February 3, 2004

Oxford in Literature

            “The air increased in transparency with the lapse of minutes, till the topaz points showed themselves to be the vanes, windows, wet roof slates, and other shining spots upon the spires,” (Hardy 19) describes Thomas Hardy in Jude the Obscure.  Through the eyes of a young, male protagonist who yearns to visit the fictional city of Christminster, Hardy captures the mystery of a city often “veiled in mist” (Hardy 19).  In Jude the Obscure, the fictional place of Christminster can only allude to Oxford, where “’all learning there—nothing but learning, except religion’” (Hardy 22) exists.

            Hardy portrays the city of Oxford with “an aura of mystique unparalleled” (19) like many of his contemporary writers.  According to Dougill, such literary trend began with the “shift in taste away from a preoccupation with classical form to a revaluation of the Gothic in which Oxford remained rich” (20).  Thus in the late eighteenth century, romanticism took hold and Oxford soon became the inspiration for the new, non-classical literary movement. 

            Oxford became the symbol of the new literary movement “not only by its historical appearance, but by the pastoral nature of the setting and the intellectual tradition” (20).  William Hazlitt, one of the leading essayists, was particularly fascinated in the sense of past or genus loci of the great minds that once dwelled in Oxford.  As mentioned before, the Catholic Oxford was famous for its religion-based academia.  Amidst the industrial upheavals, historical Oxford represented “a cultural oasis of stability and continuity” which could also be said of its religious Catholic faith.  In the moment when times are fast changing, do we not seek to find the static?  Like the rector in Jude the Obscure, we “dislike the sight of changes” (Hardy 9).  Although the Earth turns degree by degree, we enjoy the ability to remain grounded upon earth.  Oxford was then the ideal ground, for there was “cloistered life amidst beautiful surroundings untouched by the outside world of pointless struggle” (37).

During the early nineteenth century, the individual reaction became the number one concern as writers sought to express their personal Oxford experience.  Perhaps this idea inspires our semester project to pretend we are corresponding with a famous historical figure who lived in Oxford.  Or is it only coincidental that these personal letters ought to capture the individual reaction to the Oxford experience?