Oxford
by Andrew Lang
- Pages
- about 114
- Category
- History
- Language
- English
- Reading time
- 2.1 h at 250 wpm
From the opening
THESE papers do not profess even to sketch the outlines of a history of
Oxford. They are merely records of the impressions made by this or that
aspect of the life of the University as it has been in different ages.
Oxford is not an easy place to design in black and white, with the pen or
the etcher’s needle. On a wild winter or late autumn day (such as Father
Faber has made permanent in a beautiful poem) the sunshine fleets along
the plain, revealing towers, and floods, and trees, in a gleam of watery
light, and leaving them once more in shadow. The melancholy mist creeps
over the city, the damp soaks into the heart of everything, and such
suicidal weather ensues as has been described, once for all, by the
author of John-a-Dreams. How different Oxford looks when the road to
Cowley Marsh is dumb with dust, when the heat seems almost tropical, and
by the drowsy banks of the Cherwell you might almost expect some shy
southern water-beast to come crashing through the reeds! And such a day,
again, is unlike the bright weather of late September, when all the gold
and scarlet of Bagley Wood are concentrated in the leaves that cover the
walls of Magdalen with an imperial vesture.
Our memories of Oxford, if we have long made her a Castle of Indolence,
vary no less than do the shifting aspects of her scenery. Days of spring
and of mere pleasure in existence have alternated with days of gloom and
loneliness, of melancholy, of resignation. Our mental pictures of the
place are tinged by many moods, as the landscape is beheld in shower and
sunshine, in frost, and in the colourless drizzling weather. Oxford,
that once seemed a pleasant porch and entrance into life, may become a
dingy ante-room, where we kick our heels with other weary, waiting
people.
A short sample. Read the whole book
More to read
- A Belated Guest (from Literary Friends and Acquaintance)William Dean HowellsHistory19 pages
- A Bit of Old ChinaCharles Warren StoddardHistory17 pages
- A Book of Remarkable CriminalsH. B. IrvingHistory341 pages
- A Book of ScoundrelsCharles WhibleyHistory202 pages
- A Brief History of the Internet The Bright Side: The Dark SideMichael HartHistory59 pages
Public-domain text from Project Gutenberg, Standard Ebooks or a similar open source. Copyright differs between countries. Rights holder? See our takedown process.