Back To School

As part of my recent research for my studies here, my task this week was a personal investigation into a subject area - any at all. But, we were conditioned this experience had to be a fresh and completely unknown to our minds and (quote) "the more out of character, the better" (unquote). I believe that the outcome is not so much out of character as yet it is not the most predictable area to pursue. After plenty of research and hectic activity, read this for yourselves and be the judge:

A Day at the College

By Jack Welch

The College, from the Chapel side.

When William of Wykeham, Bishop of Winchester and Lord Chancellor (a.k.a Prime Minister) designed the foundations of St. Mary College of Winchester in 1379, one may have not entirely anticipated the fortress it was going to become. But as its historian, Arthur Leech, comments “But it was not a monastery but a castle that the designer had before him.” With its vast expanse of 250 acres of stone, flint and neglected grounds where once self-sufficiency had dominated, the space is now reflected by the “politics” of present day education and not simply a state within a world of scholarly, isolated from a much more liberated society and its unpredictable nature. On my visit to the grounds, I enquired strongly as to the conformity of the chapel and its mandatory attendance. Surely, 700 students could not fit into narrowly fixed pews, in which its original medieval stricture could cope? Regardless of faith (or none, to that end), all boys must recognise the customs of Sunday worship and attendance. Still, it could have been worse, which in its prestigious past – a daily sermon from 7.30-8 in the morning looks to the most of us a completely absurd proposition in a multicultural faith such as ours. Winchester College remains the exception to this. After surviving two World Wars, a reformation and all too various rebellions, the constant state of its adherence to change ensured that this place was in a grip of a bygone age which had long ago vanished in this time.

William of Wykeham, Found-
er of Winchester College

An inextricable fact of the grounds of this college was its devotion to their heritage and a correlated pattern of reverence to the many scattered portraits of its founder, Wykeham. It is certainly for no reason that its students pride themselves on the title of Wykehamists and that from the admirably preserved Scholar dining hall, where still lie the closely knitted wooden fixtures of mahogany benches and refectory tables, which to their discomfort, the boys would gaze at the ancient faces of school’s past. One would assume that where any young boy were to go, let him not forget especially the task that is firmly rested on his shoulders from here and beyond into a respectable future. On the face of the entrance of various tourists (which I myself categorise that day) and visitors in the Middle Gate, I found it a strange tradition that the boys themselves were forbidden to exit this particular gate whenever they made their occasional stroll into the wider world. Perhaps it is a curse of the original monument above to the Virgin Mary and Chid that a degree of any superstition was to remain in this part, though that is an educated guess. It was during our short ramble of the different locations that we stopped on the pavestones of an expansive terrain and looked far ahead to the distant War Cloister, erected six years after ceasefire of WWI, which overlooks the estimated 500 young men who left the College and died on the battlefields shortly after. One of the figures that overlook this imposing structure is universal the solider alongside Christ himself. Everyday the commoner population would walk through this square, reminding them of the solemn fate in store if a new worldwide conflict were to occur, and that on a weekly basis still, the boys partake in Corps and train themselves in that rite of passage from boyhood to man. Though this generation of 14-18 year olds have only experienced this country in peacetime, my guide told me without uncertainty that they enjoyed the activity.

With these constant mentions of ‘Scholar’ and ‘Commoner’, the College has maintained a series of unexplainable and perpetual Notions which, like many English clichés present, hide an old usage of antiquated vocabulary that remains today. To be clear, a Scholar is one who sits a more ‘complicated’ examination and faces a grilling with the Headmaster of the school, who, if successful, reward the 70 boys selected to live in particular housing outside the rest of the Common dorms. And it is clear for all too see such class divisions: the flowing robes on the boys backs and the strong inconvenience of hauling around endless textbooks and oversized folders for their Saturday classes. Indeed, life at Winchester College on a Saturday morning is a far more hurried lifestyle than that of their future lives at Oxbridge, I am sure. Rebellions of the 18^th century were, if unsurprisingly, caused by the now larger Commoner population who live in reasonably comfortable circumstances still. Other notions for this exclusive community include: sport, to offer, dibs, for money and, my personal favourite, jig as a clever fellow. After my visit to the College that day, there was quite a strong feeling of an institution, the oldest, still coming to terms with its new found modernity and a tradition which does not wish to be threatened in any way. As a stark reminder of this, one of the most hated environments when first constructed two centuries back, which now sits as a decorated exam hall, by coincidence, for 100 pupils presently, had a large coat of arms on the wall’s front which every boy must perspire with the consequences of failure in their tasks. An image of paraphernalia, familiar to a Bishop (To learn), a sword (To fight) or a whip (To stay) and be brutally punished if any sign of diversion were to arise. Curious about the lives of these individuals as I was, it was only relief to know I was the visitor that morning and not the learning student.