Why Oxford remains a small business hub
A walk down Cornmarket is enough to show anyone that Oxford has, by no means, escaped the grasp of giant, multinational chains. It cannot be denied, though, that small and independent businesses do...
View ArticleThe Rocky Road to Success
The end of another term is, somehow, drawing near and the minds of many are turning to how the Easter vac will be spent. For some it will mean returning home to eat inordinate amounts of chocolate with...
View ArticleIceland: thoughts from the land of dreaming geysers
For most of us, Iceland is on the fringes of our international consciousness: it’s a geopolitical irrelevance, which basically has nice fishing, pretty geysers, and maybe some Vikings. We’d almost...
View ArticleThe real Oxford super market
They say you should never talk politics at the dinner table. I’m not actually certain who ‘they’ is, but they sure sound scary. The Ox Co-op, however, throwing caution to the wind, wants to make dinner...
View ArticleThe Brudda Pon di Glass
We all know how it is. You are accepted into Oxford and you cannot quite believe it! That magic, academic world with its dreaming spires, autumnal leaves and stony fortresses that you aspired to be in...
View ArticleIn the Valley of Art
Head out east from Bordeaux deep into the Dordogne and you’ll find a truly extraordinary place. The Vézère Valley is quite pretty, banded by pale cliffs there are any number of charming French villages...
View ArticleThe Café Critique: The Missing Bean
The Missing Bean is a staple of the central Oxford café scene. The haunt of many an Oxford hipster and coffee fanatic, both old and young, it is renowned for serving absolutely delicious coffee. It is...
View Article1979 Revolution: Black Friday
This is my first time in Iran – the streets are heaving with mustachioed men and women in flares, above the squawks of megaphones and chanting crowds, boom-boxes are playing illegally obtained copies...
View ArticlePaul Dillane and the plight of LGBT refugees
In December, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) released a landmark report on the protection of LGBT refugees across the world. This was the first global report released by the...
View ArticleSeasoned Shakespeare: Michael Pennington spices up the Bard
Performers of Shakespeare, more than naughty children, have to listen when told to act their age. Michael Pennington, in a career spanning six decades, has played the lot: a youthful Hamlet, a mid-life...
View ArticleSinging for sponsorship: the Deci-Belles on tour
The first thing you should know about the Oxford Belles is that they don’t need a manager. I already asked, which is why I’m sitting here writing this lousy article like a mug. The second thing you...
View ArticleAndy Warhol: a collector’s perspective
Recently I had the chance to sit down with Andrew Hall, who since graduating from Oxford in 1973 has gone on to amass one of the world’s greatest collections of Andy Warhol works. Mr Hall has been...
View ArticleProfile: Vitaly Klitschko
The résumé of Vitaly Klitschko is an extraordinary one. During a professional boxing career, from 1996-2013, he was defeated only twice, and never suffered a true KO; from 2005-2013, he balanced a...
View ArticleThe Café Critique: the Crisis Skylight Café
Next time I will venture out into Cowley and Jericho, but for this week I felt that this centrally located café deserved a review as it is surprisingly, and unfortunately, little known considering its...
View ArticleThe real Oxford landmark: G&D’s
When I first came to Oxford for a summer school, I only managed to ascertain two absolute certainties in this world. The first is that the architecture at St Catz was never going to grow on me. The...
View ArticleSuch dank, much meme
Oxford has a lot of student societies but earlier this year second-year PPEist and Corpuscle Ada Pospiszyl noticed that there was no society for lovers of the iconic images we so love to share online;...
View ArticleWorking Mothers: a personal perspective
Being a mother is a job in itself. The responsibilities are endless. But women also want, as they should be able to, driven ambitious careers. Employment is an option for some, and a necessity for...
View ArticlePaul Ostwald: The Journal of Interrupted Studies
Coffee seems to be Paul Ostwald’s preferred editorial tool when it comes to The Journal of Interrupted Studies, an Oxford-based academic journal that will publish the complete and incomplete scholarly...
View ArticleProfile: Michael Eavis
Passing Michael Eavis on the street, you might not think he was the man behind one of the world’s largest and most successful music festivals. Over 125,000 people descend upon Worthy Farm every June,...
View ArticlePlaying her cards right: an interview with Liv Boeree
Liv Boeree didn’t intend to become a professional poker player. “I started playing on a gameshow,” she explains during a talk at the Oxford Union, “in which five complete beginners, with coaching from...
View Article