Ecological writer Satish Kumar once wrote that ‘unless you know Nature, you cannot love her’. Likewise, if we wish to protect England’s green and pleasant land, it’s important to get to know why. People who drop fast food litter, pollute our seas with oil and hunt our precious wildlife, obviously were never taught all about why our land is so beautiful and precious. Oxfordshire is a mostly rural county set on the Thames, outside Morse-style Oxford city. It’s home to many pretty villages including Thame, and many people commute from here to London.
home to one of the world’s oldest universities
Oxford University is home to one of the oldest seats of learning (some escaping students facing persecution founded Cambridge University). In recent years there has been controversy over animal testing, leading to the founding of Vero (voices for ethical research) where boffins argue the scientific arguments for humane (non-animal) research instead.
Home the Oxford Dictionary, it’s also the place where Roger Bannister raced the 4-minute mile. Already an Olympic runner, the junior doctor clocked the time in just under 4 minutes, a record that only lasted 46 days. He went onto become a neurologist and married a Swedish artist, saying he would rather be remembered for his medical work than his running. Over 1000 people have since broken the record, the fastest being Hicham El Guerrouj, a retired (at the grand old age of 49!) Moroccan runner, who now served as one of 54 elite athletes in a ‘Champions for Peace’ club, promoting peace through sport.
the prettiest town – with ugly politics?
Henley-on-Thames is regarded as one of the prettiest towns in England, situated on the River Thames and near the Chilterns. Voted one of the best places to live by The Times, it has many independent shops and a popular boating regatta held each year.
One former MP is Boris Johnson, who as we now know, danced with others, while others nearby buried relatives remotely, to ‘follow the rules’, not able to hold their hand. The sitting MP has said he will vacate the seat (due to retirement), with some believing that Boris is hoping to fight a ‘safer seat’ at the next general election than his current one just outside London. But local councillors are not amused.
Under 2 miles separate my corner of London from the garden of Downing Street. I am today haunted by the tinkling of those glasses on that sun-drenched night. Their actions feel like direct assaults in the face of my family’s (and all our shared national tragedy). They can’t point the finger anywhere else this time, can they? After all, they brough the bottle themselves. Rory Kinnear (James Bond actor, whose family ‘followed the rules’ without hugs, when burying his disabled sister who died of COVID, the same day of the Downing Street party)
the nostalgic home of Inspector Morse
Inspector Morse was arguably one of the best TV series ever made (though the books portray Morse as a very different character). Colin Dexter actually studied at Cambridge, though said that he was indeed similar to Morse on religion and politics and also loved Wagner, beer and crosswords. But he said he ws not interested in cars, unlike Morse and his red jaguar. A bit like Alfred Hitchock, Colin made a silent walk-on appearance in almost every episode (he was part of the choir in the top-rated episode Masonic Mysteries).
John Thaw himself was a lovely-looking man, but did always look older than he was, due to his premature white hair (he was just 44 when he began filming and only 60 when he died). When the series finished, he was offered the famed Jaguar, but turned it down, saying (he drove a new Jaguar), it was ‘too slow and terrible to drive’.
It’s interesting to know the real stories behind the scenes. We all adored the basset hound (a real-life shelter rescue dog) in the popular series ‘Columbo‘. When Peter Falk was told about his new sidekick, he was expected a ‘cute dog’. Then he met a dog that ‘can hardly walk, he’s half-dead, he’s a million years old and he’s irresistible!’ He later said that ‘Dog’ would be as synonymous with the program as the cigar, raincoat and beat-up car. Today the bronze statue that stands of Peter Falk (who had Hungarian heritage) in Budapest also has a statue of ‘Dog’ nearby!’
The Oxford vs Cambridge Boat Race
This well-known boat race has been has been held each since 1856, bar the two World Wars. It covers a 4.2 mile section on the River Thames, a race thought up by two friends. The race is watched by 15 million people (in the days before TV in 1912, both boats sank as they filled with water during poor weather). One former rower was Hugh Laurie, in the race when his team (Cambridge) lost, after clashing oars.
