A List: Adventures Since the End of September, Plus Photos

Some of my current work materials

Goodness, I've been a bad updater.  I intended last week to do a post on the excitement of the first two weeks of term, but now we're at the end of 3rd week already.  So, instead I offer up a list of my adventures since the end of September.

1)  I attended the SCWBI Agents' Party in London, where I was very brave and pitched my novel to four literary agents.  Pitching was terrifying at first but became easier when I reminded myself that agents are book nerds just like writers.  We're all just looking for a great book to read.  Now I need to finish my polish/proofread and make sure all my spellings are British (rather than Canadian or American: see my last post) and start sending it out.

2)  Having previously seen Vertigo as part of the BFI's Hitchcock retrospective, Tim and I also went to see Rear Window, which was also even more amazing on a big screen with great sound.  Also, I realized it's much easier to see what the characters in the other apartment buildings are up to on a big screen and in high resolution.  (As opposed to the fuzzy VHS version I'm sure I originally watched the film in).

3)  At the very beginning of First Week, Tim and I went back to London to see the Original Practices production of Twelfth Night at the Globe, starring the one and only Stephen Fry as Malvolio.  It was amazing and very funny, especially since they milked the comedy of men playing women (and in Viola's case, a man playing a woman playing a man) for all it was worth.

Before we went to the theatre, we popped into the famous Daunt Books in Marylebone and finally made it to Regent's Park.

4)  Also, in first week, I taught my first ever Oxford tutorial on Oscar Wilde (Paper 7 - the special author paper).  Now three weeks in, I must say I'm really enjoying myself.  It's lovely to get my teaching muscles working again.  Tutorial-style teaching is definitely very different from the teaching I did during my Master's degree of the University of Saskatchewan.  It's strange going from having, say 15-30 students down to just one.  At its best, the teaching resembles a supervision meeting or a really productive conversation, with ideas and interpretations zinging back and forth.

5)  Then we had EGO (English Graduates at Oxford) committee elections.  I will be serving on the committee for the second year in a row, this time as Academic Affairs Officer.  I'm really excited to be involved again and will aim to do my best.

6)  I'm also on the organizing committee for the graduate conference again this year.  We decided on the theme for the conference just a couple days ago: Object.  We're hoping to here some really interesting papers on materiality, tangibility, Thing Theory, and also more political/theoretical/critical objections.  A CFP will probably go out in December with an abstract deadline in March(ish).

7)  Last week, I also had the opportunity to hear a bit of a children's publishing celebrity speak.  The Oxford branch of the Society of Young Publishers hosted a public talk by David Fickling, head of the Random House imprint David Fickling Books, which publishes some of my very favourite authors in the UK: Linda Newbery, Kenneth Oppel, Margo Lanagan...  David Fickling was a fabulously energetic and enthusiastic speaker, running off onto fascinating tangents like some of my very best university professors.  He spoke really engagingly about what an editor must do (recognize talent, add energy, provide stability, communicate to the author).  It was fascinating to hear about the editor-author relationship from the editor's point of view, especially because unpublished writers tend to focus more on getting published and the submissions process.  Also, it was lovely to hear David speak so passionately about importance of publishing good books and great stories, rather than focusing on market issues.

8)  Last week I also got to meet another hero of mine, David Mitchell, who was in town at the Oxford Waterstones signing copies of his memoir Back Story.  If you haven't seen David Mitchell and his comedy partner Robert Webb in Peep Show or their sketch show That Mitchell and Webb Look, do so.  Fantastic British comedy.

9)  My 9th adventure comes later today when the Interdisciplinary Nineteenth-Century Forum is hosting a tour of Oscar Wilde's rooms at Magdalen College, which I am very much looking forward to.

This image isn't related to anything in this post, except that autumn has come to my favourite churchyard by the English Faculty.

 And to close, some general thoughts on beginning the second year of my DPhil.  First of all, where did first year go?  It went by so quickly.  I'm a third done now!  But, really, everything feels a bit more comfortable this year.  I have friends inside and outside my program; I'm used to the city; I'm well into my research (though writing is still a struggle).  It's also scary, however, because I recently realized that instead of applying for scholarships next fall, I'll be applying for lectureships, post-docs, teaching roles and really thinking about the transition into an academic career.

Freshers'/Noughth Week

Well, Michaelmas Term officially started on Sunday.  We went to Portsmouth for the afternoon and had a lovely time.  Pictures to follow.  So far, this term, I've gotten a fair bit of reading done, including a novelette Charlotte wrote when she was 18 called "The Spell" and its much better than what she was writing at 13 or 14, let me tell you that.  However, that's not much of a surprise.  When I think of how my own writing improved between 13 and 18...

So, last week was 0th Week, as in, the first week before term starts.  I believe undergradutes need to write practice exams in 0th Week, so it's not exactly part of the vacation.  For new students, it involves many, many orientations (or inductions, as they seem to call them here) and social events.  I will try to recap.

Last Sunday, I started meeting some of my fellow graduate students at Mansfield College at a Welcome Tea.  There was also a welcome tea at our university housing complex, so we finally got to meet some of the neighbours.  Then it was back to Mansfield in the evening for a drinks night in the MCR (Middle Commmon Room, or graduate common room), which is quite lovely.  It's two rooms (with red and green walls respectively) in the upper tower room at the college.  I got to meet yet more people, which was lovely.

Next day, I had to sign the college register and hand over my passport for scanning, as per visa regulations.  I was also given the gigantic Examination Regulations books printed each year by the OUP which outlines everything official about every course.  Yikes.  There was also a college induction in the Mansfield Chapel, which is lovely by the way.  Instead of saints, it has carvings of prominent dissenters (Mansfield was the first college at Oxford non Church of England people could attend, by the bye).  Between events, I visited the lovely, bright and airy Upper Reading Room at the Old Bodleian Library for the first time.  I'm sure I will become quite well-acquainted with that venerable reading room before long.

Tuesday.  There was a graduate student induction from the English Faculty in the morning, which had really useful session on library and IT training opportunitites.  I also found out that about 70% of English doctoral students pass the official transfer for DPhil (aka PhD) on their first try (technically I'm in a probationary period for my first two terms here).  This is good to know.  In the evening, Mansfield had a graduate freshers' dinner, at which I got to meet my lovely college advisor and drink claret while everyone else at the tasty-looking meal in the dining hall (which is also a beautiful room - it all felt very Harry Potter!).  Then there was coffee and drinks in the MCR again and I got to meet more people and renew acquaintances made in the last couple days.

Wednesday, I signed up for Mansfield rowing...

Thursday, I had a second meeting with my supervisor.  I feel like I have a pretty good sense of the direction my work should be tending at this stage, which is really wonderful.  I also got to meet my English graduate student mentor, who knows people who live in Saskatoon - what are the odds?

On Friday, a friend from back home who is starting her DPhil in History at Wolfson and I went gown shopping.  We're both matriculating on Saturday - that is, formally becoming members of the university.  In order to do this, we must wear sub fusc, which means white collared shirt with velvet ribbon, black pants or skirt, black stockings, and black shoes, as well as mortarboard and the graduate gown.  Unlike the undergraduate gown, which only goes down the waist and frankly looks silly, the graduate gown goes down to the knee.  Gown-shopping felt very much like Harry Potter, again, going off to Madame Malkin's to be fitted for robes.  I'll tell you all about matriculation next week and perhaps provide photographic evidence.

Saturday was the rowing induction for Mansfielders (and apparently many other colleges - the Cherwell was crowded!).  I've decided I will continue on with rowing.  I quite like it, when I'm stroking correctly and at the same time as the others in the boat.  It's very disappointing to make a wrong move, however, because it is glaringly obvious to yourself and everyone else in the boat.  This week, I need to pass a swim test in order to become part of the team.  There was also a cocktail night at the Mansfield MCR that evening, plus a Junior Common Room (undergraduate) "bop" (a dance party, usually with a dress-up theme).  The theme this time was the London Underground, which proved interesting in practice.

And then Sunday, we went to Portsmouth, as mentioned above.  Again, more later, with pictures.  We took lots.