Post-Modern Pilgrimage

"And thou shalt kisse the relikes everychon / Ye, for a grote! Unbokele anon thy purs" (944-945).

Yep, you guessed it. As evidenced by the Middle English, this is The Canterbury Post. I think every nerdy English major who has ever been to England must have written or thought about his/her trip in terms of Chaucer's The Canterbury Tales. Let me jump on the literary tradition, then.

My day went a little something like this. First, in the morning, I auditioned for Little Shop of Horrors. More on that if I get the part. If I don't, then just forget I mentioned it. After the audition, I met Hayley and Danielle at the train station, and we took the 11:31 to London-Paddington. From Paddington Station, we took the Underground to Victoria Station, and from there we caught a train to East Canterbury. The trip took about 3.5 hours, which is considerably faster than the pilgrimages of the Middle Ages.

The most predominate sight in Canterbury is the cathedral, and as we stepped out of the station, the spire greeted us is the English misty-rainy afternoon. We were so excited walking up the street towards the cathedral, making nerdy jokes about my favorite character in the Tales, The Pardoner, and saying to each other, "Kiss my relics!" See, Chaucer's Pardoner is kind of a bad buy (which is kind of an understatement). He preaches sermons about greed and cursing, especially emphasizing the physical suffering of Christ caused by the congregation's sins, in order to swindle the laity; he scares them into buying Papal pardons, indulgences, and relics. The opening quotation comes at the end of The Pardoner's Tale as he tries to dupe the Host of the pilgrimage, basically saying, "Kiss my relics!" It's like "Kiss my grits," only not. "Kiss my relics," has kind of been my Middle English anthem. I'm not sayin', I'm just sayin'.

Finally, I have some pictures to show! First, here is the cathedral from outside.


Pretty, yeah? I'm a fan of the flying buttresses. Anyway, the cathedral is where the Archbishop Thomas Becket was murdered in 1170. Rumors about miracles occurring at the site of his murder prompted a canonization. Ta-da, we have St. Thomas Becket, and we used to have a nifty little shrine for St. Thomas, but Henry VIII tore it down. But there's a candle burning on the spot to signify the shrine.


Since I cannot turn off my brain, I was thinking how the architecture and iconography in the cathedral relates to the literature of the age. More specifically, since I'm fascinated with the Medieval fascination of the body (oh yeah, lots of fascination going around), I looked at how martyrdom, saints' relics, and physical suffering tied in with lay piety and affective devotion. Very briefly, affective devotion is a form of worship which became very popular in the 14th and 15th Centuries, and it is rooted in the emotional connections between the uneducated laity and Christ's corporeal self. Christ became human and thereby, in his human body, he is connected to the worshipers. Medieval Christians were called to ruminate on Christ's suffering body, especially at the Crucifixion--one of the moments which insist most heavily on his humanity. One of the drawbacks is that the laity, in only engaging with the pathos fail to contemplate higher spiritual matters and are vulnerable to the abuses of the Church. For instance, Chaucer's Pardoner loads his sermon with images of Christ's physical body being torn apart on the cross--very vivid stuff--in order to rob the congregation.

In the cathedral's crypt (where unfortunately picture were not allowed), I noticed a theme of beautifying the bloody body. Lots of affective devotional texts concerning the Crucifixion drew close attention to Christ's wounds in his hands, feet, and side. One writer in The Doctrine of the Heart describes Christ's death as a form of barbecue where he is like meat being roasted upon a spit. It's kind of disturbing. Anyway, as fascinated with Christ's wounds as Medieval writers/worshipers are, there is a need to wipe the blood away when it becomes too much. The sarcophagi in the crypt have the figures of the martyrs on the top of them, statues of the dead. The martyrs are depicted with stigmata, blessed with the same wounds as Christ, connecting their physical suffering to his. But instead of bloody holes in their hands, the wounds become roses, thereby anesthetizing the brutality. So, as much as the clergy and writers emphasized the physical suffering of Christ, there is a contradictory need to hide it when the pain becomes too much.

In keeping with the theme of the body of Christ, pilgrims who made their way to Canterbury Cathedral would have been surrounded by the Eucharist, the literal Body of Christ transubstantiation in the Mass. Central to the pilgrimage was the church,and central to the church was the Eucharist, so pilgrims subjected their bodies to long travels and other exhausting feats in order to connect to the body of Christ. I found an interesting stained glass image which I hope you can see. The sun was setting outside, so it was hard to get a good shot, but here it is:


And one more to really show the lower image:


Got it? So, there is a man vomiting and, more importantly, a priest holding the Eucharist over a bed-ridden man, most likely giving him Last Unction. The Body of Christ is present, even in death. It is absolutely central to the Medieval psyche. And pilgrims who made their way to Canterbury to worship in the church would have seen these images of both physical suffering (the man all throw-upy) and of Christ's body on Earth (the Eucharist). Well, I think that's about it for my Canterbury post. I am so glad I went to all of those Medieval Lit lectures this term; they have really shaped the way I read both texts and images of the Middle Ages. I hope I didn't bore you too much. I just get really excited over bodies in Medieval literature. But, hey, cathedral pretty, right? Thanks for sticking with me this long, and I'll post soon about the other show I went to see in London. Have a great day, and remember, don't get suckered in by every man in a robe yelling, "Kiss my relics!"

What's the Victory of a Cat on a Hot Tin Roof?

Saturday night, I went off to London's West End to see a production of Cat on a Hot Tin Roof. After missing the West End's production of A Streetcar Named Desire earlier this term, I was very excited to finally get my Southern Lit fix in England. This production of Cat did very well on Broadway, so naturally, it made it's way over to London. The cast included James Earl Jones as Big Daddy, Phylicia Rashad as Big Mama, Sanaa Lathan as Maggie, and Adrian Lester as Brick. I thought this was a brilliant move on the director's part. Williams' play centers around a crumbling Southern plantation, which means that historically the cast has been all white, except for the roles of the servants. The director, Debbie Allen, immediately breaks that tradition and opens up Williams' play to another layer of creative opportunity which is not limited by race. I love that concept! For more about the play, the cast, and the director, visit http://www.catwestend.com/

So, with the big stars, the possibility for a deconstruction of racial boundaries, the "Hey, I'm going to the West End" factor, I was really excited to see this show. I was a little disappointed at first. Sanaa Lathan, in her portrayal of Maggie, did not move me at all, which is strange because Maggie is one of my favorite Williams' characters. She has some great lines, but Lathan's "Southern accent" just distracted me from them. Maggie just faded into the background next to the powerful portrayals of Brick and Big Daddy. In fact, Adrian Lester as Brick was phenomenal. He made the show for me, especially when interacting with James Earl Jones. Those scenes where amazing! Brick's "charm of the defeated" (as Maggie calls it) really came through, and I was drawn into Lester's performance. Great job!

Most of the audience, however, did not quite get Lester's performance or Williams' writings as a whole. One of the conflicts in Cat revolves around Brick's excessive drinking as he tries to remove himself from other issues of death and sexuality. Whenever another character called Brick an alcoholic or when Brick went for another drink, the audience laughed and chuckled. Um, Cat on a Hot Tin Roof is not a comedy. The other American students I went with found the laughter very disturbing as well, and I'm still not sure why the audience laughed away Brick's drinking. As far as I can tell, the social construction of alcoholism as a vice is lost on a British audience. Coming from an American background, especially Southern, alcohol is kind of a touchy subject; there were Constitutional Amendments about it after all. The British audience, however, didn't come to the show with the same cultural background, and thus, laughed off any drama over alcoholism. It was shocking. I don't want to sound like I'm criticizing the British culture, but since drinking is so common place and an integral part of social life, the term "alcoholic" does not carry the same cultural connotation. There's a discussion we could have here about perceptions of alcohol in the States and in the UK, but that would be another blog's worth. But maybe we should get into it. British students have said to me many times, "What do you feel about the drinking age back home? It's ridiculous. Kids never learn how to handle their alcohol. I think there's more binge drinking in the States because of the higher drinking age." But they say this to me while they are quite intoxicated themselves. Hi, yeah, Pot, meet Kettle. But in all fairness, they are partially right; when some American students enter college, they drink heavily. So, I'm not sure what to make of this cross-cultural disconnect. Regardless, visiting students doing this program should be aware of the cultural differences surrounding alcohol; I know two of the girls with me this year experienced culture shock because they were unaware. So, while the issues of race and sex kind of faded into the background, Allen's production of Cat certainly raised an interesting issue of alcoholism across the ocean. Sorry for maybe getting preachy and taboo! Please stay tuned for upcoming posts concerning...(the ellipses is for suspense) my pilgrimage to Canterbury Cathedral followed by a review of the West End's production of An Inspector Calls!

Mission Accomplished

Just a brief update--I'M DONE WITH MICHAELMAS TERM! Oh yeah, that's right, I survived my first term at Regents Park College, Oxford University! I'm pleased. And overall, it was a very productive term. I think I've engaged a lot with Medieval Lit on a deeper level than I would have at CSU because of the fascinating lectures coupled with the tutorials. Same with Oscar Wilde. It's not often that I can listen to the same critic who literally wrote the book on Wilde! At the end of the term, we get to see our reports of our performance in the tutes. Overall, my tutors had positive feedback, which made me happy. One tutor, however, labeled me as "imprecise" and "sprawling" at times. I laughed. She says that because I once turned in an 11 page paper which somehow upset her. Whatever. It doesn't really matter because I made A's in both tutorials. I am very happy with my marks, but more importantly, I'm happy with how much I've grown as a scholar. My Wilde tutor wants to pick me up next term for Modern Lit, and I already have a reading list for the vacation for both Modern and Renaissance. So, I've got plenty of reading to keep me occupied! Yay!

Trapped in a Chapel--It's a Trappel

OK, since I promised you this story in the last post, and since I finally have some time to spare, here is the tale about me, my friend Beth, and St. Mary the Virgin. Beth and I go to poetry readings most every Thursday nights with the OUPS. Two Thursdays ago (wow, I should really update this blog more often), we went to see a poet read in the upstairs of the Vaults and Garden, a little restaurant attached to the Cathedral of St. Mary the Virgin. Actually, if you look back to September 26th's post, Hayley and I are eating at the Vaults and Garden. Anyway, Beth and I arrived and were directed to take the hallway back and go up the stairs on our right. We start down the hallway with three other students behind us. We reach the end of the hall and there are three doors--one the left is a door to the kitchen, in front is a locked, bolted door, and on our right is an unmarked black door. "Well," I thought, "surely this is the stairs on our right that the people outside mentioned." We all walked through the door and into the dark, empty cathedral. The door slams shut behind us, and of course, it locks. There are no stairs. There is only us and the Lord. So, we start banging on all the doors we could find, and after 15 minutes of knocking and shouting, I decide to call my friend Sam to let us out. After the shock of hearing, "Sam, please, help, I'm trapped in a chapel," he told me he was on his way. After 10 more minutes of banging, a passer-by (not Sam, who arrived too late to save us) heard us and decided we weren't evil spirits haunting the church, and let us out. So, yes, make of this story what you will.

Race Results

OK, well, I think I've kept you in suspense long enough. (Actually, I got distrcted yesterday with this essay on naming and identity in Malory's Le Morte Darthur, but I don't really want to talk about it. Ever.) The Regent's Park novice crew rowed a very impressive 5:29! Um, yeah, that's 5 minutes and 29 seconds with an average stroke rate of something like 28/29? We were very in time with each other, and frankly, it was the best outing we have had thus far! We were quite pleased with ourselves. Overall, in the entire race, we came in 7th out of 17, and in our division, we were 2nd. Go Regent's! (I'll probably fill you guys in about my week a little later on--it involves being trapped inside a closed cathedral. I have this essay looming above my head like the Sword of Damocles. Not a happy camper.)

Week 5 Blues? No, no.

In Oxford, there is a sort of legend of Fifth Week Blues where students really feel the pains of being a sleepless, tired, worn-out, battered Oxford student. Well, last week, I felt none of the blues, because my Fifth Week was ON FIRE! Oh yeah, I said it--on fire.

First, it started off like any week with my Monday Medieval tutorial. I was actually really enthused about my paper that I submitted to my tutor because I felt I really had a grasp on what the poem "Patience" was trying to do with medieval readership. All of the lectures I had been going to for the past weeks seemed to be preparing me for this one essay. I talked about the problem of Biblical hermeneutics in the Middle Ages (which came from Dr. Kantik Ghosh's brilliant lectures called "Aspects of Medieval Literary Theory") and also about affective piety and its importance in lay worship (thanks to the enthusiastic and enlightening Dr. Annie Sutherland in her lectures on "Belief and the Body in Late Medieval Lit"). So, yeah, maybe I got a little carried away, because my essay ended up being about 3,500 words when the assignment called about 1,500-2,000. My tutor didn't really hold that against me too much, even though on Monday, during our tute, she started off by saying, "Jarred, it is your turn to read your essay out loud, although if you are hoarse by the end, I understand." We spent the entire tute on the points I raised in my essay which she called interesting, but she didn't score me any higher that last week. It was kind of frustrating, but I still wrote a good paper, despite her lack of positive regard.

Then, on Thursday of last week, I had my Oscar Wilde tutorial. Now, can you say, "Publishable?" Well, my tutor certainly can, cause he said it to me. He told me that the argument that I had constructed about Wilde's play, "A Woman of No Importance," could easily be published. So, yeah, I was very very thrilled to hear that. I'm not sayin, I'm just sayin. Furthermore, my tutor suggested that I get in contact with Dr. Sos Eltis, the only other critic who has even touched what I was looking at in Wilde's work. I am so excited! I attended all of her lectures on Wilde, and she is truly an amazing scholar and professor. I would absolutely die to meet with her one-on-one and have an Oscar Wilde love fest. I e-mailed her, and I am still waiting--but I'm optimistic.

Later on that Thursday, to celebrate, I went to a poetry reading. Ok, yeah, I know. Only a complete word nerd goes to a poetry reading to celebrate a great tutorial. Read my blog now, and judge me later, yeah? Anyway, I went to The Big Bang, this restaurant in Jericho (a part of Oxford that was a city and might still be its own city, but I don't think so. It's a thing). Downstairs, the OUPS sponsored a reading by Lemn Sissay, an awe-inspiring poet with a keen perception of human language and how it's spoken. Every word that came from his lips--poetry or just speech in between--was fascinating. In between poems, he said something along the lines of, "Poetry, man--it's dangerous. And it's everywhere." Darn right, Lemn, darn right! I want to share with you one of his poems, which is linked on his blog: http://blog.lemnsissay.com/blog/_archives/2009/11/12/4379536.html
Yeah, go there, and click on the hyperlink "The Waitress" in the fourth stanza. This poem gave me chills and my jaw dropped. It was moving and sickening at the same time. So, brief caveat, if you are uncomfortable with the taboo (sex, death, race, politics), then please do not listen to "The Waitress." Maybe find a safer poet? Maybe find a nice Victorian. But I think "The Waitress" sums up very well what Sissay does with his words, with his audience, and with his life.

Well, that was pretty much the highlights of my last week. I will probably post tomorrow about my this week, 6th Week. You should be on the edge of your seat because, let me just tell you, it ends with a rowing race. Oh yeah, be excited! I raced today, and I'll give you the details tomorrow. I'm going to officially log off the internet and see if I can't write a few more paragraphs on this medieval essay I'm working on. Have a great day!

A Week of Poetry!

This week has been filled with poetry, which is definitely not a bad thing! First, I've been surprisingly into this poem that I'm reading for my Medieval Lit tutorial. It's called "Patience" from The Poems of the Pearl Manuscript, which is this collection of four poems: "Pearl," "Cleanness (or sometimes called Purity)," "Patience," and "Sir Gawain and the Green Knight." These poems are believed to have been written in the late 14th Century, but like with most Medieval manuscripts, it's ambiguity-palooza. Anyway, "Patience" is a retelling of the Jonah story, and because of all of the Medieval lectures I've been going to, I feel like I've got a really good handle on what the poet is doing. One lecture, Aspects of Medieval Literary Theory, is really focused on how the Bible is interpreted and the religious complications that arise when Medieval scholars/clergymen place human interpretations on it. It is a really dense, thick lecture, but it definitely helps here because the Pearl Poet is re-interpreting a Biblical story. Also, I think it can be read as an exploration of affective spirituality--a form of devotional writing that I've been learning about through the Medieval Literary Theory lecture and my favorite Body and Belief in Late Medieval Literature. We'll see what my tutor thinks on Monday when we discuss the poem.

On a less scholastic note, I've joined the Oxford University Poetry Society and attended two OUPS events this week! The first one was a poetry workshop. Three of us from Regent's Park who are interested in writing went, and we met four OUPS members at the Turl Pub and worked on our poems. What happens is that the poet gives out copies of his or her poem to the rest of the group. The poet then reads the poem out loud three times. After that, the poet does not speak until the end; the goal is to keep quiet and listen to what the poem does after it leaves your control--see if it can stand on it's own, you know? The group then takes the poem through three stages of scrutiny. We ask and answer, "What is the poem about?" Then, "What does the poet/poem do well?" And finally we give constructive criticism. I found it incredible illuminating. Since I've only just been branching outside of my Slam Poetry comfort zone, it was really good to see how my more formally constructed page poems were able to exist without performance. By the way, the OUPS workshop group loved my poem. I'm not sayin', I'm just sayin.

Also, Thursday night, the OUPS sponsored a reading in Jericho Tavern by the famous poet Simon Armitage. Well, I was at least told that he was famous. He has published many, many books of poetry, written a few novels, plays, and screenplays. Also, a lot of people study his work for this exam in their schools (I don't remember the name of the exam, but I'll post it as soon as I find out). The girl I went with from Regent's, during the exam, she wrote over three pages on the rhythm of his poem "Kid." The reading was amazing, and Armitage has such a striking presence. His poems mix humor and pathos very well, and his style was natural, yet surreal. The last poem that he read (I don't think it's been published yet because it was in a big black book of just typed up poems) was my favorite, and the silence between the end of the poem and the moment that the audience realized that Armitage was finished sent gave me the shivers. It was beautiful. And I want to leave you with one of his poems that stuck with me from Thursday night. It's on the Poetry Archive's website, linked here: http://www.poetryarchive.org/poetryarchive/singlePoem.do?poemId=88

And finally, to complete this highly creative week, last night I auctioned off my poetic (dis)abilities at the annual Regent's Park Charity Promise Auction. The two charities we raised money for were the NDCS (http://www.ndcs.org.uk/) and A4ID (http://www.a4id.org/). Last night's goal was to raise over 400 pounds, so we had a lot of inventive pledges. For example, my friend Omar pledged to read a thirty minute bedtime story, and people bid viciously for that one--he raised about 50 pounds. Well, I pledged a personalized love poem, and just to make sure that Regent's Park knew that I could make an interesting arrangement of love metaphors, I gave a little teaser that whipped up before the auction. Now, I don't like to brag or feed my inherent narcissism, but let me just say that after my little preview, hands were flying into the air for a personalized Jarred Wiehe love poem. I raised 64 pounds. By the end of the night, Regent's Park raised over 1,000 pounds for charity, so I feel both creative and philanthropic. I slept well last night. Well, I have to get to work and be productive today, so I'm off. Have a great day!

What a crazy week. I have barely had time to breathe, let alone blog. Rowing has been a major theme in the mornings, as well as in the afternoons, but I really don't want to get into that. I mean, I feel like every session last week did not end with me improving my form or technique. Nope. Instead, I think I got worse and worse. Literally, the rowing coach (Felicity is her name, but she goes by "Flick" because it sounds more hard-core) told me I looked like the hunchback of Notre Dame in the boat. Only, she doesn't address you by name; Flick calls you out by your position in the boat. So, with me, she yells things like, "Bow, you're rowing in a box." Or, "Bow, do you even know what 'backstops' mean?" She's, well, um, intimidating, but she is a really great coach. Every time I learn a body problem of which I have to be hyper-cognizant. For a sport all about repetition--you repeat the movement of the man in front of you, and you repeat the last stroke that you performed--there is a lot of brain strain involved in keeping myself properly functioning.

Now, I feel like I haven't blogged about my academics in forever--it's been a lot of rowing news. Since I am here for higher learning, maybe I should do a little sharing on that front. Actually, I've been terrified to report on the tumultuous relationship between myself and my Medieval tutor. See, she does this thing where no matter what I write, she refuses to truly validate my ideas. The closest she comes to telling me, "Good job," is this really sneaky rhetorical move; she writes and says to me, "Point taken, however..." and follows through with phrases like "you fail to consider" and "making your point extremely limited." Now, let's break this feedback down, shall we? She spends two words to show that she "takes" my idea, and then with one word begins a string of criticism to undercut the previous two word validation. This is hardly an "atta boy." He feedback at the end of my papers are similarly problematic. My first essay (a 66 in Oxford marks, which translates roughly to an B+/A-), she called "well considered," yet "incomplete" as she feels that I did not answer all of her question. It is not a bad grade, yet I was still a little frustrated about it. Anyway, this past essay which she gave back today, she makes use of the same "point taken, however.." move, and used the phrase "competently handled and sufficiently illustrated." But competent and sufficient are some of those ambiguous compliments that aren't really compliments, you know? However, she did score this essay one point higher than the last one, so color me "improved" by her standards. (I'm sorry if the bitter came out in that last sentence; I am trying to keep it in!)

On the happier academic note, I had my second tutorial with John, my Wilde tutor. I'm not sure if I told you this, but he rather emphatically insists that I call him John. He's really young and an American-gone-Brit from California, so he understands where I'm coming from academically. His tutorials are always rather bizarre, and last Thursday was no different. I read my essay looking at the relationship between Wilde's short story, "Lord Arthur Savile's Crime," and Wilde's critical essay, "The Soul of Man Under Socialism," looking specifically at his emphasis on individualism and the artist's role in society. John liked it; he thought it was intriguing, although he kept bringing up The Picture of Dorian Gray, and asking how my argument could be applied to that. In my head, I kept thinking, "But I'm not writing on Dorian Gray, now am I?" Anyway, we discussed Dorian Gray and he said he liked my reading of it. At the end of our tute, I asked him how I was doing (since I am now half way done with it as it is a half tutorial). He said, "Definitely A level work. Don't worry." This week, in stead of the questions he suggested I write on, I talked with him about me researching the intersection of Wilde's drama, American Lit, and his perception and portrayal of Americans. He was OK with this idea, so I'm happy.

Besides rowing, I'm really looking forward to doing some drama and creative writing in Oxford. There's the Oxford University Poetry Society, which I'm planning on getting involved in. As for the theatre, there is the university competition called "Cuppers" that I'm going to perform in. It's only open to freshers (but I think I'm eligible since technically I'm like a Regent's Fresher). Basically, Cuppers is like a One-Act Play competition where different colleges can submit 30 minute plays which are then judged in different categories. One of the clever freshers has written a 30 ensemble based comedy show about the history of theatre. I have a part and we are going into competition rehearsal mode ASAP. I cannot wait!

On the River Isis

I skyped back home on Sunday, and my mother's new favorite question was, "Are you warm enough?" Well, it might be a good thing that she's an ocean away, because on Monday morning, she would have fainted. Why? Because I dragged myself out of my cozy bed and into gym shorts, a long sleeved tee under a short sleeved tee, and my jacket, and headed out the door at 5:45am to go rowing. Yeah. That's right. I am rowing at Oxford, and yes, I do feel quite pretentious; thanks for asking. No, but it was an experience, for sure. See, our crew of eight novice rowers met at Regent's Park bright and early (except it was not so bright and a little too early), and we made our way to the university boat house. Guided by the very intense coach, Felicity, and coxed (steered and directed) by Lottie (one of the rowing captains), we made our way up and down the river Isis. Actually, fun nomenclature fact--the river Isis is really the Thames, except that it does a name chance while it passes through Oxford. In a way, it's like the artist formerly known as Prince. Anyway, I was rowing bow, so I was at the front of the boat, which was nifty. We must have been on the river for at least an hour as the sun came up and other colleges started their training. The best feeling was getting into a steady rhythm with the three other guys rowing "bow four," and Felicity shouted from the bank, "Good work, bow four. Not bad." Oh yeah, validation in the a.m.!

I would like to impart some new knowledge that I gained Monday morning. First, when not using your oar, you should cradle it. Yeah, just cradle it in your arms like a tiny baby. Because, I guess oars need love, too. And, if you kill a goose, it's bad news. Once, Felicity's crew actually killed a goose with their boat while crossing the finish line of a race. In theory, you're then supposed to write a letter to the Queen apologizing for goose-icide, but I don't think anyone really does that. Still, how hardcore do you have to be to kill a goose with your oars?! Well, I have to get to bed now. Tomorrow I am rowing at 6am and then again at 3:30pm. I may or may not have arms on Friday. We'll see.

Callbacks

I just wanted to fill you guys in on callbacks for the improvisational comedy group, the Oxford Imps. Well, out of the original like 60 or 70 people that showed up for the first audition, only 25 of us were called back. Each performer did about two improved scenes with a partner, and it was really fun. Ultimately, though, I was not what they were looking for this year. And there were some AMAZING performers at the auditions--I really hope they made it. But what has been the best part of this whole experience is that now I am running into people from the auditions around Oxford. In fact, the morning of callbacks, I was in a lecture on Body and Belief in Late Medieval Literature (which was absolutely amazing, by the way), and one of the guys already in the Imps who was judging at auditions sat down behind me. We talked for a bit about nerdy English Literature stuff before the lecture. That was nifty. Later Friday night, after the auditions, some friends and I were walking down Cornmarket Street when I ran into two of the other people who made call backs. And yesterday afternoon, I ran into someone else from the preliminary auditions. Basically, even though I didn't make the Imps, I've made some sort of impression--at least enough of an impression to be recognizable while hanging out in Oxford. Yay, me!

Tute-talk

Hey, everybody. Well, this week has been hard. I'm not going to lie--it's been really hard. I have had my first meetings with both of my tutors, and I have been to some lectures. I have officially started my Oxford academic life. Let me break it down for you:

On Monday morning at 10:45, Hayley and I had our first Medieval Literature tutorial where we discussed "where we can discern reality in The Canterbury Tales." If your face is making a very weird express, that's OK, because I can guarantee that mine looked about twice as worse. I was not reading for concepts of reality in the text; I was more focused on Chaucer's subversive religious couplets and social criticism. In fact, I had an argument a-brewing in my mind about how Chaucer uses comedy to deliver concerns about a corrupt Medieval Church, only that argument was shut down. Hard. My tutor told me, "No. Chaucer is not a theologian. Do not go down that road." So, after that hour of fairly traumatic fun, I hit the English Faculty Library for research on my Medieval paper about moral framework in the tales. That library, after all the time this week I've spent there, has become my new best friend.

Tuesday was interesting, as well. I checked my e-mail that morning, and after weeks from not hearing from my Wilde tutor, I get an e-mail saying that we're going to meet on Thursday, and to please compose a four to five page essay considering the background of Aestheticism. You remember that face from the last paragraph? Well, insert it here, too, cause I had no idea where to begin. I had a lot of Wilde main work under my belt, but as far as his influences, such as Walter Pater, J.-K. Huysmans, and others, I was completely illiterate. So, my plan was this: go to some lectures on Medieval Lit in the morning, and spend the rest of the day in the EFL (English Faculty Library). I took off to make it to a 10am lecture on Chaucer poetics, only when I arrive, I sit down in Lecture Theatre 2. I needed to be in Lecture Room 2. By the time I realized this and tried to get over to LR2, the room was filled and the next lecture that I wanted to go to at 11am was canceled. Basically, this means that from 10-12:30, I was in the EFL doing research on Pater and Huysmans and their influences on Wilde. I got some great quotations, and seeing as how I only had TWO DAYS to write this essay, I was really quite on top of everything. Except for missing those lectures...

Wednesday was great in the sense that I actually went to my first lecture! Now, lectures are not mandatory, but they provide a lot of information that might be difficult to get from just pouring over books in the libraries. Plus, they provide a social learning environment, unlike the one-on-one tutes. The lecture I went to was called "Aspects of Medieval Literary Theory" and it proved to be insightful, yet really dense. The material, even though watered down quite a bit, was thick--a lot of theory to grasp at once. I enjoyed it well enough, although I don't think it is particularly useful for my papers right now.

Thursday was such a bizarre day. First, Hayley and I went to a brilliant lecture of Middle English, specifically the language and theories of authorship in Medieval texts. Without printing presses, the authors works are given to scribes to rewrite, and scribes make mistakes. Scribes might actually change drastically the meaning of texts, accidentally or intentionally. It's pretty crazy. Also, I found the cultural connotations of different Middle English diction pretty fascinating as well. For example, words from French or Latin roots have more power than words from a Germanic root because French and Latin are used in law courts, official documents, Church decrees, and so on. This new knowledge will definitely come in handy for my Chaucer paper. Thanks, Dr. Barr!

After the lecture, I had my first Wilde tute at Linacre College. That was an, um, interesting experience. My tutor and I talked about Wilde, and I read him my essay that I had composed (although it almost felt like he forgot that he assigned me an essay, which was slightly unnerving...). He gave me a little feedback on my essay, stopping me after every paragraph to kind of gloss what I had written. We then went through Pater's Marius the Epicurean, and he explained to me what that was all about. It wasn't a bad session, but it wasn't mind blowing, either. I left kind of confused about what we actually accomplished and kind of unfulfilled.

Then that evening, I skipped dinner at Regent's Park because I had an audition with The Oxford Imps, an improvisational comedy group. They were pretty nice and fun people, and I did enjoy myself at the auditions, but I was certainly not on my A game. Not even my B game. In fact, I left thinking, "Well, there are plenty of other groups that I can get involved in because there's no way I got a call back." So what am I doing today? Well, I got a call back. They want to see me again because they liked my physicality on stage and my involvement with my scene partners; however, they want to see me out of my comfort zone a little more. Um...yeah, I think I can do that.

Also, today there are two more lectures I want to go to: one on Medieval and another on Decadent Gothic (which I think might help with Wilde). Yep. Wish me luck tonight, and also wish me massive amounts of luck on my Medieval paper. I'm a little nervous about both. Well, have a good week-end, y'all. (Man, I don't get to say y'all enough over here.)

It's Like Harry Potter!

Sorry for the lack of posts, but last weekend was insane! On Friday, Regent's Park has a formal dinner in the dining hall where the lights are dimmed, candles are lit, and everyone is in their academic robes. Oh, yeah, I have academic robes now called a"subfusc." Not entirely sure what that name means, but it makes me feel like I'm in a Harry Potter film. The entire night was gorgeous. Underneath our little swaths of robe, we wear something very "smart," that is to say, something nice. The food was spectacular. Regent's Park actually has a five star rating for it's dining quality, and after Friday night, I believe it. I thoroughly enjoyed the entire evening! I have to dash off to a lecture on "The Poetics of Chaucer," so I'm going to leave you with this picture of me, Hayley, and Danielle before formal hall. Have a great day--I know I will!

Human Addiction

Hi, my name is Jarred, and I'm a People-holic. I love meeting new people, getting to know them, and finding out odd details of their lives. (It's kind of why I wake up in the morning.) I'm admitting my addiction because this week end was the kick off to Freshers Week (or 0 Week, or Naught Week as it is sometimes called), and Saturday night we had a noodle dinner in the Junior Common Room (the JCR--the on campus hang out for undergrads) where I was able to meet the freshers and other international students like myself. First, the other internationals are all Americans from either Kentucky, Missouri, or Minnesota, and most of them will be here for a year, although a handful will only be here for Michaelmas Term (until Christmas). They are a great bunch, and I feel like making friends with them is easier since we share a similar background and are all dealing with life in a new country. However, I'm making it a special point to get involved more with the British students.

As for the British freshers, they are a very clever group! I enjoy hearing about their experiences in the British school system, as well as their social lives. For example, last night I heard about "gap years," something that was not quite familiar to me. A gap year is just a year off from uni (short for university) to travel. Some went to Fiji, Germany, France, the U.S., and it sounds like a great thing to experience before throwing yourself back into the academic fray. Also, I met a lot of enthusiastic freshers filled with questions about the States. They wanted to know where I was from, what was it like, how was the weather, and all of those standard questions, but my favorite question was, "So, I have a relative that lives in Houston, and I am so afraid for her. I mean, what's it like with everyone having a gun? Do you miss your gun?" I laughed a little--I have no gun--and I explained to them that it's not THAT bad, and that I've never been robbed at gun point. The girl who asked that seemed relieved because she really wants to go to the States. Also, I explained to them how I really can't wait to get rid of my car and live in a place with great public transportation like in the UK. Well, they were shocked, and one girl said, "You mean like here? Really?! The transportation is rubbish!" I then explained how in Columbus, public transportation is not reliable, or safe--when the buses come towards me, I am actually afraid for my life. This shocked them, because one guy really wanted a car!

And I can't forget about some of the English English students I've met! This one guy absolutely adores Walt Whitman, and he told me that once, when he had gotten into a debate with another student about how American poetry is always dead, he broke out some Whitman and yelled, "I sound my barbaric yawp over the roofs!" I liked that story. Also, I met this Norwegian student at a big international orientation who is not going to Regent's Park, but to another college within Oxford University. Anyway, I told him I studied English Lit, and that I really like Ibsen (who was from Norway, fyi). He was all like, "Yeah, of course, I like him, too. National Pride and all... Where are you from?" I replied, "The States--Georgia. So, the South."
"The South?! Have you read any Tenessee Williams?!"
"OF COURSE!!! I LOVE WILLIAMS!"
He said, "ME, TOO! I saw a production of A Streetcar Named Desire and I LOVE Blanche DuBois!"
I'm glad to see that the Southern taboo of insanity and sexuality has transcended the Mason-Dixon Line and has crossed into Norway.

So, I am extremely happy, what with the meeting of all of these new people from all over the world. I'm not going to lie; there was a point last week where I was shaking from New People Withdrawals. It was pretty bad. But now I'm learning that Oxford--if you're brave enough--can be a town where our multicultural world can mingle and become a truly global community. Yay!

A Keats Treat: A Brief London Exposure

I was so wiped out yesterday that I only had time--or rather, the energy--to only update you on the Bath experience, but yesterday, I went to London for the first time! Our Spencer House gang thought we really needed to make the most of this week before our Regent's Park life began, so we took the day to go see a matinee of A Streetcar Named Desire...or at least that was our plan. See, what had happened was that I saw that Streetcar was playing in London's West End, and I was really interested in seeing an English adaptation of a very Southern play. Plus, Tennessee Williams is a playwright very close to my heart. Well, we got to the theatre, and there were no tickets left. Sold Out. So, there we were, standing in London's West End with not a thing to do after we had taken an hour train ride from Oxford. Our solution? We went to the British Museum!



Founded in 1753, the British Museum houses an impressive array of Egyptian, Grecian, and Roman art. Some notable pieces are the Rosetta Stone and the Parthenon sculptures brought over (aka possibly pillaged by) by Lord Elgin. Even though I'm not a big ancient Egypt fan, I still enjoyed the huge carvings, hieroglyphs, sarcophagi, and votive statues (although there's something about those big ole bulging eyes on ancient votive statues that give me the wiggins). The Grecian statues, however, were an absolute party for the eyes, and I could feel the emotions coming from the marble.


(Surprised Aphrodite--don't surprise goddesses, just as a general rule, ok?)


(Naiads--water nymphs, so the wet drapery effect is pretty and fitting.)

Finally, the most moving piece was the pediment sculptures of the Parthenon. These sculptures, along with many others from the Parthenon, were brought over to England by Lord Elgin, with a rather disregard for ethics. See, Elgin just kind of took these from the capital of Greece as British property, and then they wound up in the British Museum. But did he really have the right to pirate creations which should rightfully belong to Greece? The Romantic poet Lord Byron did not think so, and quite frankly, neither do I. However, all colonial ambiguity aside, the marble work was absolutely breath taking, and while viewing the triangularly arranged gods and goddesses that would have rested in the Parthenon's pediment, I kept thinking of Keat's sonnet, "On Seeing the Elgin Marbles for the First Time," which I will leave here, along with my photos. Read, look, and reflect...like, now:

My spirit is too weak; mortality
Weighs heavily on me like unwilling sleep,
And each imagined pinnacle and steep
Of godlike hardship tells me I must die
Like a sick eagle looking at the sky.
Yet 'tis a gentle luxury to weep,
That I have not the cloudy winds to keep
Fresh for the opening of the morning's eye.
Such dim-conceived glories of the brain
Bring round the heart an indescribable feud;
So do these wonders a most dizzy pain,
That mingles Grecian grandeur with the rude
Wasting of old Time -with a billowy main,
A sun, a shadow of a magnitude.

Bath Time

Hey, everybody. Yesterday, Hayley, Jenny, Danielle, and I decided to make our first UK trip outside of Oxford, and since some of the girls are taking tutorials on Jane Austen, we took off for Bath. Now, Bath is famous for having the only naturally occurring hot springs in the UK, and also, Austen lived there at one point in time (although she loathed it) and set two of her novels there. Actually, the night before we left, we saw a film adaption of Persuasion, which is one of the novels featuring the Gregorian city of Bath. (The film also featured the most awkward kissed I've ever witnessed, which you might want to check out: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wx0cr2KtjmI)

In order to catch our train, we left the Spencer House at 8:30, caught a bus to the city centre, and walked to the station. We arrived in Bath about mid-morning, and the view on the train was spectacular. There were rolling green hills with little house nestled in--it was too picturesque! Our first stop was Bath Abbey--a brilliant church complete with buttresses and a spire. We went in, did the tourist thing, and gazed at the architecture. There was this beautiful stained glass window at the east end of the church that depicted 56 scenes in Christ's life.



After touring the Abbey, we went right next door to the Roman Bath Museum, which housed the remains of the original structures in which the Romans used to wash, socialize, and worship. The site where the hot spring bubbled up was considered by the Romans to be a blessing from the goddess Minerva, yet a lot of the iconography found in the excavation also has elements maybe worshiping Neptune. The museum was loaded with artifacts, such as tombstones, altars, and mosaics. The weather was perfect--clear(ish) skies and a nice breeze--so we had a very enjoyable tour!



The next thing on our tour of Bath was the crazy cross-city walk to The Crescent--a very smart place that was a very socially advantageous place of residence in Austen's time. Actually, that's where the awkward kiss happened in the film adaptation of Persuasion and a lot of awkward running around. But, The Crescent was a very scenic spot, and it overlooked the entire city. On the whole, our trip was a success!

Nerding Out

For the past two days or so, I have officially been nerding out with my new buddy, Geoffrey Chaucer. I mean, The Canterbury Tales and I are becoming quite intimate. For the better part of Sunday, I sprawled out on the floor, pouring over introductory material about the life of Chaucer. Evidently, he had a great reputation as a civil servant, managing taxes over wool, and even worked under the king. With all of his diplomatic prowess, it is no wonder he appealed to a very wide audience with such a subversive poem. And trust me, it's subversive! He is writing in the 1300s where heresy is pretty much gauche in all social circles, lest you want to be burned at the stake. Well, Chaucer, with all the wit he can muster, goes so far to give The Pardoner, a representative of the voice of Rome, a voice that sounds like a goat, which is a common sign of the devil. But what really hammers it home, is that the comparison is made using a rhyming couplet. See, I have never studied Chaucer before in his original language, so working with Middle English is helping me see his work in an entirely new light. Keeping with the example of the Pardoner (my favorite character in The C.T.), let's look at what I mean about Chaucer's rhyme scheme. When he describes the Pardoner coming from Rome and having a goat voice , Chaucer writes that the Pardoner has his bag "bretful of pardoun comen from Rome al hoot, / A voys he hadde as smal as hath a goot" (687-8). There's just something about religiously subversive couplets written in Middle English that makes my skin tingle! I don't actually start my Medieval tutorial until two weeks from now, but I am so excited to discuss Chaucer. Also, as a change of pace, Hayley and I took our readings down to the remarkably sunny Oxford park today. All in all, the week end has been slow, but productive!

Immaculate Morning

This morning was such a brilliant one that I have to blog about it. I made a list of what I needed to get accomplished this morning, which consisted of getting my mobile (the English word for "cell phone") and buying some texts--The Riverside Chaucer and The Poems of Pearl Manuscript. I woke up this morning at 7:15am to a gorgeous overcast sky, got breakfast, and then Hayley and I went into town to run our errands down on Cornmarket Street. I picked up my mobile, and then we went around to Broad Street to Blackwell's Books--this multi-storied book store! It was a little bit of Mecca mixed with Christmas Morning. I found a second hand copy of The Poems of the Pearl Manuscript and my copy of Chaucer, so I was a very happy camper. I have a lot of reading to do before my Medieval Tutorial starts! After Blackwells, Hayley and I decided to walk through Christ Church Meadow before lunch, which was a great walk.





For lunch, Hayley and I met our house director/warden, Dr. Bagley, as well as Danielle for lunch at the gorgeous Radcliffe Camera. There is this restaurant in the cellar of the cathedral of St. Mary the Virgin, which is right next to the Camera, where we ate amazing chicken in this creamy sauce over a bed of salad. The outside tables were by gravestones, since the restaurant is part on cathedral grounds, so in a way, we dined with the dead this afternoon. It was an absolutely fantastic day!

I'm Here and Not Dead!

Hey, everybody, so I finally arrived in Oxford today. It took an eight hour plane ride with some jet-lag, but everything went well. I sat next to this really genial British couple on the plane, and they asked me why I was going to London. I told them I was going to study in Oxford, and they were very excited. I asked them what they were doing in Atlanta, and apparently they went on holiday to the South, catching some sun, seeing the CNN center, and then visiting Charlotte, SC.

After the flight, and after customs, baggage claim, a two hour bus ride, and navigating the center of Oxford with my three heavy bags, I found a taxi that took me to the Spencer House. My fellow students and I had a little more than two hours before we had to meet with Dr. Robson, one of our Oxford tutors and the director of study abroad at Regent's Park. We were pretty hungry after our trip, so we went to this market right around the corner--The Co-op. It was this small place will relatively inexpensive food. We have to shop for groceries about every other day because British refrigerators are smaller that those in America, plus seven people have to share the one in the Spencer House. Well, we brought our own bags (the respectable way to grocery shop in Oxford) and perused their goods. I kind of freaked out a little bit because I felt so out of place. I felt like I was in the way of everybody else, and I was so ready to just run back and hide in the Spencer House. But, I didn't! We stayed and shopped and checked out and kicked Culture Shock's butt. Yeah, I feel kind of proud right now--proud, and kind of jet-lagged. Tomorrow I'll take on more British shops as I learn to navigate Oxford! Wish me luck!

Almost Gone

It's official.
I have my visa.
I have my e-ticket, itinerary, and boarding pass.
I have a window seat.
I have a case of the nerves.
I leave tonight, 9:15pm, and will wake up in London in the morning.
I am hours from gone.

An Introduction

Hello, my name is Jarred Wiehe, and you have found the beginning of an electronic chronicle (um, an electronicle?) of my upcoming academic year. IN ENGLAND! Right now, I am a third year English major at Columbus State University, which basically means I'm a Southern word-nerd/tweed-dweeb.
I will be spending this year abroad, studying British Literature at Oxford, and I want to document my growth as a student, scholar, and person, so this blog came into being. I'm thinking of it as a bildungsroman--a self-developement novel--only in blog form. A bildungsblog? (And, like my favorite self-developement novel, The Catcher in the Rye, this blog will probably be very stream-of-consciousness.) Anyway, I want to present an honest experience of crossing cultures, specifically looking at the differences in higher education between the United States and Great Britain, as well as the daily challenges and rewards of living in another world.
I had a rough time thinking of a name for this experience, and I finally came up with "The Way He Travels." When I pitched this name to a friend, she enthusiastically responded, "Yes! I love it! I mean, how many people's last names are homophonous with 'way he,' right?" I'm glad she approved; I'm also glad she used "homophonous" in a sentence. I hope you will follow me on this transcontinental journey, and vicariously experience the way I travel. Please leave me any comments, questions or concerns that you may have--really, I'm like a suggestions box. Well, the UPS man has just arrived with my visa, which is good because I leave in one week!