Varsity Issue 935

Yearbook & Review 2025

WEditorial

ith Easter term over, another year of supervision essays, coursework, and exams passes us by. is chaos didn’t miss the Varsity o ce – we uncovered Trinity’s decision to backtrack on divestments, the Veterinary School became riddled with accreditation concerns, and the University was revealed to be £53 million in de cit. From Cambridge’s decision to keep sta in jobs after upheld sexual misconduct complaints, to the abolition of SU sabbatical o cers, this year has presented the student body with hurdle after hurdle.

As students ooded back into accommodation in October, a series of demonstrations rocked the streets. We often nd ourselves reporting on our peers who nd their voices through protests, placards, and open letters.

e past year has been characterised by this resistance: Cambridge’s attempt to ban encampments was met with a refuted injunction, 27 colleges signed in support of fossil-fuel-free banking, and the University announced a re-

view of undergraduate teaching. Reporting on these events has given us an increased awareness of just how much this city is moulded by its students.

We have been deeply committed to making sure every facet of Cambridge life, it’s deep running traditions, and ever-changing present day are represented in the following pages. From 1800s boat races (pg. 42) and antiquated statues (pg. 43) to the struggles of modern dating (pg. 48), the possibility of a new Varsity railway line (pg. 47), and debates about AI (pg. 22), this magazine encompasses everything which makes this palimpsest of a city so unique. rough diverse fashion (pg. 54), a myriad of May Week events, and countless productions from our proli c theatre scene (pg. 25), we are constantly reminded of how lucky we are to be reporting on such a vibrant, passionate and hard-working community.

With ten print editions and hundreds of articles published this year,  Varsity is a product of tireless hard work by students, and this magazine is no exception. Long conversa-

tions, scrapped ideas, and many late nights at the o ce translated into something worthwhile: the magazine which you now hold in your hands. From the freshers who have made it out of their rst year (hopefully) relatively unscathed, to the disillusioned nalists shaking their heads as goodbyes loom closer – this Yearbook is our gift to you.

Sophie Ennis & Anuk Weerawardana

5 The year in news

The biggest stories of the last three terms

10The death of the May Ball?

An investigation into the trials and tribulations of May Week planning

12“I didn’t know I was disabled until I came here”

What challenges do disabled students face when they come to Cambridge?

14She has her mother’s eyes (and her supervisor)

An investigation into Cantabs with family ties to the University

16Black Country, New Road

On experimentation, reinvention, and being the “best in the entire world”

38What if I get a 2:2?

A Cambridge degree is about more than ‘good honours’

40Dear Auntie Jessica...

Let our Agony Aunt solve your nal problems of the academic year

41Horoscope

48In conversation with the couples of Cambridge

Long-term student couples on nding love at university

50WilldecarboniseCambridgefast enough?

18Pints from the past

A tour of six iconic Cambridge pubs and their fascinating histories

20We need to resurrect the rave

Why are we so often faced with an empty Revs dance oor?

22Open(ing up about) AI What do Cantabs think about ChatGPT?

25Setting the scene

Find out what the future holds for you beyond Easter term...

42Bumping through history

Uncovering intriguing stories from the past 200 years of Bumps

43Cambridge’s hidden statues

What can we learn from the statues we walk past every day, but never really notice?

44Life behind the (student) lens

A look into the unsung hero behind any good Cambridge production

26The queer history of a staircase in King’s e professor bringing a forgotten community to light

28Antony Gormley

On public art, technology, and his time at Cambridge

31Smoking Area

Take a break with some classic puzzles

34Midsummer to May Ball

How an ancient Cambridge fair transformed May Week

36Varsity’s musical time capsule e songs that have made students’ time at Cambridge

In conversation with the people behind Cambridge’s lm scene

46So long, Cambridge A finalist gives her feedback

47All aboard the Varsity line?

Capitalism and conservation go head-to-head

Questioning the University’s sustainability e orts

51Vintage Varsity: May Ball edition

Delving into history to nd out how to have the perfect May Week

52Small venues, big impacts e best of Cambridge’s arts venues, and why you should support them

54Varsity’s 2025 May Ball fashion guide

Breaking down some of this year’s major May Ball themes

60What does May Week do to your body?

Exploring how exam season, hangovers, partying all day, and sleeping all night a ect our bodies

e year in news

Cambridge denies dependence on China

Lucy Cav announces partnership with CityUHK

Lucy Cavendish College announced a scholarship programme with the controversial City University Hong Kong. e Hong Kong-based university has been at the centre of many scandals, including allegations that the university fabricated student members to boost its position in the QS World University Rankings.

SU slashes sabbs

Trinity elevatedinvestigates chlorine levels in water

e Cambridge Students’ Union (SU) abolished six sabbatical o cer jobs. e SU’s welfare and access, education and participation o cer roles were abolished, with their brief being taken up by new vice-president roles.

e SU’s “liberation” campaigns were also made independent of the institution.

AI caramba! HSPS Faculty scraps online exams over AI fears

SU CC HTTPS://CREATIVECOMMONS.ORG/LICENSES/BY-SA/4.0/DEED.EN

SEPTEMBER OCTOBER

Religious icon robbed from Magdalene

In late September the gilded Virgin and Child icon – depicting the Virgin Mary and baby Jesus – was stolen from Magdalene College Chapel. e painting was created by Dom Anselm Shobrook, an Anglican monk and renowned icon writer, and has been part of the chapel since 2009, when it was donated to the College by Professor Eamon Du y. It was replaced by a new icon, also donated by Professor Du y, in Easter term 2025.

Climate activists disrupted Engineering and Tech Careers Fair

Towards the end of October, student activists staged a protest at the Engineering and Tech Careers fair for inviting companies that participate in fossil fuels and arms industries. Members of the climate activist group Cambridge Climate Justice stood outside the University Careers Centre and handed out satirical yers which targeted speci c companies at the fair. ey also spoke to students entering the fair.

ZOYA YASMIN

Trinity backtracks on divestment

In November, Varsity revealed that Trinity College had not cut ties with any arms companies, despite reports last Easter term that the College had decided to divest its holdings. Freedom of information requests, seen by Varsity, showed that the College maintained investments in multiple arms companies, including Elbit Systems which produces 85% of the drones and land-based equipment used by the Israeli army. Following this, the College was referred to the United Nations special rapporteur for alleged complicity in “international crimes".

NOVEMBER

University threatens student occupiers with exclusion

Following occupations of Greenwich House and later Senate House lawn, the University reportedly threatened occupiers with legal and disciplinary action. In a statement sent via the University’s Sta Hub, Emma Rampton, Cambridge’s Principal Administration Of cer, deemed the occupations “unacceptable,” adding that it “disrupts University life for our students and sta ”.

Suella Braverman tells protesters to ‘get a life’ at Tory event

Over 50 protesters gathered outside the Babbage Lecture eatre to disrupt her speech. Braverman – who was invited to Cambridge by the University’s Conservative Association – praised the attendees for “going ahead in de ance of the mob [and] in de ance of cancel culture”. Outside the lecture theatre, protesters held placards reading “Compassion is a ‘lifestyle choice’ you should try it,” and shouted “Free Palestine”.

Pro-Palestine protesters disrupt graduations

DECEMBER

TIME Woman of the Year elected fellow of Hughes Hall

Afghan journalist and former TIME Woman of the Year Zahra Joya, was appointed by-fellow at Hughes Hall. Although forced to leave Afghanistan when the Taliban returned to power, she continues to work as Editor-in-Chief at the media platform she founded, Ruhkshana Media.

Vet course fails 50 standards

In late November, the Royal College of Veterinary Surgeons (RCVS) – who are responsible for regulating Cambridge’s Veterinary Medicine course – downgraded its accreditation and threatened to remove it entirely. e course failed to meet 50 of the RCVS’ 77 accreditation standards following a site visit in May.

Cambridge ranked worst UK uni for supporting disabled students

A study published by Disabled Students UK found that one in four disabled students at Cambridge did not feel adequately catered for. When asked if they felt they could access their course on equal footing, only 27% of Cambridge students with declared disabilities answered yes, compared to 37% nationally.

▲ BRIAN CHAU

▲AMI KHAWAJA

▲ FARON SMITH

University ‘fails to address’ ‘state-sponsored’ death threats

Corpus Challenge: Axed Corpus sports day swap returns

Uni requests encampment ban

Roshaan Khattak – a Cambridge PhD student and campaigner – accused the University of failing to take the necessary action to protect him from the Pakistani secret service, which allegedly threatened him and his family.

e annual Corpus Challenge – a sports event in which Corpus Christi College, Cambridge compete against Corpus Christi College, Oxford – was announced to return in late January. e event was cancelled in 2024 after student misbehaviour during the 2023 iteration of the sports day.

Uni creates ‘AI’ category for academic misconduct after rise in cases

Selwyn keeps up controversial Facebook comments, citing freedom of speech

JANUARY

Uni re-opens arms negotiations with students

Alleged spy received award at Churchill

In late January, Varsity revealed that Yang Tengbo – an alleged Chinese spy – received an award at a prize-giving ceremony hosted at Churchill College in 2019. An invitation shared by the Cambridge Chinese Students and Scholars Association showed that Tengbo, who was banned from entering the UK in 2023, attended the “Most Achieved Chinese Awards,” or the “Ninth Chinese People’s List” awards at Churchill College in October 2019.

In late February, Cambridge University applied for a High Court injunction to prohibit pro-Palestine protesters from entering, occupying, or interfering with access to University head o ces. e University was granted an injunction preventing protesters from occupying Senate House until March 1, but had their application for a ve-year ban shot down.

FEBRUARY

Cambridge sees growing income from international fees amid £53m de cit

In February, Varsity revealed that Cambridge's overseas student income grew by almost £70 million over ve years. It comes after a report by the University's board of scrutiny, published in November, found that Cambridge had run a £53 million de cit in the 2023/4 academic year. e board blamed a “lack of budgetary control” and described the University as “ ying blind”. It also noted that Cambridge had added almost 6,000 non-academic contracts since 2016.

Hockey Club ned over raucous restaurant behaviour

e Cambridge University Hockey Club was ned £300 in damages following a smash-up at a social in a curry restaurant. e incident was deemed to be “unacceptable behaviour” by a club member, and allegedly left the team lucky to escape without criminal repercussions. Fortunately for the hockey-lovers, the restaurant didn't bear a grudge: it welcomed the club back for another social a fortnight later.

▲ BRIAN CHAU

▲ ROSHAAN KHATTAK

Vet school saved(?)

In early March, after protests and an online campaign, the University’s General Board decided not to pause admissions to its Veterinary Medicine course. e University will admit vet students for the 2026/27 academic year. Professor Paul Freeman, principal clinical neurologist at the Department of Veterinary Medicine, said: “On the face of it that is very good news.” Although, he explained that he “would like to see more detail of what the General Board has actually said. What sta at QVSH [ e Queen’s Veterinary School Hospital] really need to hear is that the University is willing to support the continued teaching of veterinary students through a high quality research based referral hospital, and that this is a realistic possibility here at Cambridge.”

Harvey’s Co ee House faces closure

e beloved cafe announced it may shut its doors at the end of the academic year, citing rising costs rendering the business nancially unsustainable. ey pointed to rent of the site as the most signi cant cost, with a number of students accusing Caius, from whom the café rents its premises, of being responsible for the potential closure.

MARCH

Robinson May Ball scales down May Ball to ‘mega bop’

Pro-Palestine group targets Uni head o ces

In early March, pro-Palestine protesters sprayed the University’s Old Schools site with red paint, criticising Cambridge’s investment in arms. Pro-Palestine activist group Palestine Action have claimed responsibility for the protest, saying: “As long as the University continues to pro t from violence, we will continue to take action in solidarity with Palestinians who endure daily oppression and destruction.” An emergency maintenance crew was called on the same day to wash the paint o . One member of the crew said that the clean-up would take “at least two days”. Another member dubbed the paint as “criminal damage”.

ree Cam Athletes are banned from taking part in the Boat Race

Student activists stage plantbased protest at Selwyn formal

Following the college’s placement at the bottom of the studentrun Climate League of Oxford and Cambridge (which it labelled “complete nonsense”), members of the Selwyn College Environmental Society staged a protest at a college formal, urging the college to make a transition towards “sustainable plant-based catering”. Selwyn is one of only a handful of colleges not signed up to CamEATS ZERO, the University’s sustainable food initiative. Plant-based catering has taken o this academic year – from the SU voting to support 100% plant-based catering, to a number of colleges hosting vegan or vegetarian formals. ough not everyone has been impressed – in November, one Trinity College student memorably protested his college’s all vegan formal by consuming an entire pack of cocktail sausages.

▴ FARON SMITH

AMI KHAWAJA ▲

LOUIS ASHWORTH

Caius

AMIKA PIPLAPURE▲

University announces it will ‘review’ tripos rankings

Following an 18-month review of undergraduate teaching, the University’s General Board con rmed the implementation of proposals designed to alleviate a “culture of overwork”. is included provisions to review Tripos rankings – the practice of telling students where they placed in their annual exams – and abolish Saturday lectures. Most of the proposed changes, however, will be implemented in the 2025-26 academic year, with the phasing out of Saturday lectures executed by the 2027-28 academic year.

Sandi Toksvig enters Cambridge Chancellor race

STAN WAS CC HTTPS://CREATIVECOMMONS.ORG/LICENSES/ BY/2.0/DEED.EN▶

APRIL

Harvey’s Co ee House closes

MAY

2025: The death of the May Ball?

Elizabeth Bratton and Kezia Douglass investigate the trials and tribulations of May Week planning

This academic year has been challenging for May Ball and June Event committees. Emmanuel’s June Event, Sidney Sussex’s Garden Party, and Clare’s May Ball all had to be cancelled due to a lack of ticket sales, while Robinson’s May Ball was downsized.

Emmanuel June Event was cancelled “due to lower-than-expected external ticket sales”. At the start of April, Sidney’s committee announced the cancellation of its garden party, citing “low ticket demand”.

The Clare May Ball president and committee explained that the decision was “a result of a changing economic landscape that has evidently affected many events”.

One student choosing not to attend any May Balls told Varsity: “The fact that May Ball prices are so high and this is completely normalised is a reminder that most Ball-goers are not from conventional socio-economic backgrounds.” As a student who has “endured some hard economic circumstances” while at Cambridge, they said that “an extra £200 for a May Ball ticket was absolutely not an option”.

had initially faced “some challenges” with ticket sales. They suggested that postpandemic price increases had made it unfeasible for some students to attend.

Homerton has announced that it will not host a May Ball in 2026. In an Instagram post, the committee revealed: “College [has] decided not to host a May Ball in 2026 due to changing student demand and economic climate”.

The president and committee of the Clare May Ball committee declared: “The burden on student run committees to finance these events without any security and investment from College is a worrying development for the future of May Week events, especially given the precarity of student living costs.”

❝ Spending £250 for one night is a waste of money

A similar sentiment was shared by a student who told Varsity: “I genuinely believe spending over £250 for one night of the year is a waste of money.”

One first year student said that, although they were “looking forward to attending a May Ball” before they started Cambridge, they feel that “the perks that come with the ticket aren’t enough to justify the price”.

Girton’s Spring Ball, which took place in March, appeared to face challenges in the runup to the event. At the end of January (27/01), Girton students were sent an “urgent

The secretary of one May Week event explained to Varsity that some students had told committee members that “due to general cost of living, raised rents etc., they were unsure if they could afford attending May Week”.

The chair of a May Week event at one of Cambridge’s larger colleges told Varsity that, while 90% of their tickets were sold on general release day in 2024, this figure plummeted to less than 15% in 2025.

One member of the Trinity Hall June Event (THJE) committee told Varsity that the event at one point seemed to be “on the brink” of cancellation. They explained that the committee had been “hanging on for news from various meetings with the governing body” to find out whether the event would be cancelled.

In messages sent to the committee in mid March (12/03), a senior member of the THJE committee revealed ahead of a governing body meeting that the event was at risk of cancellation. They explained that the event needed more College sales in order to “break even”.

A spokesperson for THJE confirmed to Varsity that the event will be going ahead, adding that it has broken even, making its budget proportional to the number of sales.

Corpus Christi’s May Ball president, Omar Burhanuddin, told Varsity that, although the event did not sell out as it did last time, “we have sold enough tickets to be significantly above our minimum budgetary operating threshold”.

Burhanuddin added that Corpus was able to keep its May Ball budget “fixed and unchanged,” meaning that “no costs have been cut, and no aspects have been scaled back”.

The Queens’ May Ball committee told Varsity that two events are on offer this year: the traditional May Ball and an event called ‘Bounce’.

The committee explained: “Tickets for the Ball were released in December with a rapid uptake and alumni purchases remain consistent with previous years. Since January, sales have been slower than in past years, but the event is intentionally planned at a lower capacity.”

update” about the Ball, being told that the event needed “to sell a few more tickets” by the end of the month in order for the “ticket threshold” to be met and “to make the Ball a reality”.

They recognised that there are “far more” May Balls this year than previously, proposing that capping the number of May Week events in future years could alleviate the issue. They said: “There are far too many aggregate tickets around this year, with a declining population of those interested/capable of attending.” This chairperson’s May Week Event was forced to “reevaluate [their] budget,” using the ticket revenue they had at the end of Lent term “as a provisional budget moving forward, staggering contracts to allow for budgetary increases

Ball committee member confirmed to that the if allowed”. opposite”. challenging”.

❝ No aspects have been scaled back

They continued: “With other May Balls cancelling, we were able to recoup some of our earnings, particularly through discount schemes to those attending cancelled May Balls.”

Anna Stoffel, the president of the Hughes Hall May Ball, told Varsity that the committee sought to create a “more affordable, fun, and welcoming alternative”. With tickets at £75 for Hughes students at £85 for non-Hughes guests, Stoffel says the pricing has attracted “strong interest” from Hughes and nonHughes students alike.

Stoffel acknowledged that organising an event “on such a tight budget” has “been a challenge”. She said: “We’ve spent hours finetuning spreadsheets, trying to find that last couple of hundred pounds to cover things like cake pops.”

St John’s May Ball executive committee told Varsity that while “more students are questioning the value or style of these events, especially with rising costs,” there are others who “think the

They acknowledged that “finding the balance between the two is extremely

Meanwhile, Joseph Cameron, Magdalene May Ball’s head of communications, said that the event has “maintained strong demand”. He added that the committee has “not had to alter the original budget too drastically”. While Cameron acknowledged that there are still “some tickets to sell,” he explained that the committee had accounted for this possibility.

Other May Week event committees and their members were contacted for comment.

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Evie Nicholson speaks to disabled students about Cambridge’s inaccessible architecture

‘I didn’t know I was disabled until I came here’

In 1954, Nicholaus Pevsner announced that he could “walk through Cambridge for a whole mile without being hurt by the sight of a single building”. Pevsner described the “ease and freedom” of navigating Senate House and the “narrow spiral staircase” of the University Centre. Reviewers praised his guide to England’s buildings for being such a “triumph of scholarship” that “no student […] should travel in England without finding room for [the book] in his luggage”.

I came across Pevsner’s paean before moving to Cambridge. I remember flicking through the black and white photographs of the city, struggling to imagine how the space actually felt. Since moving here, I have appreciated his description of Cambridge as “more beautiful than any [university] in America” and like him, loaf about in the “exquisite gardens” of the colleges. Yet, I have also questioned who these spaces are for, if not for that able-bodied student travelling to England with a copy of Pevsner stuffed into his luggage.

A few months ago, Cambridge was ranked the worst university in the country for disability support. According to research conducted by Disabled Students UK (DSUK), only 26% of students felt that they had adequate support, while more than a third had been made to feel “unwelcome” by staff due to their disability. Findings like these sit alongside the city’s “woefully inadequate” provision of disabled toilets and bus services previously described as “the most unreliable in the country”.

Rosie Hunt, co-chair of the Disabled Staff

Network, said Cambridge’s built environment privileges certain bodies over others. Rosie described how the “irrational geography of the city,” with its “medieval centre” and cobbled streets made it a place which was built “out of a sense of exclusion”.

Rhiannon Barton, disabilities and mental health o cer at Emmanuel College, agreed with this, noting that half of Emmanuel is cobbled and impossible for wheelchair-users to navigate. She recounted a recent supervision at Corpus Christi College, which involved climbing Pevsnerian stone staircases without warning.

Others with sensory issues mentioned the “torture” of hot-desking in University o ces. Rosie spoke of colleagues who had arrived at lecture halls only to be unable to use them. Ria, an undergraduate who is deaf, described not having a suitable re alarm in their college until halfway through their degree, and the “contradiction” of nding the Sign Language Society was hosted in the inaccessible and raucous Grain and Hop Store.

and their “emotional toll,” Rhiannon told me, that left her feeling “isolated”. She said that disabled students end up not “liking socialising […] because it’s so inaccessible”.

❝ These issues extend beyond college walls

Rhiannon noted that engaging in Freshers’ Week as a student with disabilities required “a lot more e ort,” and recognised that feelings of “embarrassment” hindered participation. Rosie noted the emotional toll of occupying spaces which did not feel they were designed for you. She described the “administrative burden of disability,” how much extra paperwork is involved “just to get access to your rights”. A PhD student said, “[you are] treated like a problem if you ask [for help] more than twice, but […] don’t get it unless you ask four times”. “What you learn, as a disabled student at Cambridge,” Rhiannon summarised, “is no one else is going to check things for you”.

with disabilities in Cambridge, and modern Britain generally, is the experience of “being spoken for”.

Disability activist and educator Jos Boys calls for us to consider space from the starting point of “di erence”. Starting from di erence opens up a range of possibilities for how we might think about space in ways that are energising rather than stultifying. Rosie described the “joy” of running a panel discussion where the voices of disabled workers were put to pro-vice-chancellors and heads of department. Having librarians, administrators, and researchers communicate their experience was “one of the things I’m most proud of,” she explained.

Building and rebuilding our spaces can open up new ways of moving and being in the world and diversify communities. Given that 23% of students in Cambridge have disclosed a disability to ADRC, accessibility is less of an issue of di erence, and more one which can bene t large numbers of students.

While everyone I spoke to recognised the importance of the city’s heritage, Rosie argued that “[disabled people] are [always] second to the building”. Rhiannon noted that the in ux of tourists over summer left some disabled students “locked in [their college]”. One interviewee claimed: “I always knew I had a disability, but it was not until I came to Cambridge that I realised I was disabled.”

Most agreed that the disabling nature of the built environment stems from chronic ignorance rather than prejudice. Last year, the Centre for Teaching and Learning updated its guidance to stipulate that lecture recordings would only act as “a supplement” to improve “learning experience”. Occasionally, however, ignorance slipped into prejudice – with Rhiannon recalling one lecturer who told them “this lecture’s being recorded for your bene t only”. ese issues extend beyond academics. Despite a 2020 Varsity investigation calling for “clear guidance” on access arrangements, nding that 56.6% of students with disabilities felt they ‘missed out’ on social events, this year’s Access-a-Ball Scheme was criticised for neglect, having launched only in late Lent Term – months after May Ball planning began.

Outside of the university, disabled people continue tobe met with inacessible design. Of 32 public toilets in Cambridge, only four are accessible. Accessible toilets at Gonville Place not only require 20p to operate, but are all out of order. e help-desk phone number leads to an automated message saying that the line was no longer in use.

Part of what makes the 2024 DSUK report important is that it focuses on the way disabled students felt. Many disabilities are not visible. It is worth noting the feelings of fatigue, isolation, and weakness that constant self-advocacy requires. It was these “overwhelming feelings”

Rhiannon admitted that although she “would love to say that [she’s] on a mission to make college more accessible […] it’s just not possible in most areas”. Her comments sit alongside the news that the Accessibility and Disability Resource Centre (ADRC) has one of the highest caseloads in the Russell Group and has controversially cut funding for ADHD and autism diagnoses. Given that Cambridge is the wealthiest university in the country, I wonder whether its problem with accessibility is less a question of capital, and more of political will.

When I asked what spatial changes my interviewees would like to see, all of them mentioned “ exibility”. Ria called for spaces which could “suit different kinds of needs,” Rhiannon mentioned her ambition to get a “quiet room” installed so that “people who are experiencing anything can go there”.

Rosie described the “world of di erence” recordings and subtitles made. She also called for more attempts to give people with disabilities “space to speak” and listening to them. Another student described how so much of being a person

Pevsner’s remark that he “was not hurt by the sight of a single building” may have been light-hearted, but he draws our attention to something structural. Our built environment can be a violent place, delineating not just who can participate in student life, but also the emotional cost of doing so. inking about space from the perspective of exibility and di erence shines a light on both conscious and unconscious forms of discrimination. It also better aligns Cambridge’s medieval built environment with its 21st century values.

She has her mother’s eyes (and her supervisor)

Over 27% of undergraduates at the University of Cambridge say they have an immediate family member who studied at Oxford or Cambridge, a Varsity investigation can reveal.

In a self-selecting online survey of 306 students currently enrolled as Cambridge undergraduates, 27.1% reported having at least one immediate family member who attended Oxbridge for undergraduate studies.

Of 77 additional respondents who stated they were not current undergraduates, 50.6% said they had immediate family who attended either university, suggesting legacy families are more common among alumni.

Taken together, 31.9% of the 382 respondents stated they had a family member who had attended Oxbridge, while 16.9% identi ed as rst-generation students.

Charlie Rowan investigates the Cantabs with family ties to the University

[family connections] more that it gives you the courage to try than any innate advantage. My Dad was at Cambridge, he used to take us there and show us round and take us punting now and again. When I thought about applying we could talk about the reality of it. He was the son of a boilermaker, so no class advantage there!”

❝ He was the son of a boilermaker, so no class advantage there!

Students shared a wide range of experiences with family ties to Oxbridge. One current undergraduate said: “I am the 18th generation Cambridge student in my family.” Another recalled being “asked in the rst week of uni ‘so what college did your parents go to?’” when their “parents didn’t even go to uni, let alone Oxbridge”.

One student re ected on how these ties a ected their decision to apply: “I de nitely think it helped having a sibling go to Cambridge before me – lots of insight into Cambridge and helping me decide that it was a genuine option open to me. If I didn’t have that […] I wouldn’t have even thought of applying here.”

Some were struck by the legacy culture only after arriving. “I was so amazed when I arrived at how many students had not only parents, but also grandparents, great grandparents and further relatives who went to not only Cambridge, but even the same college,” one student wrote. “It might sound silly but I genuinely thought that the Cambridge ‘legacy family’ was a thing of the past.”

By contrast, one second-year student with family ties to Oxbridge re ected: “I’ve found that in my freshers’ week everyone was concentrated on what school people went to and more class based things […] From my parents’ experiences, the Uni is very di erent, particularly academically, to in their day.”

A former applicant re ected on past practices: “When I applied to Cambridge, many years ago now, some colleges actually wrote to applicants asking for details about any family on the alumni […] I applied to a college that none of my family had been to and did not get o ered a place […] while peers who applied to colleges that family had attended or who had had ‘familiarisation dinners’ run by their schools […] all did.”

Meanwhile, an alumnus stated: “I think it’s

Katie Clarke, Access, Education & Participation O cer (UG) at the Students’ Union (SU), said: “ e Varsity survey highlights just how deeply legacy admissions and informal networks remain woven into the fabric of Cambridge. [...] e quiet power of family familiarity with elite institutions still undoubtedly casts a shadow over our admissions system and student experience.

“Success at Cambridge is often shaped by a layer of unspoken, untaught knowledge, from choosing niche subjects to college choice and understanding what to expect in supervisions.

“[...] e class divide at Cambridge isn’t dened by income alone, but also by condence, community, and access to insider knowledge. at’s why even naturalised initiatives like bridging weeks, college families, and society buddy schemes are so vital. ey help level the playing eld by giving rst-gen students the tools to nd their footing, build networks, and develop a sense of belonging,” Clarke continued.

Alice Lawrence, an organiser in the SU’s Class Act Society, also commented: “ e survey [...] highlights what many students who identify with the Class Act Society already know – that family background and connections still play a signi cant role in shaping who accesses such institutions and who feels a sense of belonging. While 31.9% of [the total] respondents having had an immediate family member attend Oxbridge may not be surprising to some, it is a stark reminder of how inherited social capital remains deeply embedded in the University’s admissions processes.

“By contrast, the 16.9% of students who are the rst in their family to attend university often arrive at Oxbridge with fewer resources – not just nancially, but in terms of guidance, expectations, and networks. [...] Oxbridge must begin to reckon with the ways class, connection, and privilege shape not just access, but the entire university experience,” Lawrence added.

Nick Hillman, Director of the Higher Education Policy Institute (HEPI), said: “I am not surprised, though this is not necessarily wholly Oxbridge’s fault. ere is a strong correlation between individuals’ life courses and their immediate families that goes far beyond Oxbridge. For example, many apprenticeships have traditionally gone to people with family links to the industry in question.

“It is hardly surprising that people who understand the strange ways of Oxbridge want to pass that knowledge on [...] I have got in trouble in the past for suggesting we should have lots of new Oxbridge colleges to help open these institutions up and, while that would not be easy to deliver, it is still worth considering,” Hillman continued.

▼ EZRAIZER

Mike Nicholson, the University’s Director of Recruitment, Admissions, and Participation, stated: “Relatives and family friends can be useful in helping students focus on their applications to Cambridge but so too can teachers. If you don’t have insights into the process from these connections, there is a wealth of support available from the University and Colleges through mentors, online resources and access schemes.

“ e Cambridge application process is tailored towards the individual and help is available to those who may not be familiar with it. At no stage in the process do candidates indicate if family members attended Cambridge or Oxford,” Nicholson added.

In a 2024 feature on outreach, the Gonville & Caius admissions team told Varsity: “One resource that we often nd students from underrepresented groups don’t have access to is the opportunity to directly hear from Oxbridge alumni, be it about the application process or, more importantly, their experiences of Oxbridge.”

by

Illustration

Richard Briggs

B LACK COUNTRY, NEW ROAD L

ike many Cambridge students, we have been mildly obsessed with Black Country, New Road since they released their debut studio album, For the rst time, in early 2021.

Featuring sombre tracks like ‘Athens, France’ and the gutwrenching ‘Sunglasses,’ the album hosted a unique sound, ranging from jazz to post-rock via klezmer. e band then went on to release their critically acclaimed “art rock meets chamber pop” magnum opus Ants from Up ere which debuted at number three on the UK Albums Chart. e album’s success was bittersweet, coming with the amicable departure of the band’s frontman and co-founder Isaac Wood and questions around the bands future. Any questions were quickly answered by Live at Bush Hall; a live album featuring the recording of performances of original songs at Bush Hall, London. Now the band are back with their third, highly anticipated studio album: Forever Howlong

❝ It was sort of hermetically sealed online

Considering the band’s popularity with Cambridge students, it feels tting that their journey started in the city. e band all grew up and went to school here, with the band’s drummer, Charlie Wayne, re ecting on their overlap at school: “Half of us went to Long Road, half of us went to Hills Road”. e band’s early days were a local a air too, with saxophonist, autist, and occasional frontman Lewis Evans reminiscing on how the band rst started playing in Charlie’s childhood bedroom – a room he recognises as his Zoom background instantly. Both bandmates seemed proud of their Cambridge ancestry as Charlie went on to explain how the city’s relatively small music scene was perfect for budding musicians: “[you could nd] people who were […] interested in similar music fairly easily than if we were maybe based in somewhere bigger, like London, or Manchester, or maybe even like Bristol”. However, the band’s unique sound soon outgrew the Cambridge scene, and they made the transition to London. e transition from Cambridge to London was “such a culture shock,” Charlie tells us, emphasising the smaller city’s unique and quintessential charm: “ ere’s sort of an equal playing eld. e arts

didn’t feel as sort of like this thing we had to penetrate. It kind of was just there and, like, that was kind of exciting.” “ ere are only like three venues that we would play at, maybe just like starting, you know, e Portland, e Blue Moon, and where else? at might be about it,” Charlie cites, before Lewis energetically adds e Rathmore to the far-from-extensive list. Despite Cambridge’s small size and perhaps the lack of viable gig locations, Lewis looks unbothered as he explains why these factors didn’t necessarily matter: “Lots of creative people in Cambridge, aren’t there? It’s a saturation of people who are into the arts”. is unpretentiousness was a far cry from London, with Charlie claiming it felt like everyone’s “best mate is like extremely famous […] or their parents that worked in the arts were like, fucking Colin Firth or something”. While the band have a lot to thankhometown charm of Cambridge for, the move to London gave the band the room to grow, and earn their title as “best in the entire world”. Most famously, the band broke through at e Windmill, Brixton – the iconic south London venue that has hosted the likes of black midi, Bloc Party, and e Vaccines to name a few. “It felt like a real music community that we hadn’t felt before,” explains Lewis, “I don’t know if it necessarily inspired the music we made, but it de nitely inspired us to be more motivated”. “It felt like a kind of healthy competition where, you know, […] we thought we were the best band in the world, and then played a show with black midi and thought ‘oh fuck,’” he adds half smirking. e band has since gone from strength to strength, receiving critical acclaim and acquiring over 1.3 million listeners on Spotify. However, with a long string of successes – going from their Mercury Prize-nominated For the rst time, to magnum opus Ants from Up ere, and the live-album triumph of Live at Bush Hall – was there an added pressure when creating Forever Howlong? “A little bit,” Charlie confesses, but is quick to add that the band’s rst two album releases had its own “strange[ness]”. “It was sort of hermetically sealed online,” Charlie explains, before listing

Anuk Weerawardana and Wilf Vall talk to the enigmatic Cambridge band about experimentation, reinvention, and being the ‘ best in the entire world’

the plethora of circumstances that led to this fact: most of the members were still in school, COVID-19 was very much still a thing, and the band’s frontman and co-founder Isaac Wood had amicably departed prior to the release of their second studio album. It was, safe to say, an odd period for the band, as questions were raised on who would replace Wood’s intense angst- lled vocals. ree years on, neither band member looked at all deterred by the question, “we weren’t rushed into anything, it felt quite relaxed,” Lewis explains. “It de nitely wouldn’t have been helpful to […] create [a] creative space that was constantly trying to refer back to [Ants from Up ere], or create something like that, in its light, or sort of shadow, because it just would have been crap,” Charlie adds.

tighter songs on their latest project. “ ere’s obviously something to be said about a song that is justi ably longer than ve minutes long […] but you’ve really got to work for it,” Lewis admits. But the band wanted to create something that is “impactful and interesting and musically like […] cool and complete in three and a half minutes”. Charlie buts in: “It’s like Glasgow. It’s a very small city. But it’s so high quality as a city. at’s the three-and-ahalf-minute banger. Your twelve minute rambling, it’s all a bit shit, that’s LA.”

❝ eir parents [...] were like fucking Colin Firth

sets, and in its performance they realised “what the song needed”. e piece went from a “full band, quite rich arrangement” to “something very di erent,” Lewis tells us, claiming that the experience of playing the piece live so much helped them learn to “tone it down a little bit, taking the band away from it slightly, and kind of knowing that it doesn’t have to be super active the whole time”. e live audience reminded them how “a good part of our composition is knowing when to just not be there,” letting the music speak for itself.

We couldn’t help but agree. Forever Howlong – with its unique and distinctive sound – stands out in the band’s updated discography. e vocal duties, now split between Tyler Hyde, Georgia Ellery, and May Kershaw, still packs a hefty emotional punch. However, it’s not just the vocals that have changed but the sound too. It’s the album’s freshness that makes it so enjoyable –it doesn’t sound like they’re trying to re-make Ants from Up ere, or emulate what captured listeners ears in the rst place, but make something new and exciting that they as musicians love. “We are all lovers of music […] When you’re obsessed with music, your taste changes, and we’re only ever going to make music that suits our taste at the time,” Lewis explains. “It’s really cool to do new music every record and keep things changing, because there’s nothing more boring than a follow up album that sounds exactly the same, slightly worse. You know, that’s really bleak,” he adds half-jokingly. e statement has clearly informed the band’s constant process of musical reinvention over the years: “We can keep changing it up, keep moving on, doing new stu . People like that”. is isn’t to say the band hasn’t faced challenges. Despite being known for 10 minute-plus epics like ‘Basketball Shoes’ and ‘Turbines/Pigs’, the band have tried to restrict themselves to shorter,

Another way the band has tried to stay fresh is by being open to a sometimes ba ing range of instruments. e group are all classically trained musicians, so hearing the odd saxophone or violin solo is unsurprising. But Forever Howlong goes further. Banjo, piccolo, harpsichord, bass clarinet, and even the recorder feature on the record. is experimentation came from trying to break from the past and “broaden and make the sound richer,” Charlie explains, “to make a bit more of a studio record”. And when the band’s instrumental talents were eventually exhausted, they still found ways to make new sounds, with Charlie recounting how the band emulated of “layered clarinets” on Forever by all learning recorder, providing a “great kind of pipe organ, reed organ sound, with a bit more vulnerability, kind of from the fact that some of us are quite shit at recorder”.

eir upcoming tour is a new opportunity for the band, being the rst one for a studio release, and avoid the experience of a gig where “no one knows the songs and you’re not getting the instant validation for what you’re doing,” Lewis explains. He’s excited to “play shows that feel like a cohesive artistic statement to them […] Taylor Swift style". When talking about live shows, we can’t resist mentioning that we’ll both be at the show in Cambridge in September, and asking what to expect. “Its quite an honour to be playing at the Corn Exchange like […] that’s kind of reserved only for very big artists in my head,” Charlie re ects, before adding: “We’re going to hopefully be tight as fuck […] We’re going to have toured these songs for a good four or ve months, so they should be, hopefully sounding their best”.

While the excitement of a studio album and the musical experimentation it brings are exciting, BC,NR are, and always have been, a band that thrives in a live setting. Previous albums have always focussed on sounding “as good as they can, live” Charlie claims. And although Forever Howlong’s experimentation does move beyond this, the impact of live performance is still present. One track on the album, ‘Horses’, was part of the Bush Hall tour

It’s about at this point where we realise that allocated 30 minutes of interviewing (read: self-indulgent fanboying) is up, and that we’ve probably overstayed our welcome. But can you blame us? With a band as exciting and creative as BC,NR, even over video call, you just want to keep hearing what they have to say, and are always excited for what’s coming next.

EDDIE WHELAN▼

Pints from the past

Ben Curtis takes us on a tour of six iconic Cambridge pubs and their fascinating histories

and the home of equal parts sadness and rev-

yard, now a top-class beer garden, has

to the pub’s back room, the R.A.F. bar, your eyes can’t help being drawn

❝ A theft that leaves as bitter a taste as paying over £7 for a pint

plaque outside

Champion of the ames’, and the name stuck.

▲ KITTY FAY

❝ Pubs are as central a part of a Cambridge student’s life as the library

e site was and it was reportedly a favoured pub of Douglas Adams.

A student favourite, a very good mate of mine described its appeal, saying: “Biased by their friendly sta , ramshackle pub quiz, and very decent pint of Guinness, the Baron is my favourite pub in Cambridge. It doesn’t have e Eagle’s nooks and crannies or e Pick’s decor but it serves a mean

spot across the road

tour of Cambridge’s pubs. It goes without saying Cambridge has plenty more available if your thirst for knowledge still remains unquenched, as so many of these pubs have artwork, letters, or old maps on their walls that recount their histories and the legends that have built up around them. At the very least you might be able to say that you have drank a pint in the same seat as Stephen Fry. In a world of schooner scorers and American pale ales, it’s easy to ignore the history and character of these buildings, so on your next outing, maybe pause before your pint, and think about the story of your surroundings.

We need to resurrect the rave

CApril O’Neill explains why we’re often faced with an empty Revs dance floor ❝

lubbing is a huge part of British identity. Friday nights have become culturally de ned by a swarm of youths piling onto sticky dance oors across the country, throwing their limbs around to the biggest hits of the day. Cambridge, however, has always been a bit of an outlier. You never hear anyone tell you that they had the wildest night out of their life here. In fact, it tends to be the most traumatic one. e propensity for High School Musical medleys, the old men who awkwardly try and dance their way into your tight-knit group formation, and the obnoxious cheers of drinking socs often make you question whether you’re in MASH or the seventh circle of Hell. Every time I see one of those groups of lads rock up in suits and ties to Revs, I take a shot in mourning for what life at my insurance uni (Bristol) would have been like. But is there something deeper going on here than Cambridge’s nightlife just simply being bad?

back, and maybe a late-night kebab, and your student loan has vanished. Clubbing has become a luxury.

I take a shot in mourning

Boarded-up nightclubs are becoming a common sight up and down the UK. Since 2019, one club has been closing every two days and if this trajectory continues, projections suggest that there will be none left by 2030. e very prospect of a night out is being threatened. So why aren’t people ocking to the club in response?

Well, one key barrier is that we simply can’t a ord it. e days of the noughties where you could go out with just a tenner in your pocket are well and truly over. Want to go to Junction? Cough up £20 for entry. Fancy a Rumboogie? Don’t forget the service fee on FIXR. Factor in drinks, getting there and

At Cambridge though, there is another cost. Managing your workload is di cult enough without having to navigate a supervision with a violent hangover. It’s understandable that we’re hardly ravers; losing an entire day trying to ght down water while your essay sits unwritten makes hangxiety even more unbearable. You wake up the next day broke and behind. But, is turning away from the club the best solution? Nowhere is a night of healthy detachment, away from the desk, needed more than in Cambridge. By constantly devoting yourself to the sacred academic grind, it’s so easy to forget you’re human. Clubbing is so much more than hedonism. It brings connection. It brings escapism. We might think that we can get all that during a quick scrolling break, but phones give only the illusion of company. Nothing can really bond you closer (and bring you back down to earth more) than holding your mate’s hair back as they vomit into a club toilet.

Bad nights out are actually crucial for social development.

❝

e club is a place where young people can experience things for the rst time: they can learn their drinking limits, discover di erent genres of music, discern what kind of night out they enjoy. Crucially, clubs are also cultural spaces where new genres of music and new artists are born. Would we ever have had Charli XCX’s BRAT without the rave scene?

being boring. And look, it might seem counterproductive pushing the crusade for the revival of clubbing in a city like Cambridge where the student body is made up of the most boring people on earth. A bunch of nerds with super niche interests need a board game cafe, not the dance oor. But boring has become a status symbol; it’s that ‘clean girl aesthetic’. It’s all the rage to cancel your plans and curl up with a nice hot chocolate and a documentary. is focus on ‘protecting your peace’ has made the club seem a hub of wild immaturity: true self-care is journaling with a face mask. While these things aren’t necessarily bad, this glamourisation of quiet solitude – this antisocial era – means that we risk severing ourselves from new, meaningful experiences and connections that the club can o er.

I’m not saying that we need to go out and get wasted every other day. Alcohol isn’t the key nor the solution: Gen Z has been dubbed the ‘Sober Generation’, with a YouGov survey showing that 39% of 18 to 24-year-olds don’t drink at all. But, dare I say it, you can even enjoy a night out sober. If you like music and the people you’re with, you’re still in for a good time.

Clubbing has become a luxury

e thing is, no one wants to be messy anymore. We’re all happy

To save Cambridge (and the UK’s) nightlife, venues and attendees need to meet each other halfway. Behind the business deal, the owners of MASH buying Lola Lo’s (now Kiki’s) is nothing but an attempt to shake up and bring some new life to the Cambridge clubbing scene. But costs need to be lower, clubs less overcrowded, and tickets not oversold. At the same time, we need to let go of this judgemental mentality that going out means taking your degree less seriously. An evening o is not an evening wasted but an evening well spent. So, next time you need a break from studying, instead of scrolling in bed or binge-watching the latest reality TV show, why not hit the dance oor? e nightlife industry and your social life will thank you.

If the area of the outside square is 100cm², what is the area of the inside square?

What percentage of respondents successfully solved this?

Open(ing up about) AI

What do Cantabs think about AI? Four students tell Maddy Browne their thoughts on how it will impact our futures

The world is buzzing with talk of articial intelligence (AI). If you can get to grips with platforms like ChatGPT, suddenly you have access to a whole host of shortcuts and even job opportunities. Here at university, there are few places where this is more pertinent, as thousands of us labour to

nd new research gaps or write our next essay. Indeed, a Varsity survey at the start of this term found that over 60% of Cambridge students have used AI to help with their work, up 14% from two years ago. Many faculties have yet to catch up. e writers here explore their views on the place of this new technology in our learning, and

AI

cannot replace the humanities, nor the human

Recent surveys have found that 92% of university students in the UK make use of AI. ere is no doubt that this will impact the study of the humanities. But, ultimately, they are the study of people, by other people, seeking to understand the human experience. So why are we all so worried about AI’s encroachment? e term ‘humanities’ comes from fteenth-century Latin, referring to the study of humanity, as opposed to divinity, its use pioneered by Renaissance humanists. e notion that ChatGPT could paint the Mona Lisa, or write Utopia, the notion that we are on the cusp of an AI Renaissance, is comical. My fellow History students and I are regularly reminded that true objectivity in our discipline is impossible. We all view the lives of others through the lens of ourselves. e details that stay with us, that move us and that evoke our empathy, are highly individual, shaped by personal experiences and values that cannot be divorced from our studies. I can’t see a world in which ChatGPT steals the jobs of philosophers, or historians, or novelists. If all the essays you write are written by AI, I’m not sure your services would be a great

loss to society, anyway. After all, their humanity is the reason we engage with these works.

“AI can’t replace the humanities, because AI can’t laugh or grieve, dream or doubt. It can’t look at a child’s drawing and cry. It can’t change its life after reading a poem. e humanities are about being human – and that is something no machine will ever be.”

our lives – from its impact on human creativity, to its usefulness as an academic tool and its environmental consequences. If open-source AI is the tool of the present, rather than the future, it is time we too opened up about them.

e above paragraph is what ChatGPT had to say when I asked it to write an article with the same title as this one. But ultimately, this article could only have been written by me. I remember the giddy hilarity of a speci c moment with friends, or the weight of a speci c funeral. Even the most mundane of supervision essays is a mosaic of the elements that make us who we are. Maybe I’m overthinking it, or getting too emotionally invested. But isn’t that the whole point?

– DAISY STEWART HENDERSON

Cutting corners will hurt the planet

I do not dispute that AI has the potential to be a force for good in some instances – think improving the mapping of the projected impact of future wildfires, or streamlining detection of methane emissions. That said, AI often replaces less carbon intensive and more simple actions with unnecessarily high-tech ones. Just 100 words generated by ChatGPT uses the equivalent of a small bottle of water, and enough electricity to power 14 LED light bulbs for an hour. Writing emails, coming up with essay titles,

or even just the weather forecast; all of these tasks would take up such small amounts of time and energy if we used the tools already available to us. A single Google search produces just 0.11g of CO2.

I do think that our individual usage of AI is one of the clearest examples of an individual choice that does have environmental rami cations that are completely within our control. e energy required to train generative AI is enormous, as are the quantities of water needed to cool the hardware used to sustain it.

AI is set to be the de ning technological change of this century, and it has the potential to transform our lives and economies for the better. But in order to achieve these lofty aims, we need to use it wisely. In a world that is already feeling the e ects of climate change, the last thing we need is yet another reason to accelerate our energy consumption.

– ELSIE MCDOWELL

We cannot let machines take over our creativity

In E.M. Forster’s prescient 1909 story e Machine Stops, humanity lives underground, nourished by a vast and intelligent system that satis es every need, including the need to think. Human contact is replaced by glowing screens; original thought is replaced by recycled ideas. e catch? When the machine inevitably breaks down, so does everything else.

Forster holds up a cautionary mirror to the age of interdependence and hyperconnectivity. Today, AI tools are being integrated into our creative processes at breakneck speed.

ere’s an obvious appeal to AI-powered creativity. For students under pressure, it’s a

tempting shortcut or a comforting co-writer. Yet, call me a romantic, but I still believe subjectivity is the heart of human creativity. AI can shu e what’s already been said, repackage beauty, mimic wit: but it can’t feel anything it generates. As Daisy rightly points out, machines cannot su er or laugh, and we should keep this insight at the heart of our everyday interactions with AI. If we start aligning our own processes with theirs by constantly optimising and streamlining, we begin to hollow out the very things that make us irreplaceable: intuition, empathy, imagination, care.

e danger isn’t that AI will surpass us. It’s that we’ll forget what it means to be more than e cient. at we’ll dull our instincts, outsource our insights, and gradually become as mechanistic as the tools we build. So yes, AI can’t feel. is should not comfort us, however, we should use this as a warning. e more we rely on it, the more ercely we must protect our capacity to feel.

– LUCA CHANDLER

e University’s fear of AI shouldn’t get in the way of our learning

First, the calculator was going to destroy our maths ability. en, the Internet was going to end academic integrity. And today, if you believe the doubters, AI will doom our critical thinking skills forever. Don’t get me wrong, I do think that if AI can be detrimental to education if used to avoid studying. However, using it correctly can make us all much better students. What does the University have to say? Well, not much. e page on academic misconduct simply carries a one-sentence warning: “A student using any unacknowledged content generated by arti cial intelligence within a summative assessment as though it is their own work constitutes academic misconduct, unless explicitly stated otherwise in the assessment brief.” I believe the University should encourage its students to use AI, letting us study more e ciently in a way that works for us. AI allows students to adapt their studies to their own learning style, which may not overlap with the way that their course is taught. As an strophysics student, I have access to past exam papers dating back twelve years, but no answers to go with them. ChatGPT has been a lifeline for me to generate model answers with surprisingly high accuracy, allowing me to mark my own work and revise e ectively.

As Teymour points out, we have been scaremongering about technology since the start of the Industrial Revolution. All of the fears that these writers have raised are not new. Yet, they do point to a growing sense that, as our technology accelerates, AI presents a bolder, bigger threat, something unique to our history. e latest models can be vital in recognising the patterns that we are still learning to grasp, from identifying cancers to marking problem sheets. is is aside from when it is conversely accelerating our own destruction of the planet, as Elsie reminds us. e bigger problem is whether AI starts to not only replicate but damage the

In turn, AI provides instant feedback, helping me wrap my head around a tricky concept. With the University paying rates of almost £20 per head for an hour of supervision, it would be far more e cient to encourage selfmarking assisted by AI. Supervisions could be refocused towards stretching students’ understanding of the subject, rather than correcting small mistakes on question sheets. If the University does not start promoting AI in education, the consequences could be dire. AI is being integrated into the workplace at breakneck speed: unfamiliarity with the new technology could make the prospect of hiring Cambridge grads less appealing. Furthermore, the current guidelines on its academic use are unclear and unrealistic, leaving students uncertain on how much use is acceptable. AI-generated content is becoming impossible to avoid, it is high time for the University to step up to the plate and embrace the bene ts of AI, for the sake of its students and its future.

way humans think. Luca and Daisy both warn that, even to varying degrees, human creativity is at stake if we do not learn the risks of AI. Instead, regardless of when and how we use these tools, we must push for comprehensive regulation at university and governmental levels. Arti cial intelligence threatens to make us less intelligent and intuitive, so long as we submit to normalising its everyday use. Perhaps every time we ask ChatGPT to write an essay title, it gets a little harder to do it ourselves.

–

TEYMOUR TAJ

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Setting the scene

Varsity's Theatre team take a look into the

unsung hero behind any good Cambridge production: the set design

When considering all the creativity poured into a production, our minds may ick back to the contributions of actors, writers, and directors. Yet, the last year in Cambridge theatre has been testament to the impact and importance of set design. Re ecting on a variety of sets, ranging from the grandiose designs of the ADC to the smaller, more intimate examples found in college chapels and the Corpus Playroom, Varsity’s eatre team consider the standout sets of the academic year, narrowing them down to their favourites below.

Skellig – Josh Pritchard

less glamorous, the Oscar becomes a phone, taken down from its pedestal to become a household commodity rather than the highly coveted award. In a world of maximalist set designs, the more minimalist approach allows the characters and story to take precedence, but also allows the props on stage to speak for themselves.

Everybody's Talking About Jamie –Kate Woodman

❝ It was stark and exposed and utterly hypnotic

It’s hard to create an ADC set that truly feels unique, but Skellig’s bold and experimental design was undoubtedly one of the most impressive sets I’ve witnessed throughout the year. Separating the front and back of the stage through the use of a gauze drew a striking boundary between the chaos and freneticism of the outside world, and the quiet, nebulous world of the titular character. Director Stan Hunt was unafraid to experiment with levels, using ladders at the side of stage to enhance the whimsical interactions between Abi Beton’s Mina and Alex ompson’s Michael. is was all heightened by a truly extraordinary, almost cinematic, lighting design, lending ample spectacle and pageantry to a production already blessed with an incredible script and talented cast. at moment where Skellig’s wings rise above the golden stage? A truly iconic CamDram moment.

Stempenyu! – Daisy Bates

I’d be remiss not to mention this play, whose beautiful set was both practical and immersive. Incorporating the band into the set by xing them downstage left made the play’s diegetic music all the more engaging. In the few scenes where the band wasn’t onstage, their seats remained as a reminder of the music that drives the story. Really, it was the backdrop, handpainted in vivid colour by a team led by Oscar Gri n, that captured my attention. e cloth depicts the story of Stempenyu! through motifs from various Chagall paintings, at once drawing you into and elevating you above the Ukrainian shtetl where the play is set.

Life with Oscar – Kaitlyn Butterly

Less is more when it comes to the set design of Life With Oscar. As a one-man show, it was important that the set didn’t distract from the actor. A coat stand, a bowl of water, a chair, and the centrepiece: the Oscar. All are used throughout the show, each piece seamlessly changing in meaning and importance as the story transitions. Take the Oscar: at rst, it remains perched on the coat stand and is only taken down to draw attention to its high value. But as Hollywood becomes increasingly messy and

e set of Everybody’s Talking About Jamie was impressive: a testament to the ability and dedication of the technical team. It delivered a polished and professional look, with many features of the set being similar to that of the professional production. e set added considerably to the atmosphere and audience enjoyment of the show. e kitchen set, in particular, was striking in its attention to detail which helped ground the production in reality. e fact it was moved on a track on the stage rather than being pushed on by the backstage crew was e ective and slick, and especially commendable in a student show.

a mere lowering of lights, decreasing the space available for the actors to employ, and focusing the audience’s attention on Timon as he scrambled through the dirt pit cut into the projecting stage. Overwhelmingly simple, but e ective, you could almost imagine yourself in the Blackfriars eatre.

L'incoronazione di Poppea & Sola–Leon Rake

Two sets stayed with me long after the nal curtain. L’incoronazione di Poppea was wild and opulent. A baroque vision reimagined in the 1980s, the stage was thick with symbolism. Towering pillars framed a huge, haunting portrait of Myriam Lowe as Nero watching over everything. It felt excessive, corrupted, and beautiful, just like the story. I couldn’t look away.

en came Sola, and everything fell silent. ere was no set and no backdrop, just a bare stage and bodies moving through white light. It was stark, exposed, and utterly hypnotic. Nothing distracted. e power came from the performers alone. Every gesture felt deliberate, every movement heavy with meaning. I sat completely still, as if any shift might break the spell. Time seemed to stretch.

Timon of Athens – Millie Wooler

In the past year, there’s been a real buzz around the various (largely Shakespearean) productions being staged in various college chapels. ese comparatively sparse but beautiful buildings are taking on new life as theatres. Perhaps the most e ective of these conversions was Michaelmas term’s Timon of Athens in the opulent Trinity Chapel. e contrast between the intricate architecture and the minimal set created a sense of isolation and exclusion, complimenting the play’s major themes. e transition from the spacious city into the su ocating woods was managed not through a scene change but through

The queer history of a staircase in King’s

Felix Armstrong speaks to the professor bringing a forgotten community to light

One night in 1882, something happened to Arthur Benson. Then an undergraduate at King’s, who would go on to be a celebrated poet and master of Magdalene College, he obsessively journalled the anniversary of his “great misfortune” for the next 60 years: “it was in these rooms that I passed my darkest hours – it hardly does to think of now – and yet it was so fantastic and unreal.” Whatever happened to Benson, this experience lives at the heart of King’s College’s queer history – a history which lives at the heart of the college itself.

This was far from the first thing to happen in the rooms of H staircase, and far from the last. Benson’s sexual identity during a time of outlawed homosexuality was centred around his room, H1, as was that of its previous occupant, J.K. Stephens, and of M.R. James, who took the room after Benson. In his book Queer Cambridge, Simon Goldhill, a Classics professor at King’s, sets out to map the extraordinary gay history which unfolded around this room and those surrounding it. Goldhill’s history of homosexuality at King’s begins before such a category entered use, and includes the lives of novelist E.M. Forster, economist John Maynard Keynes, and mathematician Alan Turing, among many others. Compared to the famous Bloomsbury Group, who also have history at King’s, this

group of men was “a real community,” Goldhill tells me, “not just a group of friends from different areas, a community that lasted over time,” rooted in the brick and mortar of the Gibbs Building.

As we evade the sun in the generous shade of the college’s Webb’s Court, Goldhill explains that Cambridge’s peculiar architecture was a vital factor behind the emergence of this unique community: “a lot of the college is and was designed for intimacy”. He recalls: “when I was here as a student, the bar was made of little circles where you were expected to sit in a clique”. And on a practical level, while social attitudes to homosexuality changed drastically across the period covered in Goldhill’s study, “the simple fact that you could shut the front door” was vital. The walls and courts of this college retain memory and identity to a vivid extent. Michael Proctor, a former King’s provost whose current office is on H staircase, agrees: “the ghosts of the many fellows who have lived here since the 18th century are definitely present”.

For some of Proctor’s predecessors in H staircase, their academic and sexual lives were blurred together under the pressure of this intimate living environment. For Charles Ashbee, a leader of the Arts and Crafts movement, and Goldsworthy Lowes Dickinson, a pioneer of the League of Nations, “homosexuality was not merely a personal matter, but intimately tied into a political and social vision,” Goldhill writes. This is yet another characteristic of this community that was influenced by their unique environment, Goldhill explains: “They were writing and talking and thinking at the same time about their academic lives and their personal lives, there was no gap between those things.”

Dickinson, for example, was a scholar of ancient Greece: he delivered popular radio broadcasts on Plato and

Arthur Benson PUBLIC DOMAIN

accordingly grounded his understanding of sexuality in “a history of Greek culture and values”. Such a blending between academics’ personal and scholarly lives continues in Cambridge today, Goldhill jokes: “It’s like when people say ‘you should go on strike’: what do you mean, I should stop thinking?”

John Maynard Keynes, who moved into the Gibbs

these men. Each experienced and reflected upon their sexuality so intensely that these convictions often clashed.

❝ e ghosts of these fellows are de nitely present

Building the year Forster left, was mocked by some, namely writer and critic Lytton Strachey, for letting his academics bleed into his sexuality: “he brings off his copulations and speculations with the same calculating odiousness; he has a boy with the same mean pleasure with which he sells at the top of the market”.

The spikiness of this assessment is not rare in Goldhill’s account of

One more problematic aspect of this history, and one which Goldhill is keen not to shy away from, is the student-staff relationships that regularly occurred here. In the book, Goldhill finds that age-imbalanced couplings were “on occasion profoundly unwanted,” while at other times “explicitly sought out by the younger men”. Goldhill explains that he intended to face up to the full spectrum of sexuality in evidence in this history. While student-staff relationships are now the subject of strict regulation, Goldhill points out that, “in those days, people just didn’t think about it in the same way. I thought that would be an interesting moment of historical selfawareness.” The elitism of much of this story is another count on which Goldhill is bracingly realistic. The people discussed in this book are exclusively white, exclusively male, and much of this account is inseparable from the college’s past as an institution reserved exclusively for Old Etonians. While society’s understanding of queerness has widened considerably since this time, Goldhill is committed to uncovering the vital contribution these men made towards modern understandings of sexuality.

The contagious enthusiasm with which Goldhill celebrates the lives and sexualities of these men is an important part of his mission statement. “I think the lonely, miserable, upset bit of gay has been covered,” he says, “so finding a community that was actually comfortable with it is such a revelation that it’s worth telling that story.” Felipe Hernández, an associate professor of Architecture who, like Proctor, has his office on H staircase, stresses the importance of this reclamation. The book, Hernández tells me, contributes to “a growing body of scholarly work” on queer histories which, “in other contexts, are often framed by hardship and struggle”.

In describing E.M. Forster’s “repressed but purposive” sexual politics, Goldhill hits upon the remarkable energy of this collection of lives. Seeming contradictions such as these shed light on the unlikeliness of these stories by which pioneering queer dialogues took root at the heart of the British establishment. And though the book takes a broadly chronological approach, acceptance did not arrive in a ordered fashion, Goldhill stresses: “It’s not a linear, teleological story, where we start with the Victorians putting doilies

around everything, including sexuality, and we end up with the 60s and everybody’s naked and dancing and fucking each other. It’s not like that.”

Proctor explains that the continuation of this history is not guaranteed even now; he seems to accept that these men are “ghosts inhabiting a space that no longer exists.” He notes that the changing geography of the college is rendering it less hospitable to

communities like these, pointing out that neither students nor fellows live permanently in the Gibbs Building today. “At night there is very little activity, illicit or otherwise, save only the choir which meets as it has for generations at the bottom of H before the daily chapel service,” Proctor says.

As well as the buildings of Cambridge, societal attitudes could begin to close up too. Goldhill worries that, while the language around queerness has expanded vastly since the lives of these men, society’s willingness to hear these stories is not guaranteed. The “liberal tolerance” that allowed these sexual identities to flourish behind closed doors is “greatly under threat,” Goldhill reflects. “Not because a few students are misbehaving. It’s under threat because of Donald Trump and [Victor] Orbán and whoever you want to name, Erdoğan, the Italians, the Greeks, the whole lot,” he says.

❝ e walls of this college retain memory

Atlanta Tsiaoukkas, a representative of Cambridge’s LGBT+ society, is aware of the threats posed by this intolerance. While Goldhill’s narrative is “a timely contribution to our knowledge of past queer communities, there is much more to be done to recoup queer histories and presents in Cambridge,” she warns, particularly for the university’s transgender residents, for whom the “battle for equality” persists.

E.M. Forster EDWARD LEIGH,, COURTESY OF KING’S COLLEGE

Sir Antony

Sophie Ennis speaks to the Turner Prize-winning sculptor about public art, technology, and his time at Cambridge

If you’re a Cambridge student, then you’ll probably recognise Antony Gormley’s works as part of your dayto-day surroundings. You might walk past the precariously stacked cast iron blocks of Daze VI on your commute to lectures at Sidge, study under the watchful eye of Learning to See VI at Jesus Library, or perhaps even unknowingly tread over Earthbound: Plant – a statue buried upside down so that only the soles of its feet can be seen – at the University’s Downing Site.

e very same city that these statues occupy is where Gormley’s artistic journey began. He studied Archaeology, Anthropology, and the History of Art at Trinity College from 1968-1971, in a political environment not too dissimilar from today’s. “From the occupation of the Senate House, and demanding student representation of the University’s boards, to the Garden House riot, demonstrations against Enoch Powell speaking at the Union, and marches for nuclear disarmament, Cambridge was the place in which my political awareness grew,” he tells me. “It was the place in which I rst recognised that challenging preconceptions and seeking out new arenas of expression and experience was not just possible but could be achieved.”

After his second year in Cambridge, Gormley made his rst journey to India and Egypt, which “became foundations for a lifelong love of journeying”. Once graduated, he returned to India, spending some years there learning about Buddhism and Vipassanā meditation; he cites this as the inspiration for his work being so rooted in the body. It was upon his return to England that he made one of his rst artworks, Sleeping Place, inspired by the forms he saw sleeping under saris or dhotis. From here, Gormley went on to make iconic sculptures like the Angel of the North and Another Place, winning the Turner Prize in 1994 and being awarded a knighthood in 2014 for his services to the arts.

by how di erent the experience of viewing Gormley’s works in a museum was in contrast to the public displays of his work that I had been so used to. “I love museums and think of them as an extension of public space,” Gormley admits, whilst explaining to me that we must simultaneously “recognise that they are refuges for works that have lost their context: in which objects are used as props for a form of cultural instruction where information replaces life”.  Witness features Gormley’s early lead works, which “were made in the Cold War, when the most likely threat to all life was the human capability for mutual nuclear destruction”. Initially “an attempt to materialise the tensions between creation and destruction and acknowledge their mutual dependency,” it seems as though there couldn’t be a more appropriate time to be redisplaying and re-contextualising, these works. As Gormley himself tells me, “In the present reversion to authoritarianism, nationalism, dictatorship, war, and political instability – encouraged by the issue of identity politics – it seemed a good time to test the resonance of those early works where I was testing what a work of art could do.”

❝ Art is always responding to the time of its making

Upon visiting his most recent exhibition, Witness, at White Cube Mason’s Yard, I was struck

This endeavouring to harness the possibilities of art is evident throughout Gormley’s career, one of my favourite examples being his installation Another Place. A powerful reminder of our vulnerability and reliance on the earth which supports us, Gormley states that the aim of Another Place is to “to materialise our dependency on the planet and our total immersion in its systems, while acknowledging that migration is hardwired into our species’ identity”. “Whether purposefully or not,” he says, “art is always responding to the time of its making. Art is a very useful place: in the world but not of it, from which we can look out and re ect on the controls inherent to our time. Nuclear con agration as the main threat to existence has been replaced by the understanding that it is our way of life that is a threat to all living things on this planet. My work tries to bear witness to this di cult truth.”

It is the public nature of Gormley’s artwork that makes this message all the more impactful. “I have always thought that the natural place for art is in the world rather than being ltered through museums or galleries. [...] Once you put art in the world you see what it can do and that’s exciting. You discover that it does not need the validations or framing provided by institutions.” For Gormley, this framing is instead provided by the landscape which surrounds the sculpture. His public installations often feel incongruous in their architectural contexts, whether it’s iron gures submerged out at sea, an angel overlooking a motorway, or, in Cambridge, sculptures in iron and steel situated amongst decorated gothic buildings. When asked about how he considers the surrounding architecture for his installations, Gormley makes it clear that the positioning of his work is very intentional, telling me that “context has to be acknowledged and become part of the way the content of the work is conceived and transmitted. If there wasn’t a certain strangeness in either the work itself or the way that it is positioned within the build world, it would simply be decoration. ere has to be an element of confrontation in one’s rst engagement with a work: what is this thing? What is this thing doing here?”

One statue which demonstrates this “strangeness” in its positioning is True, for Alan Turing, its iron blocks framed against the decorated architecture of King’s College. Despite the statue’s seemingly inhuman form, Gormley explains that embodiment was still a key element of its composition: “I felt it necessary to both evoke the spirit and internal attitude of Alan Turing while using the empirical and mathematical principles that his work opened up. What I hope I have done is make an objective correlative for not only the advances that his work gave us in computer technology, but also an evocation of the tensions within the man himself. In that respect, I was trying to empathise

Antony Gormley

with Turing through experimenting with body postures that could evoke a tension between stability and instability.”

As opposed to a lot of his earlier works which were formed through making plaster casts of his own body, Gormley – in collaboration with King’s Research Fellow Sebastian Ahnert – began working on True, for Alan Turing using “a software program based on the Turing engine,” which allowed him to “mutate forms”. However, he tells me that “in the end this arti cial form generation became a distraction and I had to abandon it in favour of the making of physical

❝ I feel immensely grateful to the University

models that I felt were more in keeping with what I was aiming to do.” Gormley maintains an awareness “of how easy it is to be trapped by [cyber technologies],” saying that “every advance in our extended arm changes the way we think, feel, and move. It is di cult to use our cyber technology without it using us, or falling into the false agency that it promises.” at doesn’t stop him from making use of this technology, however. “You could say that danger of entrapment has become part of the subject of my work. It certainly was for the  Angel of the North.” In a modern world where “we spend more and more of our waking lives engaging with screens and devices,” it is more important than ever to prioritise “ rst hand physical engagement with materials and objects”. “Sculpture can be a strong antidote to the surrogate forms of experience that the cyber world and virtual reality o er us.”

In Cambridge, then, there is a lot that we can learn from sculpture. As Gormley tells me, “it is a very good thing within the university environment to have objects that are materialised questions that are not yet linked to xed iconography or meaning. Sculpture is, by its nature, still and silent, bearing witness, while being in contradiction to the functional world around it. It waits for our attention, waiting for the thoughts and feelings that arise in our minds and bodies as we engage with it.”

After being bogged down in exam season, the way in which Gormley speaks about Cambridge reminds me of how grateful I am to be studying in a place which inspires such creativity and curiosity. “I feel immensely grateful to the University and all it o ered in its open-minded encouragement,” he says. “My time at Cambridge was exciting, allowing experimentation in all forms of being, making, and thinking.” When asked about what he hopes students here will take away from his work, Gormley shares with me some valuable parting wisdom: “Stop, look, circumnavigate, and use the space displaced by the work itself as a place to be. I am acutely aware of the pressures on all students these days and I’m hoping that these still, silent works will be some form of ally to the internal journeys that all of us have to go on.”

Smoking Area

CRYPTIC:

ACROSS

1 Breaks under pressure, cracking bones (6,9)

9 Ease in Heidi’s pelvis (6)

10 Attentiveness, say, demonstrated by untangling larch ivy (8)

11 0s for participation, rarely given for 20a (10,5)

12 Typeface problem with this Varsity copy (5,5)

14 Men’s haircut with bleach (4)

15 Irish growth ending profitless slump you forecasted (4)

17 Field event one’s put up on review (10)

20 Magical Roger Lee complicated friends’ wedding (7,8)

23 Find fault with leftist Frank (8)

24 Arrive in term having studied (6)

25 Sabotaged crime scene — PC out to get subject (8,7)

DOWN

2 Runnier solvent (7)

3 Pointed out river delta around field (9)

4 Work out, as you’re trying to do now (5)

5 Shake aliens with projectiles (7)

6 Heartless Trudeau after money or drink (9)

7 You, mum, and me reportedly have basic taste (5)

8 Uninitiated, underage, unstable and irate. (7)

13 Taunt in pub gets worker justifiably angry (9)

14 Fans cite a nutty interest (9)

16 No payment for U2 singer (3,4)

18 Remains confused after supervision (7)

19 Healthy, hearty, brainy, skinny, say? (7)

21 Drink, as a Californian city dog (3,2)

22 Roman Catholic priest collected holy bones, maybe (5)

QUICK:

ACROSS

1 University, say (6,9)

9 Bridge on the Thames (6)

10 Floatation aids (8)

11 Liberty, or what you receive at graduation (6,2,7)

12 Confused (10)

14 Perfect or imperfect, as tense (4)

15 Eary (4)

17 Examination (10)

20 No going back now, as at graduation (5,2,2,6)

23 Take a year out (8)

24 Flowers (6)

25 Envy, lust, pride etc. (5,6,4)

DOWN

2 Where a foetus develops, in Latin (2,5)

3 Your Majesty, or Senpai (9)

4 Rolls (5)

5 Made to seem small (7)

6 Grantanbrycg, in Modern English (9)

7 Exchange (5)

8 Alumni (3,4)

13 As a schoolboy is (9)

14 Peas in Paris (5,4)

16 Demolish (7)

18 Frank _____ (7)

19 Rowers by another name (7)

21 Nichte in English (5)

22 ________ Wilson, actress (5)

PUZZLES BY SOPHOCLES

Smoking Area

BATTLESHIPS:

Find the armada of ships in this grid. The fleet consists of one battleship (4 squares), two cruisers (3 sqs.), three destroyers (2 sqs.), and four submarines (1 sq.). The ships are placed either horizontally or vertically and are arranged so that they do not touch each other, not even diagonally. Numbers at the bottom and right of the grid give clues about how many squares in each row and column are occupied by ship parts.

PUZZLES BY SOPHOCLES

EZRA IZER ▲

Reconnect to reality

Are you a finalist?

Did you eat worms as a child?

Would you ever wear double denim?

Are you a seasoned Rumboogie veteran?

Can you ride a bike?

Are you a STEM student?

Do you like to cook?

Will you become a corporate sellout?

Are you a serial monogamist?

Do you get hayfever?

Do you play video games?

Are you a good cook?

You’ve been locked in forever – now’s the time to get out of the library and touch some grass.

It’s time to enjoy a feral night. Go forth and impress everyone with your sick dance moves (and prepare for the incoming hangxiety).

Did you ever perform at a school talent show?

Have you ever written for Varsity?

Do you like arts and crafts?

Before the intensity of Cambridge exams, we all had a passion that wasn’t our degrees. Now’s the time to return to it!

You’ve spent the year in the library, the gym, or lectures. Recover after exam season with a night purely dedicated to self-care.

Jessica Spearman helps you reset after an intense term

▲ JESSICA LEER

As someone who struggled with imposter syndrome coming to Cambridge, I did not expect to feel at home at a May Ball. e idea of a multi-hundredpound, champagnefuelled, all-night party in a Cambridge college was alien from my native Teesside nights out. But, when the black tie, Georgian architecture, and crappy tribute bands are discarded, and the May Ball is stripped to its skeletal form, it takes on the shape of a familiar North Eastern and – to my surprise – Cantabrigian staple: the travelling funfair.

Cambridge’s history of funfairs predates our ancient University. Midsummer Fair –the oldest and grandest of Cambridge’s fairs – traces its roots to medieval celebrations of Midsummer. A report by local history group Friends of Midsummer Common details how a patch of grass known as “green croft” was regularly “used for semi-pagan festivities around the wellhead once a year on Midsummer Eve”. e fair became a more formal event in 1211, when King John granted the fair a formal charter to celebrate the Christian feast of Saint Ethelreda, giving it to the local priory to make the most of potential tax income. Around two years prior, a group of scholars eeing violence from Oxford townsfolk congregated at the ancient Roman trading post of Cambridge for the purpose of study, the earliest record of the town’s University.

Despite their historic closeness, the two institutions held great animosity for centuries to come. An article on the history of Midsummer Fair by Enid Porter – a former curator of the Cambridge & County Folk Museum – details how power struggles between Town and Gown plagued the fair. Even though the council had acquired the rights to the fair, University Proctors retained the “privilege” to search for “beggars, vagabonds, and lewd women and to imprison or banish them,” causing great upset to the fair community. Porter acknowledges some positive intersections between the University and fair; the awarding of degrees and the fair overlapped in the 1830s, leading members of the University to “mingle with humbler crowds at the fairground” in “brightly-coloured gold-embroidered gowns,” with some even indulging in “ra es for pictures, china, and millinery”. e University proclaimed the opening of the fair twice – despite the council jealously guarding this traditional right – with o cials drinking “egg ip and sack [eggnog and sherry] in the Senate House” to prepare themselves to face the townsfolk. However, the fair was treated with disdain by University o cials for the most part, who saw its frivolities as posing a threat to educational ideals, and often landed themselves in hot water for o ending members of the Council organising the event.

Midsummer

Wilf Vall explores how an ancient Cambridge

and University began to show cracks late in the 20th century, in the wake of a shift in student attitudes toward traditional May Balls. Balls began as a heavy night of drinking in pubs to celebrate rowing clubs’ success at May Bumps, with the First and ird Trinity Boat Club holding the earliest ‘ball’ (read: pub crawl) in 1838. e rst formal Ball on college grounds was held in Trinity in 1866, taking its name after the Boat Club. Early May Balls were strictly formal a airs: white tie, champagne, classical orchestras, and a waltz were to be expected. e Cambridgeshire Collection – a set of local archives – depicts balls of the early 1900s as “lavishly illuminated and decorated” a airs with “21 dances on the programme and three supper dances” scheduled – a far cry from today’s world of headliners and silent discos. s continued through the 1930s and 40s, with “lantern lit cloisters” and “fairy lights” featuring heavily newspaper reviews of the balls. While balls remained excessive a airs, it would take the explosion of the rock-and-roll generation to turn May Balls into the carnivalesque expression of hedonism we know today.

e scholarly partition between the fair

with tolerating rock and roll, ball committees broke the centuries-long taboo against intermingling with the fair. In 1968 a Varsity May Ball guide noted the advent of a ferris wheel at King’s May Ball: described as a “unique and exciting gimmick,” this was likely one of the rst instances of a funfair ride being welcomed to a May Ball. Some followed soon after, with Peterhouse’s famous ferris wheel rst appearing in Varsity in the early 70s.

Tracing the history of the funfair business at May Balls led me to Irvin Leisure, a company that has been a funfair business since the 1870s, but got involved in May Balls in the 1960s. George Irvin Senior, who organises ride hires for May Balls, recounts how “My grandfather, also George Irvin, started doing them in the 1960s. He diversi ed the business a lot by moving into balls and lming work with the Mary Poppins lm”.

❝ Power struggles between Town and Gown plagued the fair

e sea change came in the late 1960s, when students started rejecting the perceived stuness of balls, and committees scrambled to keep up. Symphonies were traded for popular music acts, with names like Françoise Hardy and Nick Drake appearing on Varsity May Ball guides. 1971 King’s May Ball president, Henry Gewanter, told CAM Magazine how they aspired to turn the ball into “the world’s rstever multimedia rock and roll  extravaganza”. Along

George tells me how the company has sent rides to “almost all the colleges,” ranging from the cramped court of Corpus Christi, to the spacious grounds of Homerton. Despite having worked plenty of other grand University events, Cambridge stands above the rest for George: “there is something really special about Cambridge and May Week. It’s like nowhere else! I feel like we’re a good t for Cambridge because our community really values tradition and history”. He describes a common ground between working fairs like Midsummer and a May Ball: “[at] both you are trying to create a sense of magic and wonder for people”. e main di erence he nds is with the age of the people they’re working with, recounting how, “at funfairs, we’ll often have people come to visit us with their sons or daughters who say ‘my parents brought me to your funfair as a child and now I’m bringing my children here’ [...] You obviously don’t get quite the same sense of continuity at a May Ball”. But the essence of the event still feels the same to him. Whether at a ball or on Midsummer Common, George claims he’s always proud to “help

to May Ball

Cambridge fair transformed May Week

people celebrate some of the best days of their lives”.

Getting a fairground ride into a Cambridge college does provide a logistical headache for all those involved. ose delivering rides are provided with detailed photos of college gates to ensure the ancient walls remain intact. Photos only provide guidance, with the physical act often requiring on-the-job improvisation. Delivering a “hulk arm” ride caused particular difculties at King’s A air last year, with the driver de ating their lorry’s tires to squeeze through the Grade I listed gate. Benny Irvin, who is often responsible for the delivery of rides, admits that the “hours it can take to get to Cambridge, build up the equipment, run it all night, then pack up and be gone again the next day,” remain his least favourite part of the job. It’s all worth it for him though as rides give students the chance to relive “the magic of being a kid again”. Some companies have tailored rides for student needs too, with “vintage” dodgems being marketed to May Balls. e main attraction is not the old-time aesthetic of the cars, but the manoeuvrability of their archaic structure. e “ oor” the dodgems drive on is detachable piece-by-piece, meaning they can be carried into a ball by hand – a solution preferable to anxie-

Student committees tussle with the responsibility of ensuring delivery of rides doesn’t become a demolition job too. Belle Chatdokmaiprai, the Vice-President of Corpus May Ball, tells me how they have relied on their main gate on King’s Parade to deliver a helterskelter and swing boats in the past, with plans for this years’ dodgems already underway.  Despite opting for a bouncy castle to ensure a “cost e ective” event, Jen Price, Trinity Hall June Event’s, non-musical entertainment o cer relays the importance of rides at a ball: the bouncy castle adds the opportunity to “capture some of the youthful joy it can be hard to nd” elsewhere.

❝ ey give students the chance to relive “the magic of being a kid again”

the assumption that she’d feel out of place. She states how through the fair “I knew the city, I knew the places [...] my upbringing had given me the con dence to go up to anyone and talk to them”.  Nowhere else did Zoah feel more at home than at May Balls. Telling me childhood story a story of watching Trinity May Ball reworks, she recounts how her mother told her that if she worked hard and got into Cambridge, she would get to go to a ball. Naturally, then, once at Cambridge Zoah “went to every ball I could get my hands on”. Despite the presumed stu ness of the events, her experience was not that of an outsider. She describes the experience of “seeing funfair rides and feeling at home,” as soon as she entered Jesus May Ball in rst year. e familiarity continued when talking to showmen working the rides at balls: “My mum told me it was my duty to go nd out who it is working the rides [...] I always wondered if she’d show up selling candy oss one day and just not tell me!”

It’d be a disservice not to pay tribute to the community behind these rides. Showmen – the group who organise fairs up and down the country –have been at the heart of Midsummer throughout its history, with the Showmen’s Guild of Great Britain maintaining the National Fairground Archives, ensuring the rich history of fairs is not forgotten. To understand the relationship between Midsummer and May Balls, I spoke to Zoah Hedges-Stocks, one of the rst showmen to come to Cambridge University. She describes fond memories of Midsummer fair: “I went every year of my life until exams when

❝ I went to every ball I could get my hands on!

Unsurprisingly, Zoah is a big defender of the indulgence of May Balls: “the excess is the point!” she proclaims, before adding “I think it’s great that colleges are doing more sustainability and bursaries for them, but don’t do away with them, they’re the one big thing we have over Oxford!” She estimates that she’s been to fteen and counting – with Trinity being ticked o this year: “I’ll always nd an excuse to go back, they were always the best nights of my life”. But in the face of rising prices, and May Balls getting cancelled all around, I’m keen to ask if students should consider the Midsummer fair as a May Ball alternative. “Absolutely! Yes!” she exclaims “it would be lovely to have more students come and have a nice time, they’re taking part in history”. Maybe you want a break from the pompousness and excess of May Balls. Maybe, like me, you’re feeling nostalgic for the queasiness of eating too much candy oss before having your insides ipped around on the waltzers. Or maybe you just want something to ll the daylight hours of May Week before your next ball. Whatever the reason, take a stroll to Midsummer Common this May Week to indulge in a real Cambridge tradition. Or, at the very least, remind yourself that there is a rich history of fairs and celebrations in Cambridge beyond the University. And don’t forget that it took ditching the pompousness and bridging the town-gown divide for Cambridge students to learn how to have some proper fun.

Varsity’s musical time

Varsity’s music team look back at the songs that have made students’ time at Cambridge

Songs have the power to pull us back in time. Musical notes are like nets tangled up with our past; a few familiar chords can dredge up moments, long forgotten. In a way, a piece of music is like a memory – condensed and focussed on the emotional world and texture of a moment. So, what better way to capture the whole cosmos of a year at Cambridge than through music? Made up of eight songs all chosen by students at various stages of their time at university, this playlist is an eclectic time capsule of the 2024/25 Cambridge year. Press ‘play’ and enjoy a brief trip down memory lane.

Cambridge obviously isn’t an island, and it de nitely isn’t always under the sun, but there is something about its insular nature that reminds me of the song. e Cambridge bubble is so real, and I really enjoy being in it when I’m here. But that means sometimes it feels weird when we have to go back to ‘real life,’ similar to the feeling you get when you come back home from a holiday. Although, instead of feeling relaxed I generally feel more exhausted when I come back home from a term in Cambridge. e song has good vibes with some grittier moments in the middle, which pretty much sums up rst year for me.

Anjola Adesinas

It’s a totally sarcastic and silly song. So danceable and perfect for marching down Trumpington Street when I’m running late for a lecture. It’s just an instant good mood song. Such a joy. All the energy. It’s impossible to have a bad day when it’s on!

Lucy Jude Grantham

Putting the self-explanatory title aside, ‘How Did You Get Here’ is a song which manages to be highly personal in subject matter to the artist, but is still able to cross boundaries and become extremely personal to the listener. It takes my mind back to my past self, pre-Cambridge. It encourages me to take a moment to acknowledge how far I’ve come, whilst also reminding me to pay attention to the freneticism of Cambridge day-to-day life. e meaningful lyrics, paired back drums, and soulful choral additions always remind me to step back, and that there’s more to life than the essay cycle.

Francis McGabe

is song meant a lot to me, especially in Michaelmas. I often listened to ‘Let the Light In’ on loop, whether strolling along the backs in the autumn sunset or across Parker’s Piece on a cold morning. My rst year in this city has been so magical: seeing the aurora borealis from Castle Mound, staying up late chatting over tea and hot chocolate with friends, and cycling to Grantchester. I love how Lana’s song captures the duality of the dreamy beauty and intensity of Cambridge life. She captures a sense of loss and grief for what has passed, while reminding us that bright things are around the corner.

Daniel Kamaluddin

time capsule

Life really is worth living! With a new one from Cambridge-hailing Ugly, I couldn’t be feeling more hopeful about everything. Ugly truly have been a band that has accompanied me through so many terms here, from the release of their folk EP Twice around the Sun, released just about this time last year. As of now, maybe I’m cheating a bit with the whole ‘song of the year’ title (as this only came out a few weeks ago), but rest assured the song was played at least six times on the car journey up to Uni for Easter. e band’s sunny, tight melodies ourish on guitar and in their classic choral harmonies, ‘First to Die’ feels like a transition for Ugly. A total summer song, their lyrics meditate on trying your best even if something is doomed to not succeed. Madcap, rejuvenating, and ever genre-bending, the return of Ugly can only bode well for this term!

Daisy Cooper

A nalist always has one eye on the next thing. ere’s not many opportunities to slow down, a bittersweet sacri ce for Easter term’s glorious sun. On the train back from an interview, though, there’s nowhere to run. As the sun winked its last glimpses of light from behind the tall bodies of trees, Stevie Nicks croons, “Can I handle the seasons of my life?” ree years whittled down to two months, my college children with their own children, I realised I was knee-deep in my last summer here. Sentimental, I know, but if Fleetwood Mac can get away with it, let me have this.

Jamie Chong

e night before I came to Cambridge I was in my room at home, listening to the then-brand new Jacob Collier album of live piano ballads. It’s full of musical tangents and self-indulgences, but I was feeling pretty dramatic at the time. About a month later, I was sitting in a room with some people I barely knew, and the same album came on. ey’re now my best friends. I’m graduating at the beginning of July, and although I couldn’t possibly have known how brilliant these three years of my life would be when I heard that song for the rst time, it felt like I might.

Polly Almond

DAISY COOPER

What if I get a 2:2?

Julia Ongking explores the stress surrounding degree classifications, and asks whether it really is so bad if you graduate with a 2:2

Clearly, the possibility of getting a 2:2 is a touchy subject among the wider Cambridge community. When asked, “what would you do if you got a 2:2?” student responses ranged from “trigger warning please” to “there’s no way I could get a 2:2”. Discussing the demands of college-level rowing, a recent graduate shared the single piece of advice that she best remembers from her DoS’ second-year brie ng: “whatever you do, please do NOT row”. Struggling to manage their workload and commitments on the Cam, they nished their degree with a disappointing 2:2.

Career anxiety, balancing academics and extra-curricular activities, and a lingering habit of rewarding high-performance with cash prizes and high room ballot spots contribute to an environment where students stress endlessly over their exam results.

Back in 2017, considerable discourse was generated by leaked Boston Consulting Group (BCG)’s 2017 applicant prescreening criteria, which detailed that Oxbridge students obtaining a 2:2 or below were to be immediately disquali ed from further consideration by the company.  O ering some of the largest entry-level salaries, internationally recognised CV prestige, and a high-intensity, travellled lifestyle, places at BCG are highly desired within the Cambridge community. Naturally, it follows that places at BCG and similar wellpaying industries are competitive – BCG boasts an acceptance rate of less than 1%. That’s even lower than any Oxbridge degree you could apply for. With degree classi cation deter- mining entry to these coveted careers, con- siderable fear exists surrounding obtain- ing a 2:2 or below.

❝ Whatever you do, please do NOT row

needing to maintain or improve their external reputation to attract future talent. Highachieving student results preserve prestige and are a key marketing tool for colleges to attract top-tier applicants.

softening, with employers placing greater value on skills, experience, and individual potential rather than academic classi cation. Graduate earnings for those receiving 2:2s are higher than those graduating with Firsts or 2:1s, despite unemployment for the former being higher. e Careers Centre adds that “the longer you’ve been in work, the less important academic grades become to employers in most sectors,” suggesting that job performance and potential aren’t always neatly predicted by Tripos results in the long-term.

Students also struggle with balancing academic pressures and personal life, caught between the fear of doing too much and burning out, or too little and falling behind. Jerry Conde, a second-year Economist at Hughes Hall, acknowledges that obtaining high degree classi cations and exam marks are non-negotiable if applying for study abroad or Master’ s programs. He reects on “whether it’s worth it to get a rst class, where the time one spends studying

For instance, some students consult the Tompkins Table, ranking of Cambridge colleges based on the percentage of Firstclass degrees awarded, as a proxy for academic prestige when deciding where to apply. University and college infrastructure is partly built around boosting students’ academic performance; Trinity College used to place First-receiving students within a special “scholar’s ballot,” providing them top-priority in choosing their accommodation ahead of others. While the ballot has been abolished in Trinity, some colleges, like Christ’s, continue to reserve their 20 best rooms for Scholars (those who receive Firsts) and Intermediate Exhibitioners (those who receive high 2:1s).

could’ve been time making friends, hanging out, or networking important career skills for applying to jobs”. He said, “if your goal is to get a job out of uni in an industry you have passion for, the best time spent is doing things that show your passion towards that industry, such as skill-building, networking, and practising to get the process right. Consider: if you were a recruiter, would you hire a student with a 2:1 who has working experience doing the job, or a First class without the experience?”

Furthermore, certain subjects impose academic restrictions based on degree classication. Alara Clayton, a rst-year Spanish and Russian MMLer, said getting a 2:2 bars her from taking her rst- choice additional language paper in her second year. In the Natural Sciences Tripos, students must achieve at least a 2:1 in the relevant Part IB papers to take certain Part II sub- jects. e university does not take a neutral stance towards academic performance, but actively incentivises students to achieve top classi cations on their end-of-year exams.

Ac- cording to HESA’s Gradu- ate Outcomes Survey, logging post-Bachelors career outcomes 15 months after graduation between 2017-2022, it is notable that “the 353 Cambridge respondents in the period who reported a 2:2, were earning slightly more than the 6366 who reported a 1st or 2:1,” illustrating that classi cahadn’t hurt earnings. However, Cambridge students with 2:2s were twice as likely to be unemployed, although these numbers are “still low compared to many other Universities”. Higher unemployment amongst those with 2:2s may be chalked up to the fact “some graduate employers in certain sectors do have a policy of not accepting applications from students whose grade is lower than 2.1,” but recent trends have seen many more employers open to applications regardless of grade.

e Careers Centre said that the “2024 Institute of Student Employers recruitment survey showed that a minority of its members require a 2:1 or above,” potentially indicating that historical emphasis on achieving a 2:1 or higher may be

Catherine Patterson, a rstyear HSPSer at Trinity, said, “[balancing personal and academic commitments] is probably the thing I have found most challenging in my rst year. I’m aware that there are so many di erent opportunities, societies, and sports to get involved in, and it was definitely difficult at first trying to balance all of these other priorities with my academic work.” However, she’s come to realise that “I won’t enjoy my course, or get the most out of it, if I end up getting burnt out or don’t allow myself time to do other fun things.” Fears over grades can lead to burnout, yet many students attempt to balance academic work with making the most of their time at university.

❝ As an employer, it is the degree we look for, not the grade!

A former Cambridge Porter and business owner advised students, “to do your best in all exams, put the e ort in to achieve a good grade, but don’t think a 2:2 is anything less than a degree”. He adds that “a 2:2 is a pass in anyone’s language; in business, a Cambridge degree is highly desirable, and as an employer, it is the degree we look for, not the grade”. It is worth questioning who bene ts when students internalise success as something de ned by classi cations.

Cambridge and its constituent colleges face reputational pressures that may contribute to a culture of grade-based anxiety. College and university administrators actively dissuade students from scoring poorly on their exams,

Personally, I’ve found that the memories I’ve made outside academic contexts – nding the cheapest RyanAir trips, post-Revs debriefs, weekend breaks in London – have taught me just as much, if not more, than any exam mark. ese are personal experiences that don’t explicitly show up in a Tripos score, but are crucial to shaping the kind of person I want to become. And, I argue – isn’t that what university is for?

Dear Auntie Jessica...

In her swan song as your spiritual and moral guide, let Agony Aunt Jessica Spearman solve your final problems of the academic year

I’m banned from every single May Ball bar one because I snuck into John’s last year. How do I still have a great May Week, despite the odds?

is is the best example of why not to break into May Balls, even more so than the masses of broken bones from fence-hopping over the years. Not to rub salt in the wound, but if it isn’t the consequences of your own actions… Without indulging in too much Camfess discourse, a May Ball is still an immense privilege and you still deserve to have the best time after the horrors of exam season. Not making the most of your only May Ball is worse than not going to any –seriously, why spend so much money on one night if it’s not going to be the best night of your year? My top tips are: don’t get too drunk in the rst two hours (the alcohol isn’t going to run out, and you won’t remember anything except throwing up after the dodgems); make sure you have friends there (a May Ball isn’t the best place for a solo date, and, besides, you’ll need someone to take Instagram photos, because did you even go to a May Ball if it doesn’t end up in your end-of-year photo dump?); do the activities that you want to do most (I spent Jesus May Ball at the Queen tribute band alone because my friends were all at the headliner, and it was still the highlight of the night); and wear sensible shoes. Remember, May Week doesn’t consist of just May Balls and insomnia – you can still spend time going to Grantchester, the pub, dinner in college gardens, and so much more. One last thing, don’t even think about trying to break into any more May Balls – you’re at the top of every security guard’s most wanted list (and I don’t want to be held responsible for any injuries you acquire in the process).

has consisted of job application spreadsheets with ticks next to ‘Applied?’, ‘Interview? ’, ‘Written task? ’, but never next to ‘O er? ’. Alas, that sounds like a them problem, which you’re not here to listen to. You’ve just survived an three intense years and you should take time to celebrate, even if you’re graduating with a ‘degree’ in Philosophy or Land Economy. Make sure you use the time between exams and graduation to really enjoy yourself and relax! You could even travel somewhere new – holidays are always cheaper during term-time.

I didn’t nd ‘the one’ before leaving Cambridge, and feel like I’ve failed. ere’s often a lot of pressure for people to nd their future spouse at university, and it can be pretty overwhelming. Before panicking about not being in a relationship, just think about whether you want to, or even should be in a relationship. You can experience love in a multitude of ways – without my friends, I think I’d still be struggling to understand what love really means. Your family might also be a great source of support. Being in a relationship takes commitment, and in a high-pressure environment like Cambridge, it can be either make or break. Being single helps you to work out your own interests, and experience an independence that’s completely di erent to being independent within a relationship. It’s better to wait for someone decent than waste your time (which is especially eeting in Cambridge) on someone who’s a dickhead (and there are a lot of them here).

out of the gutter). In times of desperation, think ‘WWJD’ – no, not Jesus, but what would Jess do? If it’s something I’ve de nitely done, but would never recommend, then you absolutely shouldn’t do it. I’m all for fun experiences and learning lessons, but there are some lessons that should stay as second-hand knowledge. My nickname isn’t ‘Messy Jessy’ for no reason: I’ve been there, done that, and got the t-shirt to prove it (and now I’m trying to sell my t-shirts on Vinted, so always exercise caution). At the same time, you’re a clever thing, no matter what that silly imposter syndrome is telling you, so exercise your best judgement. And please stop ooding my DMs with problems, I’m going to have enough of my own entering that big wide world outside of the Cambridge bubble (unless you have some absolutely mad gossip, then by all means send it in).

How should I hard-launch my inevitable topping of tripos?

You’re wondering how everyone will nd out about your raging academic success, mainly because you don’t know anyone, because you’ve been locked in since you left your mother’s womb. A cheeky LinkedIn post is a classic, and I love seeing who took my deserved number one spot (I’m kidding, of course – the last time I opened a book was e Cat in the Hat circa 2009). You could also do a shameless Instagram story, though I’m not sure how that’ll work out for maintaining any street cred. e rumour mill always works overtime, so maybe just start planting a few seeds. Either way, I hope your top spot makes up for the love you never received as a child!

How am I supposed to cope without your advice next year. and every year after?!

All good things must come to an end, and so must the time of Auntie Jess. Fear not, young one, I’ll always be inside of you (no, not like that, this is a wholesome moment – get your head

I’m entering the corporate world two days after graduating, but wish I had more time to relax and travel… Did you hear that sound? at was the collective groan of every Cambridge student wishing they were in your shoes. For them, the past year

Your future is looking lucrative – these next few weeks will see you flourish in the finance department. I hope you’re ready to track down available InPost boxes all summer, because your Vinted sales will be mysteriously shooting up.

Venus will be in your sign from June 6th to July 4th, which means it’s time to go all out. When planning your May event outfits, the key word is extravagance. You know you’ve done it right if you’re resembling a disco ball come sun down.

You’ve been having a hard time of it, Cancer: every little thing is getting you down. Step away from the confessions page: it’s summer. There is no need to submit another post begging the freshers to keep it down.

Time to get a grip: you need change. Pick a new hobby or burst the Cambridge bubble and reconnect with life beyond it. The stars say you’d look great with that Clairo-style fringe you’ve been mulling. Just saying…

Love is in the air on June 24th, Capricorn! Whether that means reconnecting with an old flame at ball food stands, or spending a last night with your staircase before leaving Cam, your relationships will be thriving. Cherish that!

Mercury is entering Leo on June 26th: Your self-confidence is soaring. Time to speak your mind. Make the most of it at May events – now is the time to finally befriend the intimidating trio you always see at the back of lectures.

Whether to go corporate, that is the question, Scorpio. With student loan dwindling, intern life appeals, but so does that of your friend getting paid for her TikTok lookbooks. The stars can’t advise further: time for a pros/cons list.

June is Gemini season so naturally this second half of term has been treating you well. That exam you had to wing on minimal revision and two hours sleep was actually completely fine, and you’ve been riding on a high ever since.

With Mars slipping into Virgo on June 17th, productivity is coming. With exams done, how to channel this energy? Time to stick on a podcast and get your packing done way before May Week takes your desire to move before 5pm…

Aquarius, say “yes” more. The long vac is approaching. This is your gentle nudge to take the opportunities that arise for you, whether that’s as small as picking up a cat-sitting gig for a neighbour, or as big as leaving the country.

The sun’s out, and you are…not? Now is not the time for rotting in bed, Sagittarius. Decompressing after exams is important, but be honest with yourself. Will a fourth day inside watching Barbie movies really make you feel better?

Uh, oh Pisces, it seems like your capacity for delusion is high on the 23rd. Just because your course mates look 10x more attractive after you’ve made the most of the unlimited May Ball drinks, doesn’t mean you really want to go there.

Bumping through history

Barney Blackburn looks through the Bumps archives to uncover some of the most intriguing stories to have emerged from its 200-year history

Aquintessential part of Cambridge’s sporting calendar, the Lent and May Bumps are raced every year on the River Cam. More than a thousand students take part in the culmination of the college rowing season. With almost two centuries’ worth of history, myths and legends abound, fact and ction are often as blurred as a crew hurtling round Grassy Corner – so I’ve delved into the Bumps archives to explore the stories of this classically Cambridge competition.

In the Clare College Boat Club is a blade presented to the club in 2018 by Rosemary Dooley. It commemorates the Cambridge Bumps’ most tragic accident – the death of Edward Campbell in 1888. On the third day of Lents, Clare College’s crew were enjoying a fantastic campaign; bumping up on their rst two days, with Queen’s next in their quest for blades. As the sun glistened down on First Post Reach, Clare brimmed with con dence as they paddled to their starting position.

amateur sporting event. An inquisition was duly held. How could such a fatality have occured? Was it the fault of the willow stumps that had supposedly obscured Clare’s boat from Jenkins’ view, as Trinity Hall’s butler claimed, or the searing sunlight? Campbell’s father rejected this notion: Jenkins himself had admitted that his attention had been solely directed towards the Emmanuel boat. Ultimately, Jenkins was not convicted of manslaughter – it was, however, a “very close shave”. Campbell’s death revolutionised rowing safety – since that fateful day, boats have been tted with rubbery bow balls: little attachments on the end of the boat to avoid another tragic impaling. Since the invention of bow balls, Campbell remains the only rower to have been killed during the Bumping Races.

At 4-seat sat 20-year-old Edward Campbell, the engine room of the boat. A storming start saw Campbell and his Clare colleagues catch Queen’s in superb time, securing a bump by First Post Corner.

Racing behind Clare were Trinity Hall, coxed by rst–year Edward Jenkins. After being bumped by Clare the previous day, Trinity Hall were still struggling, and Jenkins could feel a charging Emmanuel crew hot on his heels. Inexplicably, the coxswain diverted all attention to Emmanuel, xing his gaze behind him while aiming to create choppy water for the oncoming crew by activating the boat’s rudder. Unbeknownst to Jenkins, the Trinity Hall crew had failed to take the corner and were on a collision course with Campbell’s celebrating Clare crew.

❝ ese days, rivalry between Trinity and John’s tends to lack medieval weaponry

raculously, a spare oar was slung his way from the bank, which the bow-man expertly caught, and proceeded to continue rowing, rejoining the rhythm of the rest of his crew. Unbelievably, they achieved the bump by e Plough pub. e celebration following the win is generally regarded as the rst ever May Ball

It’s not just May Balls that Cambridge’s college rowing scene has given rise to. Lady Margaret Boat Club’s dashing bright red jackets can lay claim to being responsible for the origin of the term ‘blazer’. No, they are not red to commemorate the blood shed in the Bumps’ “sword incident,” as some have claimed! ese days, rivalry betwee Trinity and John’s tends to lack medieval weaponry. Every day of the Lents and Mays, the two colleges meet in the early hours for the ‘Stomp’. is ritualised clash sees rival rowers partake in shoulder-barging and a modi ed version of British Bulldog – amidst the stunning background of Trinity’s Great Court.

St John’s College attached a sword to their bow

Unless, of course, you have been seduced by a popular myth. According to legend, St John’s College attached a sword to their bow during the bumps of 1876, killing Trinity’s cox in the process of bumping them. ere are , however, no o cial records to support this fantastical claim. However, there was a near fatality in 1876 – a small boy darted out onto the water in a canoe and sustained an injury after colliding with a Lady Margaret boat. ere was also a key rivalry between Trinity and John’s that year, with LMBC bumping Trinity’s seconds under the willows on day two. How these stories became con ated, and spiralled out of control to the extent that a sword became involved, I can not decipher. And while proof of the incident is often based upon the fact that Trinity’s second crew dissolved that year, this was merely due to not having enough theologians to make up their exclusively one-tripos club.

Perhaps my favourite story belongs to that of a certain R.R. Hall, taking place in 1888. A hold-up on the river forced a re-row at a later time and, with an exam ending at 1pm and proceedings resuming at half past the hour, the collegiate rower would have to move fast to return to his crew. After rushing over to e Pike & Eel pub, he stumbled across a horse, mounting it and galloping down the river. In the nick of time, Hall had hopped back into the LMBC boat and returned for the start of the race.

❝ Campbell remains the only rower to have been killed during the Bumping Races

While being far from glamorous, Bumps perfectly captures the peculiarity of Cambridge traditions. With a never–ending dictionary of jargon, coupled with a history of heroic antics, college rowing’s strange allure is still just as prominent. Just watch out for those crafty Lady Margaret boats: who knows when they will try that ol’ sword trick next.

Careering straight for the bank, Trinity Hall’s boat clattered over Clare’s rigger; its bow lifting Campbell out of the water as he was fatally impaled. Carried straight to e Plough Inn at Fen Ditton, Dr Rygate inspected Campbell, and the death was widely reported on, most notably , and cast a shadow over this great

Trinity College Boat Club, now known as First and ird, have still had their fair share of escapades on the water. In 1857, a mid–Bumps collision left a Trinity man without an oar. Mi-

Cambridge’s invisible statues

Ben Birch explores what we can learn from the statues that we walk past each day, but never really notice

Ithink there’s an argument to be made that sculpture is the most hackneyed art form. We pass by public statues everyday without so much as looking up, without so much as realising they’re there. Statues, unlike other forms of art, have a kind of camou age to them. We frame portraits in gold, music blares, we watch lms on 30-feet high silver screens. But a statue does not announce itself like these – it stands silently and waits for you to notice it.

At least some of them do. India’s Statue of Unity is 597 feet high and commemorates Sardar Patel – it’s even placed on a plinth just in case you missed it. Often, these public statues have served ideological ends rather than artistic ones. For years, public statues have depicted dictators, colonisers, and divisive gures from history. e toppling of a statue has come to represent a rejection rather than a celebration of the history that has led up to this point.

Statues in Cambridge aren’t quite as dramatic. Last year, there was what can only be described as a big fuss made about ‘ e Cambridge Don’ on Hills Road. e statue depicted a gure in vicechancellor’s robes, and was supposed to represent Prince Phillip. Passers-by objected to it as something ugly which lacked planning permission. Personally, I didn’t realise it existed until it was removed. Despite having been described as a kitsch eyesore, I’m sure it was completely invisible to many. is is the ne line on which public statues teeter: discreet street furniture or gauche propaganda?

Another story of a much objected to statue took place in 1845. Bertel Thorvalsden’s statue of Lord Byron depicts the poet sat atop Greek ruins, composing his poem ‘Childe Harold’, and gazing into the distance. He cuts an undeniably dashing gure in the Wren Library. But before the statue found its home in Trinity’s 330-year-old library, it was rejected from both the college’s chapel and Westminster Abbey. It turns out that being a mad, bad, and dangerous to know rebrand is not something that the clergy nd particularly appealing, nor wish to memorialise. Indeed, the church objects to Byron to this day. In 2020, a grieving husband was told by a Church of England court in Lich eld that he could not have Byron’s poetry on his late wife’s gravestone. e husband had wanted to memorialise his wife with lines from ‘So We’ll Go No More a Roving’:

So we’ll go no more a roving

For the sword outwears its sheath

And the soul wears out the breast

And the heart must pause to breathe

And love itself have rest.

Due to an objection on both aesthetic and religious grounds, the husband was denied this. Both ‘ e Don’ and orvalsden’s statue of Byron were objected to, but for very di erent reasons. We struggle with public art not just on an aesthetic level, but also because it forces us to interact with ideas that we nd objectionable in an everyday context. But this struggle is saved for only the most noticeable statues, and being noticed is seemingly incredibly di cult for these artworks.

something quite charming about how unnecessary they are. Like the porcelain beneath the glass on Sidge, they are equally unassuming: they frown down from above and ask nothing in return. While they might commemorate the great and good of yesteryear, they do little more than adorn and decorate the Cambridge of today.

Not far from Byron is Cambridge’s Sidgwick Site. e campus is home to several unidenti able statues that all serve their own unidenti able purposes. I’m sure many of you have walked over Edmund de Waal’s ‘a local history’ several times without ever having realised.

▲ JESSICA LEER

The installation hides in a showcase beneath your feet and is lled with porcelain items. e glass is translucent, the spot is unmarked, and the work does nothing to draw any attention to itself. Not far from de Waal’s piece, though entirely different, is Nigel Hall’s ‘Bigger Bite’. Hall’s statue, while equally ine able, is enormous. Yet despite its mammoth strangeness, I’d never really looked at it before. Just outside the ARC Café, the statue seemingly blends right into its surroundings when everything about it suggests that it should not.

But I do nd myself smiling as I pass beneath this series of mysterious mugs. ere’s something in the idea that what delights us most about art, as viewers, is risk. We can admire Michelangelo’s David and easily imagine the chisel slipping and picture a chunk of lithe marble torso smashing on the oor. But it didn’t. ese statues have endured for years and have been unmoved throughout all of it. From exquisite carvings to alien e gies, public statues in Cambridge show us how tastes have changed – we’ve moved from marble to bronze, and from form to formlessness. More than this, these statues can serve as a record of how we have chosen to memorialise our past and our precursors.

But it is not just the more modern public statues that go unnoticed in Cambridge. Along Trinity Street, faces and gures protrude from the walls. ese gargoyle-like gures look like the kind of statue that could come alive at night, switch places when you’re not looking, or come crashing down to earth at any minute. ere’s

Not only have the types of gures that we commemorate changed, but the gures that we once esteemed have literally been worn away by time into obscurity. e names and coats of arms that were intended to be made immortal in art have been corroded by acid rain, beaten by centuries of storms and gales, and eroded by hands passing over them. As much as they have endured over time, they have also had to change with it. is is not something we expect of statues – Lord Byron is hidden away in the Wren and sheltered from the wind and wet. But public statues are things which exist alongside us, things that share our habitat; we learn to live with them. e argument that public statues are the most hackneyed art form is one that may hold water for some. To my mind, these statues show us how ckle taste is and how quickly things age. Statues are a form by which we try to immortalise people, and that’s impossible. Legacies fade, histories are forgotten, and attitudes change. What is left is a smattering of nearly invisible artworks that live alongside us, unnoticed.

▲ JESSICA LEER

Salomé Gakwaya and Lara Glennie speak to the people behind Cambridge’s film scene

Life behind the (student) lens

The Cambridge film scene, though quieter than some of its more established counterparts, thrives with a palpable energy. We spoke to the lmmakers and curators bringing lm, in all its styles, to the students of Cambridge.

Zebulon Goriely: President of Gonville & Caius’ Shadwell Society and the 2023/24 Director of the Watersprite Festival

On a quiet afternoon, before the rush of Easter term began, we met with Zeb, a nal-year PhD student. When he arrived at Cambridge eight years ago, the student lm scene was far from the vibrant and diverse community it is today. Zeb’s entry into lmmaking began in 2017, when he rst dipped his toes into the world of YouTube vlogging. “When I joined […] there wasn’t much of a lm scene,” he recalls. “What there was at the time was a big YouTube scene”. His initial ventures into creating content were born from a personal curiosity to document and share his experience at Cambridge: “I was just interested in learning how to lm things and make them cinematic.”

Cambridge, though undeniably intertwined with his experience, was never meant to be the star of his work. “To a certain extent, yes, it’s where everything is set, but I never tried to glamorise Cambridge,” he explains. “I think there’s a harmful angle of trying to show Cambridge as this gorgeous beautiful place full of elite people. I was trying to show it as just another human experience”. His short lm, Day in the Mind which was published as a part of the digital Mays Anthology during the pandemic, captures exactly this.

snappy e ciency required whilst also “still get[ting] all of that emotion from the lm makers who are really pleased to have their work recognised.”

Lexi Kentridge: the Celine Sciamma Q&A at Jesus College

It’s not every day that a lmmaker of international acclaim walks the hallowed courts of our colleges. But when Céline Sciamma, the celebrated French director behind  Portrait of a Lady on Fire, agreed to return to Jesus College for a second time, it became an opportunity to bridge the gap between academic study and lived cinematic experience. It’s one thing to watch a lm like Portrait of a Lady on Fire in the comfort of your own room, after a long day of studying. It’s another thing entirely to discuss it with the director herself. A natural choice, of course, since Bande de lles (Girlhood) features on his reading list for his French course.

Sciamma’s return to Jesus marked a rare chance for students to engage directly with a lmmaker whose work many have encountered both in and out of the supervision room. For Lexi, Portrait was a

As the 2023/2024 director of the Watersprite Film Festival, Zeb found himself immersed in a world of passionate lmmakers, actors, cinematographers, and scriptwriters. Although he recently had the opportunity to attend the BFI Future Film Festival last year, where his short lm 36,000 Words for Love won the Best Micro Short Award, he maintains that there is something special about Watersprite. Most of its lmmakers are showcasing their work for the very rst time, and so the nal climax (the award ceremony) is very di cult to get right. But, over the years the festival has managed to nail the

first watch, and a revelation. “I hadn’t seen Portrait before, so it completely took me by surprise. I actually had no idea what was going to happen at any point,” he recalled. “I was struck by how much raw emotion comes through in the cinematography, and I loved the colours throughout the lm.”

But the real highlight came afterward; commenting on her conversations with the students and their questions, Lexi notices that “she was very genuine and approachable, and took everyone’s seriously”. e conversation touched on Bande de lles, as well as Sciamma’s experience

working in English. What stood out most was Sciamma’s unguarded humour and the quiet surprise of her insights: “She mentioned she actually prefers talking about lm in English and that her lms tend to be more successful outside of French-speaking regions. at really surprised me.”

Fergus Selsdon Games and Aristide Chryssoulis: Cambridge World Cinema Society

Pivoting from lmmakers to lm lovers, we meet two PhD students also getting ready to say goodbye to their mounting history thesis and the haven of cinema they’ve nurtured, (the former perhaps with a grin on their face). Fergus, the president of Cambridge World Cinema Society, and Aristide, the treasurer, sit across from me, ready to discuss lms over the ARC Cafe’s ltered co ees.

Having been in the senior

committee for three years now, they rst attended the society as eager audience members. “I just love watching lms,”

nia.” But these lms connect with new viewers, too, “often it’s people for whom these lms are portals into a whole new, unexperienced world, and that’s almost as important”.

❝ Cambridge has always felt like a place where stories linger just beneath the surface

Aristide admits, “and the Picturehouse is slightly lacking for non-mainstream cinema.” Fergus says “we wanted to tell a slightly di erent story about the kind of lms that people couldn’t access, and this was our way of doing that. I mean Arts Picturehouse is great, they’re showing stu that’s in cinemas right now, […] but we just wanted di erent stu , older or obscure movies.” Having originally been hosted by Fitzwilliam College, the society began as a cash-

“I used to live in Paris,” Aristide adds, “where the cinema scene is huge, there’s a lot of independent cinemas – everyday day you can watch [ lms] for a very cheap price.” ey both aim to bring this fervour to Cambridge, and part of that mission is their online membership scheme that was put into practice this past year – the price of a single cinema ticket, £10, for a year’s worth of 24 lms (or £5 for a term!). ey strive for independence, societal and cinematic, not connected to a college, course, or department. ose Q&As seem particularly stand out; Fergus tells me of a “Holocaust screening earlier last term where we had a panel of Holocaust historians and some lm scholars all talking about this very important lm, Diamonds of the Night It gives everyone in the audience a way to chew on this quite challenging text, give it a contextual buttress as it were.” Another highlight of the year was the Palestinian documentary, No Other Land, directed by Basel Adra, Hamdra Ballal, Yuval Abraham, and Rachel Szor in the face of the Israel-Palestine con ict. Aristide recalls how “the screening was absolutely packed, there was silence at the end, it was quite intense”.

might sneak away.”

Candlelight plays a central role: “ e idea to shoot mainly by candlelight was actually my Director of Photography Richard Allen’s suggestion, and it was de nitely the right call.” e shots are nostalgic, warm, and the screen almost sucks you into the medieval ashbacks. at intimacy is shattered in the nal shot, a cold, sudden contrast that lands like a splash of icy water; the candles added such a romantic feel, which made the nal scene hit so much harder.

Emily Knutsson: Director, writer, and co-lead of e Howling Corpus

On a bright Friday evening in Selwyn’s Quarry Whitehouse, e Howling Corpus, a brilliant short lm by master’s student Emily Knutsson, made its haunting debut. Cambridge has always felt like a place where stories linger just beneath the surface, and for this student lmmaker, it o ered just the right blend of myth and intimacy to bring a centuries-old ghost story to life on screen. is lm draws its eerie charm from a 17th century urban legend said to haunt the Corpus Christ Chapel. “It’s not

Playing the lead whilst also directing and writing may sound chaotic, but it’s clear that Emily thrives in this triplerole. “I nd I’m better at each role when I’m doing all three. I’m completely immersed. All my decisions come from instinct.” Behind the camera was a small but dedicated team: cinematographer Richard Allen and production designer Sean Patel-Gould, both London-based, alongside Toby Ellis, on sound, and fellow student Megan O’Neil as assistant director. e team lmed over two 14-hour days, shooting entirely at night. “We arrived at 2pm and wrapped around 4am. It was intense.” e cast was co-led by Finn Cullen, a nal-year ASNAC student, who Emily rst spotted during a production of Macbeth at the Round Church. “He embodied James more than anyone could” and it is impossible to imagine anyone else in that role.

But Emily is far from nished with the Cambridge lm scene. e Howling Corpus was only their Cambridge debut. A new short, Forgery, shot in Queens’ College and set in the late 1960s, shot in April – with Cullen. With an undergraduate degree in history from Edinburgh, and now pursuing creative writing in Cambridge, Emily nds it hard to separate her studies and her passions. “All my work is rooted in nding parallels between modern life and history.” at approach de nes not just her lmmaking but her dissertation project, “a play-slash-novel” heading to the Edinburgh Fringe. “Cambridge has given me the chance to build something bigger,” she re ects.

in-hand system, with thematic months built on term cards taking place in a cozy, cinema-like auditorium. But over the past three years, they’ve expanded to screenings at Christ’s and St Johns, as well as their home turf of Fitz. at obscurity is what drew them and their growing members in: “We screened this lm Black Cat, White Cat by the Serbian lmmaker Kusturica, and someone came up to us and said, ‘oh I feel so proud to be Balkan right now!’” Fergus recalls with a laugh. “We also screened this Romanian lm 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days and it really hit for me because I’m from Roma-

too well documented,” she comments, “more of an urban legend here in Cambridge”. e idea took root when Emily was hired as a ghost tour guide: “I’ve always wanted to do something with doppelgängers and love, but never quite found the right story. en this ghost story came along and I just thought it was perfect.”

Rather than shoot in Corpus itself, the lm found a home in the darker, more secluded Caius chapel. “Corpus is beautiful, but it’s so much brighter with all that natural light,” Emily explained. “Caius was perfect” – intimate, quiet, and precisely a place where “a pair of lovers

Over the last three years, I’ve spent a lot of time sitting in libraries writing articles instead of working on my weekly supervision essay. Now, sitting in the AMES Library, and trying to muster the words to write just one more before I graduate, I’m nding myself struggling. Perhaps you’d think I’d have mastered the art of putting things into words, what with having nearly completed the English Tripos. Actually, I atter myself that I’m not a complete novice. But now, thinking about how I could ever try to sum it all up, I’ve pulled a blank.

I’ve always been nostalgic. Endings make me tear up. As a year 6 I made a massive fuss about getting into grammar school while some of my friends hadn’t, and therefore my life was over, as we wouldn’t get to sing Little Mix songs together every breaktime. My teacher told me, patiently, that I’d been given a good opportunity, and things always work out for the best. At the time, I thought she could suck it, but on reection, she knew what she was talking about.

Alice

So long, Cambridge

Mainwood re ects on the last

three years

As it turned out, I went to a good school, and discovered that I could still make new friends. When the time came to move to Cam- bridge, I knew things would work out, but that didn’t stop me from a bout of nostalgia when I had to leave the school I was so reluctant to go to in the rst place. Thinking

degree easy. It’s not all sunshine, and pretty often, it’s a fair few stormy afternoons stuck in your room with a book.

❝I’ve always been nostalgic. Endings make me tear up

about leaving Cambridge is confusing for me, then. Part of me feels a deep, sometimes overwhelming, sense of nostalgia for the memories, people, and lessons that came with my move to Cambridge. Another side of me, though, feels relief. My degree has been, generally, a bit of a pain for me. I love learning, but the Cambridge way never really clicked for me. It’s been everything else that comes with the degree that made the last three years of my life so special. So I do feel nostalgic at the thought of graduating, but at the same time, I feel relieved. At the start of my third year, I sat in my college nurse’s o ce and told her that I’d never grown out of that fresher-fuelling imposter syndrome that I moved here with.  Part of me feels sad that I’ve made it all the way through my degree and could count the days I felt like I was clever enough to be here on one hand. I wish I could squeeze 18-year-old me and tell her that all that anxiety and self-criticism would become easier to bear, and tell her that the pressure of being a Cambridge student is something that you get used to, even if it always feels heavy. Imposter syndrome is a nasty thing, and it’s only really in my nal term at Cambridge that I’ve started to understand that my way of being a Cambridge student is as good as everyone else’s. So, I do feel relieved that it’s nearly over. It’s hard; I’m ready for it to

I arrived at Caius’ Harvey Court in 2022 with every single book on the English Faculty’s medieval reading list, and with more utensils than I could carry. I did a pretty shoddy job of the medieval paper, and have lost every single piece of my IKEA-purchased cutlery set. I’ve changed a lot here: I found new ambitions and let go of old ones, discovered loves far beyond my love for my subject, and have managed to change my appearance so much that Porters aren’t always too willing to hand over parcels when I present my CAMcard. Gradually, under the pressure of deadlines and essay-based disappointments, I have grown into a version of myself that feels ready for the real world. So, if you want the advice of a soon-to-beCambridge-grad, I’d have to refuse. I know no better. I’m just on the other side of it. I can’t give you a sharp aphorism that will suddenly make the world of Cambridge make sense. Try as I might, nothing will make your Cambridge

A million moments stick out to me, from brunches in Caius every Saturday, to termly visits from my parents and dog, and lunchtimes spent sitting on Sidgwick lawn with a atbread. My rst time seeing King’s’ spring bulbs in bloom as I ran to a lecture, and how much lighter I’ve always felt after chatting to my favourite porter for a few minutes as I leave College. ere’s been essay feedback that has made me question why they let me in, there’s been late nights in MASH that I’ve regretted the next morning, and there’s been dinner everyday with my friends, always served with a generous portion of setting the world to rights. Memories of pints in Cambridge pubs are paired with memories of supervisions I’ve got through by the skin of my teeth. Days spent reporting on King’s Parade are paired with elaborate May Balls until 5am and exams that I colossally opped in. rough it all, there have been days spent in the Varsity o ce, the place where I found my Cambridge home, made some of my best friends, and wrote editorials until my eyes went blurry. is isn’t an ode to student journalism; rather, it’s an acknowledgement that I did it, despite the fact I sometimes thought I couldn’t. I found the things that make my imposter syndrome quieten down. Friends that help me feel a little less alone in the Cambridge bubble, and memories that make it all worth it.

I think I’ll always be nostalgic. Soon enough, I’ll look back on my time here with rose-tinted glasses, and I’ll have forgotten how much I resented my degree half of the time. But for now, I’m just proud to have made it to the other end. e day of my matriculation feels a million years ago and at the same time like yesterday. Cambridge has delighted and destroyed me. I’ve learnt how it feels to be a student who struggles, which is a feeling that me from four years ago couldn’t have comprehended. Cambridge’s  intricacies and idiosyncrasies both delight us and demoralise us. For me? You couldn’t pay me to do it again. But my goodness, I wouldn’t trade it for the world.

WILF VALL

All aboard the Varsity line?

Hugh Jones and Jessica Leer collide over the OxCam Arc

Hugh

The accountant’s case for the OxfordCambridge Arc isn’t hard to make. Doubling Cambridge’s housing stock, rebuilding the old Varsity railway line, and letting techno-capitalist animal spirits rip through the Fens will create jobs and the conditions for innovation. e scheme could be worth almost £80bn to the British economy by 2035, according to Lord Vallance, the Science Minister. England’s two ancient universities are among the few parts of this country which are still ‘world-beating’, to use the obligatory cliché. It is only sensible to make the most of them. America bene ts from tech clusters around Boston and San Francisco. By comparison, Oxford and Cambridge don’t add as much to the British economy as they should. ey could deliver much more if their most enterprising denizens were allowed to be a little disruptive. e problem with this accountant’s case, however, is that it will involve trade-o s. In theory, that shouldn’t be a problem. In economics there is something called the ‘compensation principle’: if I want to do something that will cost you £50 but gain me £100, then I should be allowed to do it and give you £51 for your trouble. You win, I win, everyone is happy. e catch is that in England, when the compensation is mere money, and the ‘something’ I want to do involves cutting down trees, this neat theorem doesn’t hold up. is country invented the tree preservation order. Our planning system elevates your grumpiest neighbour to the status of a Roman tribune, wielding an absolute veto over economic activity. We let newts, bats, and owls determine the cost and feasibility of building critical national infrastructure. No, mere compensation won’t cut it.

Ambition, however, might. Yes, this country is the NIMBY’s spiritual home, but it is also the historical home of the industrial revolution. Our national inability to build today is only mitigated by our Victorian ancestors’ delight in erecting houses, sewers, and railways. Even Cambridge, famous for its medieval buildings, is covered in Victorian laboratories, lecture theatres, even whole colleges.

We need that ambition again. We should build the Oxford-Cambridge Arc not merely because it will create jobs and boost tax revenues but because it will create opportunities, for human ourishing in those new jobs, for discoveries in newly-built laboratories, for families in new homes.

Cambridge embodies this ambition. e noble families who endowed its colleges with a mandate to pray for their souls could not have expected that those colleges would host the discovery of DNA or the development of Keynesian economics. ey could, however, have hoped that their endowments would bear fruit of some kind, far into the future, long after their deaths. It is in this spirit that I endorse the OxfordCambridge Arc. If bloodless nancial projections are not enough to convince you of its merits, think of the as-yet-unrealised good that will come from the project. ink of the compounding opportunities, shooting forward over the decades, created by the laying of track and construction of homes.

e act of building is optimistic. It invests the resources we have today in our descendants and future selves, in the con dence that they will put what we give them to good use. Embracing that optimism is worth some sacri ce today –even if that sacri ce involves a few lost trees.

built-up. We often hear about the decline of the high street or the vacancy of towns, so why not build those areas up instead? Given the loss of green space within the UK – do we really need more grey belt in the South East?

As a fan of a cross-country train expedition, I admit that re-opening the Varsity railway appeals. Yet local people have already lobbied against East West Rail going through areas at risk of losing biodiversity. While EWR is working with rural residents and promises jobs, its construction is a short-term scheme bringing temporary bene ts, with its longer-term ones threatened by a lack of completion, since the UK doesn’t exactly have the best track record of delivering similar schemes.

New housing projects are already in motion in the region connecting Oxford and Cambridge. Bedfordshire has seen new projects lack care in their design, with new housing and industry only connected by roads, rather than public transport. ese schemes promise housing and jobs but disregard deeper issues around facilities – areas of Bedford have been developed with no schools. I do not think a singular railroad will x the ‘issues of connection’ that the Oxford-Cambridge Arc aims to resolve.

Jessica

Looking at the Oxford-Cambridge Arc through an architectural lens, it is not hard to nd the scheme greatly awed. One of the rst things you learn when studying architecture is that the most sustainable building strategy is to not build at all. Although that is highly utopian, and in a growing economy not possible, I question whether a scheme on this scale is needed to provide new jobs or housing.

My concern lies with the funding of new and ‘innovative’ schemes that ignore social and environmental issues. ere are areas left in deprivation in places that are already

If this is the lack of care we have on our smaller schemes, I think it’s clear that one spanning ve counties will not care about the rural lives it will change. Perhaps I am being pessimistic – there is a chance that the scheme works around the current lives of the area without upending them for some capitalist dystopia. But, judging by the current backlash, it’s clear that people impacted by EWR do not want something ‘new’ or ‘innovative’, they want their lives left undisturbed.

e act of building is not optimistic; in the UK it is wasteful and uncaring. A quarter of the UK’s carbon emissions come from buildings. Our construction strategies overuse concrete and other building materials. e UK will not have developed sustainable construction methods before EWR is built, resulting in further excessive use of materials and high emissions from transportation.

For years, we have disregarded the environment for economic development. I wonder at what point we will stop. When we nally do, what will be left of the people and environments we have harmed?

In conversation with the Sophie Ennis speaks to long-term student

This year I’ve spoken to many hopeful Cambridge singles about their experiences with Varsity’s Blind Date. e majority of these dates –to no fault of my own matchmaking skills, I’m sure – have ended, or even started, in the friend zone. Although there have been no disasters (the worst case being two exes who were sent on a date together and actually ended up having a lovely evening), there is no denying that so far Blind Date has been largely unsuccessful in its sole aim: it seems that the students of Cambridge are still no closer to nding love. So, in a nal attempt to instil some hope in the masses, I asked ve Cantabs who are in long term relationships to shed some light on how to maintain a lasting love while simultaneously enduring the perils of university. If you, like me, are tired of only hearing about the horrors of modern-day dating, hopefully this article has the restorative power to make you feel that little bit more positive about the summer of love ahead.

How long have you been together? Since October

How did you meet?

We knew of each other before, but we met when he was working at a May Ball (a great 20 second conversation).

nobody ‘dateable’ in Cambridge.

What’s your favourite thing about your partner?

Definitely how supportive he is, he’s always first to read my article drafts and come to my events.

What’s your favourite thing about your partner?

What’s the secret to maintaining a happy relationship whilst being at university?

What’s working get making that’s

Also communicating, relationship

When the pressure of Cambridge/life in general/long distance comes to the forefront, we’re both really good at rationalising that the most important thing is that we love each other, and we can usually fix most problems by just reminding ourselves of how important that love is.

Having both productive and unproductive time together –working in a library together so we get to see each other, but making sure that’s not the only time you see each other. Also communicating, like any other relationship – especially if you’re feeling stressed with work.

Fun, supportive, trusting.

Where did you go on your first date?

We had our first date over the summer, so we went for a drive and then got lunch (and then I missed my original train home).

Do you think there are any common misconceptions about dating in Cambridge?

That it’s incompatible with working hard/ doing well in your degree, and that there’s

Describe your time at uni together in three words.

How long have you been together? A year and a half.

How did you meet? On Hinge.

Where did you go on your first date? Pho.

Do you think there are any common misconceptions about dating in Cambridge?

That it’s impossible. We know more people that are dating/have dated than not! We think people are just very dramatic about not being in long term relationships.

What’s the secret to maintaining a happy relationship whilst being at university?

Our secret is that you can be in a happy relationship and still have to overcome unhappy things – like, uni sucks, and other stuff in life is gonna suck! I think people falter at the first sign of trouble, but you have to know that being stressed about other things and feeling unhappy doesn’t negate the joy of a relationship. It’s just harder to feel overall happiness for short term periods, but short term pain = long term gain.

Describe your time at uni together in three words.

Comfortable, understanding, romantic.

the couples of Cambridge couples about finding love at university

How long have you been together? 1 year and 9 months.

How did you meet?

We met at a social in the first few weeks of our first term, being in neighbouring staircases, and started off as friends after that.

Where did you go on your first date?

Somewhat hilariously, he was interrailing in the summer of our first year and invited me to stay with him in Vienna […] I suppose you could say that our first date lasted four days!

Do you think there are any common misconceptions about dating in Cambridge?

There is a common misconception that ‘college-cest’ doesn’t work, but I think we’re testament to the fact that it can, as long as you maintain healthy boundaries. But then again, we have escaped the impact of a messy break-up so far.

What’s your favourite thing about your partner?

Describe your time at uni together in three words.

Fun, enriching, intellectual.

How long have you been together? 18 months.

How did you meet?

What’s the secret to maintaining a happy relationship whilst being at university?

Having hobbies and making a real effort of being your own people outside of the relationship.

Describe your time at uni together in three words.

We’re at the same college, and were vaguely friends throughout first year, but she had a boyfriend […] until she didn’t (I promised I didn’t kill him).

Where did you go on your first date?

We went to Kettle’s Yard. It’s one of my favourite spots in Cambridge and she had never been; it is now a regular date spot and I often buy her prints from the shop for birthdays and the like.

Do you think there are any common misconceptions about dating in Cambridge?

His: Her openness.

What’s the secret to maintaining a happy relationship whilst being at university?

Hers: The way he sees the world. Or his hair.

If you agree to read each other’s dissertations, maintain very clear boundaries about the level of brutality you want from the other person.

College-cest isn’t that bad, although it does require some strict boundary-setting to ensure you’re not living in each other’s pockets.

Expansive, expensive, warm.

How long have you been together? One year and three months.

How did you meet?

We met at the Union Freshers’ Ball, which is pretty cool because we can tell people we met at a ball. e Union Freshers’ Ball, sure, but a ball is a ball.

Where did you go on your rst date? e Punter.

Do you think there are any common misconceptions about dating in Cambridge? Yes (we have not had sex in the UL).

What’s your favourite thing about your partner?

His: She’s incredibly kind, thoughtful, and cares about others. She makes me want to be a better person.

What’s your favourite thing about your partner?

Hers: He is unflinchingly understanding (and trust me, I don’t make it easy for him).

Hers: He’s got an excellent sense of humour, and never fails to make me laugh (even in inappropriate situations).

His: The way her eyes light up when she’s in an engaging conversation.

What’s the secret to maintaining a happy relationship whilst being at university? Prioritise kindness.

Describe your time at uni together in three words.

Live, laugh, love.

Is Cambridge decarbonising fast enough?

Calum Murray questions the University’s

efforts

This March, Cambridge’s rst climate ideathon took place. Student organisers Priya, Belle, and Amelie, said, “We came up with the idea of it being an ideathon […] where we would come up with solutions, rather than oppose or come up with problems”.

Will Crook, from Cambridge Zero, who was present at the event, said: “there should be more spaces [...] for students to talk on climate issues”. e event marked an attempt at student engagement in the University’s mission to decarbonise its activities, an issue over which students and the University have often clashed.

Cambridge’s environmental impact is large – from emissions, both direct and indirect, to the pressure it places on limited water supplies. Its goals are ambitious – to reduce emissions of scope one (those it emits directly) and two (from its purchase of electricity) to absolute zero by 2048, amongst a number of other commitments, such as eliminating waste sent to land ll.

However, student groups say it is not moving fast enough. Cambridge placed 100th out of 149 in the People and Planet’s UK University Sustainability League. Cambridge Climate Justice, a student group, said that while scope one and two reductions were “encouraging,” not enough was being done with regards to scope three emissions – those indirectly related to the University’s activities, and the greatest of the three in quantity. Signi cant scope three emissions are generated by conference delegates. Colleges, too, are under scrutiny. e studentled Climate League of Oxford and Cambridge (CLOC) seeks to score Oxbridge colleges based on their commitment to sustainability. Its commit, saying that “while most colleges are trying to reduce their environmental impact, these e orts are often not transparent nor quantiable”. Churchill College bucks this trend, having put out an ambitious plan for decarbonisation. e College’s master, professor Sharon Peacock, fellow Dame Polly Courtice and estates and operations director, David

Prinsep spoke to Varsity about their e orts to become more sustainable. With 70% of their fellowship in STEM disciplines, Courtice said, “one of the fantastic things about Churchill when it’s focusing on sustainability is just how much academic knowledge we have to draw.”

❝

ere should be more spaces [...] for students to talk on climate issues

Explaining its ambitious decarbonising targets, Prinsep said that, by switching from gas boilers to heat pumps in college accommodation on Storey’s Way, “we’ve seen reductions of about 65-70% in energy consumption”.

Prinsep also highlighted Churchill’s e orts to manage its waste sustainably, an area the University itself has made major progress in – reducing its quantity of waste sent to landll to less than 250 tonnes in 2022-23. He said, “we have compactors on site which [...] reduce

sustainability

ments in fossil fuels have also been under intense scrutiny. In spite of its commitment to divestment, Cambridge Climate Justice alleged that “the University is still happy to accept fossil fuel funding for research”. A spokesperson for the University said that it “will not accept new research or philanthropic funding from a fossil fuel company whose business model is not aligned with the target of reaching net zero emissions by 2050, unless there are exceptional circumstances”. According to Cambridge’s research donation policy, these “exceptional circumstances” include particularly large donations, or those which cannot be secured from other means. Cambridge continues to accept money from companies like BP and Shell.

Regarding college endowments, the CLOC committee argued that considerably more progress needed to be made. 20 colleges have fully divested from direct investments in fossil fuels, according to the University’s most recent sustainability report. ey said that their ambition was to “support much deeper engagement between di erent colleges and their sta and student bodies”.

Student involvement is increasingly taking a front-seat in the University’s progress towards decarbonisation. If Cambridge is going to reach a sustainable future, dialogue with its students will be crucial.

the number of vehicle movements by 76%”.

Students were crucial to this success. Dame Polly said, “the inclusion of our student body on all of our committees is really important so that we hear their voice”.

versity’s invest-

Varsity

Vintage Varsity: May Ball edition

Olga Devine and Jaipreet Lully delve into Varsity’s archives to nd out how to have the perfect May Ball

Cambridge May Week is the stu of dreams. Summer sunsets and champagne by the river. Artisan canapés, black tie, and vomiting in a college owerbed. A 2004 Varsity columnist described it as “Christmas come early, except… without presents, and with the warm love of a nuclear family replaced by a deep sense of self-loathing”. What more could one want? Although signalling the end of exams, May Week can occasionally descend into mayhem and hangovers, and it can contain a few too many awkward interactions. To tackle any potential anxieties, we have collated some important advice on how to survive the chaos of May Week, taken from Varsity’s archives.

Food and Drink

A May Week article from 1969 opens by reminding readers that “May Week is a time of total frivolity”. is is particularly true of the food and drinks on o er during May Week. “Punts full of champagne,” “thousands of oysters,” and “twenty types of cheese” were available at Trinity May Ball that year. Less glamorously, a guest at the 2004 Robinson Ball remarked that “cocktails appear to consist of a thimbleful of Sainsbury’s ethanol and a hearty dose of Tesco Value orange juice”. To avoid, any food and drink disasters, and to get the best value for money, here are some quick re tips and tricks:

will see a few throwbacks from 2010s childhood, namely e Wanted and Ella Henderson, it’s interesting to see Amy Winehouse performing before global stardom, just 2 years before the release of Back to Black. Without a doubt, a headliner like Amy Winehouse would surely be lauded in any decade. But it’s di cult to tell which type of headliner is more welcomed by Cantab: sounds of nostalgia, or newer, rising artists? Either way, you’re sure to enjoy the dulcet tones of a future global star. Or alternatively, that song you loved from your 2012 iPod playlist.

Finding love?

❝The final piece advice:of Go mad

❝May Week is a time of total frivolity

“Remember that cucumber has a flavour that permeates and ruins any drink.” [1971]

Check every part of the site, because – as a 2004 Cauis ball goer discovered – there may be “a room containing a fountain of melted chocolate”. [2004]

Check a ball’s sponsors and food vendors, although it’s unlikely to rival Queens’ 1997 sponsors – Ben & Jerry’s and Guinness.

For pres: “If you cannot a ord a good champagne it is vastly more sensible to buy a good Méthode Champenoise.” [1971]

Headliners: Past or future?

A standout moment was the 2004 Newnham Prohibito May Ball, which saw “the critically raved about sultry soul/feisty North London hybrid that is Amy Winehouse” take the stage as the headliner. Whilst this year’s May Balls

One of the more eccentric features of May Balls was the exclusive May Ball Love Locket of the 1960s. Created by Alec Bedsall and Jack Cleland, the locket comes with guidance on how it is to be presented to the unsuspecting partner (or victim?) A girl is to “present her beloved with a Love Locket of her hair mounted in acrylic above an inscription with her name and college”. It seems Megan Fox and MGK’s engagement is not so unconventional when we look at 1971 May Ball love rituals –perhaps the Love Locket walked so that Megan’s thorny diamond ring could run. For only £5.20, your partner (perhaps too inebriated to even notice the peculiarity) would have been adorned with a luscious lock of hair sealed for eternity in a resin heart. You’re sure to be “the one girl in seven” opting for such a gesture. How romantic…

Flirtation and fashion

e 1969 Varsity issue opted for a slightly more conventional approach to romantic courtship during May Ball season. In the women’s section, May Week is described to be the “apogee of the Cambridge summer” where risqué fashion choices are a crucial exercise in irtatious frivolity. “To compete,” writes the women’s section, “be the ultimate in feminine desirability.” Although a weekly issue of the student women’s section, the article feels like a historical artefact, a marker for change in female self-expression. In fact in 1960s Cambridge, limits on the number of women admitted were rescinded, leading up to allowing colleges to nally admit women in

1965. e page displays an array of models in long, owery dresses with feather trimming, alongside tight cutaway dresses rather similar to the conventional choice for formals and balls in the 21st century. In hindsight, it’s eye-opening to see such a styling choice be marketed as “orgiastic-self indulgence” or an act of rebellion. “Bare something – tummy, cleavage, or everything. Try shine, glitter, feathers, or see-through.” e nal piece of advice reads “Go mad – just this once,” as though fashion freedom is to be brie y unleashed and then contained; a reminder of its 60 year distance from the fashion norms of today. Later stumbling upon Robinson’s 1997 ball, with an ‘Underwater Magic’ theme, saw an intriguing switching of gendered ideals. What began as advertisements for women’s cut-out dresses and employment as a “serving wench” at balls in the 1960s, shifts into an exhibition of male nudity at Robinson’s Atlantis. “Naked blokes were everywhere, supposedly representing various minions of Neptune, but really just there for the lasses to drool over.”

Ball Crashing

If spending £200 on a night of free drinking, food, and (usually) bad music isn’t your cup of tea, just don’t pay! 2004 Varsity has got you covered with a very serious, and very safe ‘Crasher’s Guide’. Instead of lining up for hours, and missing the best refreshments, one could try hiding “in a portaloo” and staving o “the boredom with a bottle of vodka”. Alternatively, it might be less time consuming to “fashion a walkietalkie with two paper cups and a 20ft string” and “use it to communicate to your friend on ‘the inside’”. Or, if you’ve got any Camdram credits, then surely suggestion seven – “ nd out the name of a committee member and pretend to be their long-lost friend/lovechild/biological parent” – wouldn’t be too hard to pull o . Godspeed, cheapskate!

If money isn’t a concern, but you crave attention, why not try “steer your parachute into the ball” and “skydive from 10,000 feet.” People will forget to check your ticket, as they will be wondering where on earth you came from.

If after all that May Week still doesn’t tickle your fancy, take the advice of a fed-up 1997 columnist – “get up and get out”. Some “cheapie” suggestions include, “Be a tourist!” “Have a ying lesson,” and “Leave Britain”. e choice is yours.

Small venues, big impacts

Ben Curtis takes a look at the best of Cambridge arts venues and why you should support them

It’s no secret that smaller, independent arts venues are struggling. Barely a week seems to go by without one much-loved institution closing its doors, and Cambridge is not immune. It was only in March this year that Hank’s hosted its last gig before shutting down, joining the ever-growing list of lost venues. e urgency of their situation is evident. Independent music venues employ approximately 30,000 people. In 2024, one of these small venues was lost every fortnight, and approximately half of all venues made a net nancial loss. e importance of pubs, clubs, and spaces cannot be overstated: they nurture and provide a stage for local talent, giving them an opportunity, and you a great night out. ere would be no Beatles were it not for Liverpool’s Cavern Club, nor would Northern Soul have reached Britain without Manchester’s Twisted Wheel. So, in times like these, it’s important to spotlight some of Cambridge’s most vibrant venues. Some you may already know, but all are worth paying a visit.

Clare Cellars

In fact, our continued support is indispensable. Because of the students behind the bar who run it, the students who perform there and launch their Cambridge careers, and those of us without a talent who simply want to see the newest in Cambridge culture, Cellars remains a diverse, vital, and vibrant venue.

Yard

DAISYCOOPER

DAISY COOPER

❝ e challenges faced by these venues are slowly becoming insurmountable

is is surely a staple for any self-respecting Cambridge student. Its narrowed staircase leads you down to the stone arches and pillars beneath the chapel: a perfectly atmospheric setting. Famous, of course, for its jazz nights there is always a wealth of artistic talent on show, from nights devoted to shoegaze, to poetry readings, and DJ sets. Its variety is its virtue; Cellars always o ers a space and platform for all forms of student-oriented creativity. It’s not simply the stage which is given over to students, but the entire space. Cellars remains student-run and stands as an outlier in the

loved as a homely, intimate gallery and has been a mainstay in the Cambridge cultural scene since 1970. It’s as if you’ve stumbled into the living room of a really cool person, and this closeness is seen as its unique quality by Inga Fraser, the gallery’s

ever-more corporate world of college bars. Of course, as a college bar, Cellars is perhaps less vulnerable to the threat of nancial struggles that looms over so many independent venues, but that doesn’t mean our support can wane.

Senior Cu- rator: “In the house you can encounter paintings and sculpture by artists whose work may also be found in the grander spaces of the Tate and other galleries in London, but here your encounter with these artists is so much closer, more informal.” It’s not simply visual art that has a home in Kettle’s Yard, but there are also around 20 concerts that take place a year, performed by guest musicians and student creatives. Such concerts take place within the intimate, art-clad walls of the home. To showcase student talent

in this way, alongside visual art, puts Kettle’s Yard at the centre of the city’s cultural milieu, and by their art loan programme, puts culture at the heart of student’s lives. Jim Ede, the founder, used to encourage students to knock on his door, have a cup of tea, and enjoy the space – and this attitude of openness continues to this day.

Junction

Since its opening in 1990 making the long, cold, and treacherous walk to Cambridge Junction seems a rite of passage for many students, but its inauspicious location, around an old cattle market well outside the city centre, means it may have gone under your radar. Hosting perhaps a more eclectic clubbing experience than the typical weekly rotation of Kiki’s and Revs, many students are grateful for

its whisking them out of the Cambridge bub-

would be forgiven for forgetting it has a life beyond such nights,

be an event worth trekking halfway across town for, but with the added knowledge that your night out is safeguarding Cambridge’s artistic future even better.

❝ Your muchneeded great night out is a good deed

Junction hosts over 400 gigs, comedians, theatre, and dance shows each year. On top of this, they have a dedicated membership scheme for emerging creatives in the wider Cambridgeshire area, giving them a space and environment to nurture and re ne whatever their act might be. It’s Junction’s duality that makes it so special, playing host to so many performances across so many disciplines whilst maintaining a commitment to the artistic vitality of Cambridge city itself. Of course, there will always

e Portland Arms

e Blue Moon

home than Junction, e Portland Arms is a fantastic pub in its own right and well worth visiting regardless of whether or not there’s a gig on. But a quiet night at e Portland is admittedly a rarity, as behind the bar there lurks a 200-person capacity gig venue, complete with full PA system and lighting. It’s almost a hidden gem, if not for the countless acts that take to its stage on an almost daily basis. Cambridge University’s Amnesty International hosted their termly “Jamnesty” there in Lent, and various student and emergent acts

have taken to the stage:

e Last Dinner Party and Black Country, New Road are two of many performers who have graced e Portland and gone onto major success. e venue’s well-equipped setup and popularity with Cambridge residents means e Portland is always booked out by those looking to hone their craft.

Across the other side of Parker’s Piece, e Blue Moon is another great pub that is also a great gig venue. It has a constant rotation of new acts encompassing indie music, comedy, and the best in Cambridge drag. is diversity and multiplicity of performances is one of e Blue Moon’s strengths, and through near-constant, and often genre-speci c, open mic nights, the city’s best new acts are always given a platform. It’s a personal favourite venue of mine, but its virtues are perhaps best encapsulated by Sophie Littlechild, a member of the venue’s managerial team: “We welcome some of the most creative people in Cambridge, whether that’s through the bands and DJs, artists showcasing in the exhibition space, drag acts, or creators selling at one of our markets.” It plays a major role in Cambridge Pride, hosting one of the after parties and providing an ever-welcoming space for the city’s queer community. It’s the thing Sophie and her team are proudest of, that it’s “truly beautiful… to be part of someone’s journey.” e point is, if a performer is not entirely sure where in the Cambridge cultural milieu they may t, or perhaps if they would even ‘ t’ at all, then e Blue Moon is probably the place where they will realise that they can not merely belong to, but augment the city’s rich artistic tapestry.

e Six Six Bar

corner

Just before you reach e Blue Moon, on the rner of East Road, you’ll nd the Six Six Bar. Recently remodelled and tted with a stage at its far end, it hosts some of Cambridge’s most adventurous and exciting rock and roll acts. From hosting tribute acts to rock legends in Lizzy and e Sex Pistols, to providing a foothold in Cambridge to Electric 6 and e Sherlocks.It’s an intimate venue, packing devotees together and providing the perfect space for a mosh pit. Its grungey and alternative focus provides a welcome counterpoint to the city’s perhaps over-eager focus on jazz-based cover acts, yet e Six Six is not guaranteed to be a permanent xture in Cambridge. e venue itself stands on the footprint of much-loved venue e Boat Race – where Oasis and Kasabian once cut their teeth. As such the Six Six is at once a hub of vibrant alternative music within Cambridge, and an enduring reminder of how easily such venues can be lost.

One such act is much-loved Cambridge band Den, who told me “ e Portland Arms has been a huge help for us; it’s felt like a big deal to play there because it’s hosted countless bands that have gone on to be successful, but it still retains an integral grassroots feel.” Its accessibility is its strength; a great space that doesn’t feel in any way corporate is worth our attention in Cambridge – a lesson most college bars should learn – and as long as e Portland keeps welcoming great, emerging acts, we should keep going.

And there we have it, a slice of the Cambridge cultural experience. As we’re all well aware, the challenges faced by these venues are becoming insurmountable. Whether you’re a seasoned veteran of these spaces, or you’re unsure where to begin, these venues perform a vital service. ey foreground local, original talent and turn it into a great night out. In an age where independent venues are ghting for survival, and our degrees have us yearning for a break, your muchneeded night out is an incredibly good deed.

Varsity’s 2025 May Ball fashion guide

Ellie Buckley and Gina Stock

break down some of this year’s major May Ball themes

After a year of hard work, essays, and exams, May Week is just around the corner. is stressfree and party-full celebration comes as a sigh of relief for us all, until one remembers the horrors of organising a May Ball out t. If you’re somebody who has procrastinated out t shopping until it was slightly too late, do not fear! We are here to give the rundown of this year’s ball themes, suggesting what you could incorporate into your out ts to ensure you are serving high fashion whilst being tastefully on theme.

Tailcoats, bow ties, oor-length gowns, and gloves are emblematic of the white tie dress code at Magdalene. With Magdalene being one of the only colleges that has a white tie dress code, alongside Peterhouse, it o ers the chance to engage with a long Cambridge stylistic tradition which has been upheld since Magdalene’s rst ball in 1911. White tie can be traced back to the end of the 19th century, when aristocrats and members of royalty used to wear it as a symbol of opulence at parties. It is the champion of formality, where attendees don wing collars and waistcoats. For those wearing dresses, a full-length gown paired with elegant jewellery and close-toed heels is ideal, while those wearing suits, shop for an evening tailcoat, black patent shoes, and a white bow tie – optional accessories include a top hat and white pocket square. And don’t forget your gloves!

❝There’s a lot of scope for experimentation

Branching out from tradition, ‘Odyssey of the Earth’ at Queens’ College encourages out ts that mirror the earthly sphere, focusing on the Earth’s history, evolution, or geology. Within this theme there is a lot of scope for exploration and experimentation, whether you choose to embrace the greens attributed to the forests or countryside, or branch out to explore other biomes like the desert, or rainforest with yellow, blues, or multi-colours. Beyond expressing the natural world, there’s room to incorporate ora

and fauna elements with a oral dress. Similarly, why not style yourself as one of the elements that make up our world, and go for a owy blue or white dress to imitate air? e world really is your oyster.

Homerton’s theme, ‘Luminara’, centres on light, luminescence, and bioluminescence. However, there’s far more room for experimentation as the theme encompasses owers, insects, and the deep sea too. Tumbling layers of owing dress could gracefully mimic a bioluminescent jelly sh. Iridescent hues, deep blues, purples, and greens would imitate the glow of bioluminescence, with metallics or re ective fabrics

creating a shimmering, otherworldly e ect. Sheer or glittering fabrics would play into the glowing e ect desired. Accessorising with oral jewellery, shells, crystals, or butter ies would make sure the theme is completely enwrapped within the out t.

Channelling Shakespeare, Downing’s theme, ‘Antony and Cleopatra’, encourages Grecianinspired elements of dress, like a loose, draped neckline, or a billowy shirt. Flowy, light, and loose materials imitate the climate, while wearing colours like whites, creams, purples, and golds would echo the dress of the play’s characters. If you know the play well, why not copy Cleopatra’s description as ‘marble constant’, with a marble-patterned, royal dress? Adding gold accessories like big belts and sashes, or oral wreath headwear provide the icing on the cake to match the theme, and, paired with some smoky, thick eyeliner, and blue eyeshadow, would perfectly imitate Elizabeth Taylor’s depiction of Cleopatra.

Fashion Shoot Co-Ordinator: Holly Hardman

Photographers: Samuel Li and Ryan Teh

Models:

Felix Armstrong, Zoë Brzakalik, Violette Chereau, Alara Nar Clayton, Ta y Dune, Sami Firdose, Chloe Hawryluk, Katie Marshall, Ria Patel, Maaria Rajput, Em Sparkes, Jessica Spearman, Ewan Woods

Drawing inspiration from one of the most vibrant and aesthetically intricate festivals in the world, Darwin has opted for ‘The Carnival of Venice’ as a theme, nodding specifically to its eighteenth century peak. Thus, the theme is ripe for extravagant interpretations, and leaves an exciting door open for suit-wearing guests, who could opt for embellished suit-jackets, adorned bow-ties, or even eighteenth-century heeled footwear. Of course, all dress is incomplete without a decorated mask.

❝All dress is incomplete without a decorated mask

On a complete U-turn from the florals and pastels that appear to be inundating this year’s themes, Jesus has gone for something bright, bold and playful. Their Instagram exhibits an array of vivid colours, which can be mimicked into a luminous dress, or a jazzy, flamboyant tie. With this boldness comes the potential to mess around with some fun sleeves, or dress length, or perhaps earrings which draw the attention completely upwards while the dress is more understated. Bold necklines could be the move, like a strong halter neck to reflect the stand-out theme for this year.

Pembroke’s theme, ‘Sub Rosa’, entices with

secrecy, and a more abstract angle leaves much to interpretation. The committee have said Pembroke will transform into a “realm where mystery and splendor intertwine”. Your dress might take inspiration from roses, thorns, and everything in between, and play with appearances and intrigue. Roses are both beautiful and harmful, so think black, red, and purple, and perhaps make choices that are bold and enticing, or play with layered and tiered pieces to nod to this multifaceted and mysterious theme. Finally, Corpus’ May Ball theme also leaves fertile ground for interpretation due to the vastness of the concept: ‘The Elements’. Think nature, the earth, and the sky, think leaves, water, and fire. Opting for block-coloured dresses and suits in theme with one of the elements is a subtle and classy way to bring the theme to your wardrobe. Alternatively, adorning oneself in bold floral print or abstract shapes of blue and green is a surefire way to bring high fashion to the ball, whilst staying firmly on theme.

What does May Week

Maya Kunchur takes a look at the science behind how exam season

After a year at Cambridge, even the idea of a week of freedom easily hooks us in. Perhaps you’re looking forward to getting outside and spending time in the sunshine, punting with friends, and making that day trip to Ely you’ve been talking about for a year.

Or maybe you’re getting ready to don your waistcoat and ball gown and become nocturnal for seven consecutive nights as you drink excessively, graze on luxury bu ets – yes, I’ve seen the oyster bars – and dance away that exam stress. Chances are the average Cambridge student entertains a bit of both these parallel realities. However, it’s the second one which is most interesting, biologically speaking. Let’s say you do go nocturnal and test your liver. When you come out the other side, will anything have changed except your bank balance?

response to darkness. Studies conducted on night shift workers show that disruption of the circadian rhythm can decrease alertness, memory and decision-making. In the long term, it can worsen pre-existing conditions such as epilepsy and diabetes.

Of course, in our modern world, our intrinsic body clocks have to deal with electric light on a daily basis. Short-term disruption can be recovered from reasonably quickly, especially as a young person.

er you’re checking it or not.

For one, your circadian rhythm might be a little confused. Circadian rhythm is an intrinsic cycle which helps the body to align with day and night. Hormones, metabolism and other molecules are synthesised, circulate and act at de ned periods during this cycle. For example, even in the absence of mealtimes, insulin peaks at three de ned intervals during the day. Growth hormone peaks just after waking up. And melatonin, which helps you fall asleep, is released by the pineal gland of the brain in

BROWNING

▲LYRA

Nonetheless, May Week’s disruptions o er an interesting window into what goes on inside your body or the unconscious parts of your brain which tick away alongside your watch – wheth-

A Varsity survey conducted in Lent term found that over half of Cambridge students drink several times a week. Let’s be generous and assume the same applies for May Week. Since alcohol is broken down by the liver, there are several major drugs it can interact with: if you su er from hay fever, that loratadine tablet could make you extra drowsy in May Week. And taking painkillers to cure hangovers between drinking bouts is a risky play. Alcohol increases your body’s production of an enzyme which converts paracetamol into a toxic product. Normally just a small amount of paracetamol is converted this way, but if there is alcohol in your blood, the concentration of this toxic metabolite in your body will be higher than was accounted for when the safe doses on the back of the packet were calculated. e complexity of the body means pathways of breakdown, detoxication, absorption and synthesis can all interact with each other so drugs ranging from painkillers to antibiotics can all interact with alcohol. Many do have serious interactions so always check the correct guidance for medication.

Have you heard of ultra-processed food, ke r or probiotics? ere might be one thing tying them together in your minds: your gut microbiome. A huge variety of bacterial species reside in your intestine and help to break down much of the food you consume which your body lacks the intrinsic capacity to digest. For example, in lactose-intolerant people, bacte-

Week do to your body?

and May Week affect your body – and how to minimise the damage

ria are able to digest lactose – only their chosen method of fermentation can have unfortunate side e ects. A very active area of research is the e ect of gut bacteria on mood. Since alcohol can change the composition of the gut microbiome, it’s possible emotional changes in the aftermath of May Week are a ected by alterations to the gut-brain axis. In addition, you may not be aware of the link between the alcohol and that unshakeable cough you always seem to get right at the start of the summer holidays. Drinking ve to six drinks can suppress the immune system for up to 24 hours and leave you vulnerable to infections, particularly of the respiratory tract. Ethanol is reported to disrupt many parts of the communication pathways between immune cells and lower the count of white blood cells: the infantry of our immune systems.

❝ Taking painkillers to cure hangovers is a risky play

Some reports, however, say that red wine actually increases white blood cell populations. Perhaps every glass of wine at formal is a year added to our lives? Unlikely; despite the headlines splashed around about red wine boosting the immune system, this remains controversial and the mechanism elusive. Scienti c consensus now seems to agree that no alcohol is actively good for the body, but red wine is better than liquor because of its antioxidant properties, which arise from its relatively high polyphenol concentrations. Despite May Week not being in May, it is actually only a week, which is generally too short a biological time-span to be in the realm of chronicity. However, combine you revels with

up to a month more of stress or sleep debt from the lead up to exams – and hey presto, extra immunosuppression: that cough is sounding a lot less like a coincidence.

So what can you do? May Week events can be really fun and are an excellent way to let o steam after exams. Most of the adverse e ects described would be extrapolated from a Mayweek-esque lifestyle (see: Jay Gatsby) rather than just seven days. But that ticket price included food as well as drinks, so make sure you get your money’s worth: your organs will thank you later. After you’ve crashed out and woken up at three o’clock in the afternoon, maybe go for a walk to remind your body the sun is still out there. And nally, my recommendation: enjoy the balls, but also do the punting and the daytrips. We only get a week, and when it’s over we’ll have too bad a cold to leave our rooms, after all.

Love in the time of mono

Bibi Boyce warns about the consequences of reckless saliva sharing this May Week

Aa sleepless limbo because swallowing my own saliva was so painful it’d wake me up. My only solace is watching Pitch Perfect. (See Letterboxd review: ‘ is just cured my tonsilitis’. It does not – acapella is very di cult while manually breathing.) I return to the GP where I discover I have a fever of 39.6°C and my tonsils are practically touching, upon which I am sent straight to hospital and end up in overnight on a drip. In the morning, the EMT doctor informs me of the reason the antibiotics aren’t working: I’ve got a viral infection, glandular fever. Mono. e kissing disease. Aptly named due to the require-

bad hangover, a couple of bruises and a head cold may not be the worst thing you catch at a ball. Let the following anecdote serve as a warning to anyone who is planning on exchanging saliva (by whatever means) during May Week. Picture the scene – every good night out starts in your local pub with sticky tables. On one of these sticky tables on this fateful evening are many half empty glasses. I have the exact timestamp of when the decision to partake in an activity known as ‘mine sweeping’ took place, because I chose to document the moment on my private snapchat story with the caption ‘#freedrinks’ at 11:09PM. I enjoy the rest of my evening (or what I remember of it). Cut forward around a month and a half, I have a sore throat which soon develops to become a rather nasty case of tonsilitis and I’m on antibiotics. Despite the fact my lymph nodes are so swollen I may as well have the mumps, I feel con dent in a swift recovery as multiple friends have reassured me that on antibiotics you start to feel better within 48 hours. is was not the case. e next ve days of my life are hell: I can’t eat or drink and exist in

contact, it has a ~five-week incubation period. Perhaps the abandoned triple vodka redbull wasn’t worth it? After another week of staring listlessly into space I was back at work. I was then faced with two months of an intense excess of mucus, and glandular fever a ects the spleen (which I could feel swollen under my left ribs) so, coupled with the snot, that was also a sober two months. You may think this all sounds awful – and trust me, I’d rather bathe in the Cam than do it all again – but I was considered lucky with my recovery. Many people end up bedridden for much longer than two weeks and some are run down for close to a year. Glandular fever isn’t the only disease transferred via saliva – the u, strep throat, gum disease, tooth decay, herpes and even gonorrhoea are on the list. In 2014, it was estimated that as many as 80 million bacteria are transferred during a ten second kiss, although only a small fraction of these may be harmful. So, before you partake in any risqué activities this June, heed this message. For me on the other hand, you can only get mono once…

▲DAISY COOPER

WITH THANKS TO...

THE VARSITY TEAM: EASTER 2025

EDITORS Sophie Ennis & Anuk Weerawardana editor@varsity.co.uk

DEPUTY EDITORS Hugh Jones & Calum Murray deputyeditor@varsity.co.uk

VULTURE EDITORS Ben Birch & Ben Curtis magazine@varsity.co.uk

VISUAL EDITORS Jessica Leer & Amika Piplapure

SOCIAL MEDIA MANAGER Phoebe PryceBoutwood socialmedia@varsity.co.uk

SENIOR NEWS EDITORS Elizabeth Bratton & Charlie Rowan news@varsity.co.uk

DEPUTY NEWS EDITORS Kezia Douglass, Lili Fairclough, Evie Selby, Haley Zimmerman

FEATURES EDITORS Jonathan Liu & Julia Ongking features@varsity.co.uk

ARCHIVISTS Olga Devine & Jaipreet Lully

COMMENT EDITORS Daisy Stewart Henderson, Elsie McDowell & April O’Neill opinion@ varsity.co.uk

INTERVIEWS EDITOR Eleanor Dougan, Jasmine Heddle-Bacon, Vienna Kwan interviews@ varsity.co.uk

SCIENCE EDITORS Bibi Boyce & Maya Kunchur science@varsity.co.uk

SPORT EDITORS Joss Heddle-Bacon &

Milly Kotecha sport@varsity.co.uk

ARTS EDITORS Emily Cushion & Niall Quinn arts@varsity.co.uk

FILM & TV EDITORS Salomé Gakwaya & Lara Glennie lmandtv@varsity.co.uk

FASHION EDITORS Ellie Buckley & Gina Stock fashion@varsity.co.uk

FASHION SHOOT CO-ORDINATOR Holly Hardman

LIFESTYLE EDITORS Shirav Medepalli & Jessica Spearman lifestyle@varsity.co.uk

BLIND DATE CO-ORDINATOR Lucia TrivassBerlanga

MUSIC EDITORS Daisy Cooper & Daniel Kamaluddin music@varsity.co.uk

THEATRE EDITORS Daisy Bates & Josh Pritchard theatre@varsity.co.uk

ILLUSTRATORS Lyra Browning, Erika Bunjevac, Iris Chapman, Alara Clayton, Daisy Cooper & Ezra Izer

PHOTOGRAPHERS Niamh Ca erty, Kitty Fay, Samuel Li, Abigail Liew, Ryan Teh & Wilf Vall

VARSOC PRESIDENT Felix Armstrong president@varsity.co.uk

VARSOC COMMITTEE Romilly Norfolk (Secretary) & Alice Mainwood (Junior Treasurer) ASSOCIATE EDITORS Felix Armstrong, Grace Cobb, Sophie Denny, Hannah Gillott, Alice Mainwood, Erik Olssen-Ferrer, Wilf Vall

VARSITY BOARD Dr Michael Franklin (Chairman), Dr Tim Harris, Michael Derringer, Mark Curtis (Company Secretary), Felix Armstrong, Hannah Gillott, Hugo Gye & Erik Olsson-Ferrer (Directors), Lotte Brundle (Guest) & Zoah Hedges-Stocks (Guest)

Cover illustration: Jessica Leer

With special thanks to Ben Curtis’ radio show, Queens’ College dinners, and the o ce sweet box.

VARSITY ISSUE 935.

© VARSITY PUBLICATIONS LTD, 2025. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means electronic, mechanical photocopying, recording or otherwise without prior permission of the publisher. Varsity, 16 Mill Lane, Cambridge CB2 1RX. Telephone 01223 337575.

Varsity is published by Varsity Publications Ltd. Varsity Publications also publishes e Mays. Printed at Warners Midlands – e Maltings, Manor Ln, Bourne PE10 9PH.

Registered as a newspaper at the Post O ce. ISSN 1758-4442.

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For details on membership or a tour of the Club house on Pall Mall, please visit www.oxfordandcambridgeclub.co.uk or call 020 7321 5110 Oxford and Cambridge Club @oandcclub