world of hustle culture and relentless productivity.
The post All in a day’s Work.txt: Metatheatre’s extremes appeared first on Cherwell.
Students and the University and College Union (UCU) have joined an ongoing march and rally in Oxford to mark the 100-year anniversary of the 1926 General Strike.
The march left Manzil Way, Cowley, at around 12.30pm and arrived at Bonn Square in the city centre at around 1.15pm. Those attending include the Oxford District and Trade Unions Council, the UCU, the Teachers Union, the National Union of Journalists (NUJ), the National Pensioner’s Convention and the Renter’s Rights Union. They have been joined by members of Oxford Stand Up to Racism (OUSTR), the Socialist Worker’s Party, the Communist Party, Your Party, the Green Party and other groups. Several students attended, including a group from the Oxford Labour Club.
The event commemorated the anniversary of the 1926 General Strike, a sympathy strike which took place across the United Kingdom from 4th to 12th May 1926, in an attempt by the Trade Union Congress (TUC) to pressure the UK Government to improve working conditions and prevent reductions to pay for coal miners. In Oxford, railway, print and building workers marched in solidarity with miners in other regions of the country. The march was largely seen as unsuccessful at achieving its aims, but has been widely depicted in literature and film.
Organisers and attendees gathered at Manzil Way from around 12pm. OUSTR and the Socialist Worker put up stalls on Manzil Way and at Bonn Square, and various groups distributed leaflets and campaign materials at both locations. Marching to the City Centre, those gathered chanted “Here to stay, here to fight, workers of the world unite”, “What do we think of landlords? Shit. What do we think of shit? Landlords” and “Whose streets? Our streets”.
Speakers at the rally included Steve Wright of the Fire Brigades Union. Speaking after his address, Wright told Cherwell he aimed to “bring the message that it’s only workers that can fight back and push back employers….I think it’s about looking forward and building a society and country that’s built in the interest of workers.”
A UCU committee member told Cherwell that it was “important to show solidarity with members of other UCU branches who are experiencing significant attacks on their working rights and working conditions.
“Oxford from the outside has a reputation of ivory towers, but there are lots of problems with poor job security… [and] attacks on higher education. Oxford isn’t immune.”
In a comment to Cherwell before the event, Co-Chairs of the Oxford Labour Club (OLC) described the General Strike as “one of the most prominent points in the history of the British trade union movement…two million people joined together in solidarity to show both their employers, and the ruling political class, that working people in the United Kingdom deserve to be heard, seen, and respected”.
A brass band accompanied the marchers and played throughout the journey down to Bonn Square, with one performer describing the event as “part of the history of music within the trade union movement”.
Today’s event will be followed on 16th May by performances including live music at the Museum of Oxford to tell the story of the 1926 General Strike in Oxford.
Reporting Stanley Arlidge, Ned Remington and Hattie Simpson.
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