Talk:Balliol College, Oxford

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Didn't Lord Peter Wimsey go to Balliol? Can we add him as a fictional farmous former student? RickK 23:13, Jun 11, 2004 (UTC)

He is already there! JPF 23:35, 11 Jun 2004 (UTC)

Oh, cool. Nevermind. RickK 05:17, Jun 12, 2004 (UTC)

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This page is written in an extremely pretentious way, wouldn't one agree? Pcb21| Pete 19:49, 21 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Is it possible to be more explicit? It is difficult to respond otherwise. JPF

This page is written in a very pretentious way, one that is common for 'rah' type oxford-university students. Living in Oxford and having it up to here with these educated but surprisingly idiotic people it saddens me to find this type of thought and spirit on this page. It needs to be rewritten!--DragonFly31 17:33, 18 May 2006 (UTC)

I agree, and it's all the way through it as well, not just in places. I would advocate a full rewrite, but obviously I'm not volunteering myself! :) Nikevs 22:29, 30 May 2006 (UTC)

Contents 1 Wrong Master! 2 College templates 3 Pronouncing Balliol 4 New JCR President 5 Suicides at Balliol 6 In fiction

[edit] Wrong Master!

The name of the master, Andrew Graham, has been linked to a different Andrew Graham, who is completely unconnected —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 86.129.185.132 (talk) 20:21, 15 December 2005 (UTC) This Andrew Graham, is the son of Winston Graham the novelist and author of the Poldark series. He attended St Edmund Hall, Oxford and undertook research with Nikki Kaldor at Balliol. He was an adviser to the Labour governments of Harold Wilson and James Callaghan and had been a Fellow of Balliol since that period. He replaced Sir Colin Lucas as Master when Sir Colin became the Vice - Chancellor of Oxford. (by 4tonysharp@lineone.net)

[edit] College templates

I have created a series of templates for former students of Oxford's various colleges. There are still plenty to do, but if you want to add one the the templates to your user page then feel free. See Wikipedia:Userboxes/Education/United Kingdom/University of Oxford for complete list. Image:Anglo-indian.jpg Deano 18:15, 22 December 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Pronouncing Balliol

Could someone provide the correct pronunciation of "Balliol"? *Exeunt* Ganymead | Dialogue? 16:56, 22 February 2006 (UTC)

"Bay-lee-ill" is a first approximation. JPF 22:30, 22 February 2006 (UTC)

Actually, 'Bay-lee-oll' would be more appropriate.--DragonFly31 17:29, 18 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] New JCR President

The Balliol JCR Committee elections were held this Saturday, and I can tell you that as of the end of Michaelmas Term 2006, we have a new JCR President... Andy Mason. I can't post this yet, as the results have not been published properly yet, but I imagine it'll be announced at www.ballioljcr.org in due course.

Well done Andy!!! CPCHEM 02:29, 19 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Suicides at Balliol

I note with great sadness the reported death - presumably suicide - of Andy Mason the President of the JCR. [1] Everyone is vulnerable to the pressures of life at university. When I was at Balliol in the 70s, I personally knew someone who committed suicide there. What struck me at the time was that it was not mentioned officially. There was no counselling for those of us who might have been affected. It was treated as a private rather than a collegiate matter. Maybe things have improved and greater recognition is made of the impact on other students. Perhaps there was a fear that it was bad for morale to talk openly about student deaths. I am painfully aware that other college members have committed suicide. Should the main article not mention this rare but adverse aspect of college life? JPF 10:40, 16 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] In fiction

I've just seen that the Balliol College in Fiction article has been deleted. (I would have contributed to the discussion had I known about it.)

In any case, even if there isn't a separate Balliol College in Fiction article, we really ought to say something about Balliol in fiction in the main article. And we really ought to be able to make what we say verifiable, not original research etc etc.

Balliol's fictive references contribute substantially to the wider reputation of the college and its standing. Compare fictive references to Balliol to those made to Christ Church (see Christ Church, Oxford#Christ Church references) or the relative sparsity of references to St. John's.

So take the quotes on this link (which allegedly was the main source of the deleted article) [2]. The J.K. Jerome quote illustrates an attitude that is still broadly pervasive at Balliol as does the Yes Minister Freedom of Information joke. Balliol students are often instrumental in organising protests etc., often have "alternative" tastes, are usually very liberal etc, but despite all this there is always a suspicion of affectation about them and a vague half-hearted quality about their protests not widely considered to be present amongst Wadham students for example. This is only compounded by the large migration of ex-Balliolites into city/establishment careers... Of course this is all gross personal anecdote, and perhaps not even accurate at that, so would be entirely inappropriate for an article, but if I'm right in seeing all these connotations in the source quotes we don't need my personal anecdote, instead we can effectively get all these famous authors to spell out (in a NOR way) their feelings on the feel of the college and its members. Of course its not as definitive as a complete historical record of hypothetical "attitude surveys" or somesuch would be, but since its precisely such literary mentions that drive people to apply to Balliol in the first place, they have a semi-self-fulfilling quality, and are in any case at least indicative of this fairly intangible yet crucial aspect distinguishing colleges.

In any case, I'm adding at least a link to the article linked above. I hope others will work on re-adding a Balliol in Fiction section.

--cfp 17:12, 5 November 2007 (UTC)