Kate Fricker: “Would you like me to drive, Professor?” Watson Fuller: “No. Why do you ask?”AI actors images provided by DeepAI.
One of my most memorable Keele days, right at the end of my time there. Kate (now Susan) Fricker and I were invited to join the University guest pack at the Lichfield Festival, courtesy of Peter Held of industrial textiles behemoth Marling Industries plc.
Ironically, Marling Industries was best known for seatbelt materials. Ironically, because Kate and I were treated to a rollercoaster ride from Keele to Lichfield with Professor Watson Fuller and Mrs Fuller.
I was very fond of Professor Fuller. And I think he was also fond of us. He’d certainly heaped praise on one of my least challenging pieces of research a few month’s earlier, in his capacity as Chair of Foundation Year Committee:
Professor Fuller was Professor of Physics, so he really should have had a profound grasp of the potential physical effects, were a large object travelling at speed – e.g. a car with four passengers doing 60 mph on a duel carriageway – go out of control and hit something. Yet, he did not seem to have a profound grasp of the steering wheel most of the time, nor did he seem to be paying much attention to the road when, frequently, he turned around to us, waxing lyrical about this, that, or the other.
I suppose, as Fuller was a biophysicist, credited with vital supporting work on X-Ray diffraction with Watson & Crick, that his head was always in far loftier thoughts than mere road safety. Or should I say that driving without paying fuller attention to the road was in Professor Fuller’s DNA.
Mrs Fuller did not look terrified. Perhaps she was used to it. But apparently, on arrival, Kate and I looked a little ruffled. I remember Professor Philip Boden and his good lady taking us aside before the lunchtime concert.
Has Watson offered to take you home after the evening concert? Thought so. Not many people want a second lift from Watson, bless him. Reputation precedes him. Would you like us to rescue you? Thought so. I’ll tell him we’ve invited you back to our place for coffee after the concert. Easiest that we take you back.
We were grateful. And Professor Boden was good to his word, not only giving us a lift home but also providing us with some warm hospitality and enjoyable chat at Chez Boden before taking us home.
To the concerts. First up was a lunchtime concert at St Chad’s Church, Lichfield.
Joseph Haydn – String Quartet No 3, Op 33 (“The Birds”)
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart – String Quartet in G (K 387)
Very charming it was too. The setting. The fine quartet and the non-challenging nature of the music.
After plenty of hospitality in the afternoon and a migration to the Cathedral, we enjoyed a bigger deal concert in the evening. The Chamber Orchestra of Europe, under George Malcolm, supported by András Schiff, Yuuko Shiokawa and Heinz Holliger.
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart – Wind Serenade in C Minor
Alban Berg – Chamber Concerto for Violin, Piano and Winds
George Frideric Handel – Concerto Grosso, Op 3 No 2 in B flat
George Frideric Handel – Music for the Royal Fireworks
I must confess to have struggled with the Alban Berg. Always have, probably always will. The rest was easy listening by serious music standards.
Monday, 4 February 1985 – Busy day – did surgery – did referendum forum in evening – drink after – Petra came over.
Our Union Committee conducted “surgeries” in the refectories, on a fairly regular basis. The idea was to be accessible to students in a way that, say, being in our offices in the Students’ Union, couldn’t possibly be accessible. As my gossip columnist persona, H Ackgrass, put it, later that month in his signing off column:
The theory is that they simply don’t get enough visitors behind the closed doors of their offices, so they all go and sit in the refectories, and actually observe the swerving and other avoidance techniques that students use in order to save themselves from having to talk to these creatures.
You wouldn’t have thought that surgeries had been as much my idea as anyone else’s reading that, would you, eh readers? 😉 😉 😉 .
As for the referendum forum, I remember that the Conservative “NUS disaffiliation” people wheeled out a Scottish chap from a Scottish University – purportedly Labour yet pro-NUS-disaffiliation. Kate Fricker similarly yet conversely (on advisement no doubt) wheeled out a floppy-haired posh fellow from a posh university, who was purportedly Tory yet in favour of NUS affiliation.
The Scottish chap riffed about Union Committees being out of touch, sitting around “pontificating Nicaragua” for the NUS rather than looking after students interests. I remember turning to John White and wondering whether we had ever given Nicaragua a moment’s thought at that time. More than thirty years later, Janie and I visited Nicaragua and thoroughly enjoyed the place, but that’s another matter and another sort of pontification:
Tuesday 5 February 1985 – Union Committee in morning – busy for rest of day – went RingRoad rehearsal in evening. Petra came over later.
Wednesday, 6 February 1985 – Very busy today – committees etc [including PS&D – Policy Staffing & Development committee]– referendum – we won – got drunk – went gig.
I cannot find a reference anywhere to what this particular gig was. Where’s Dave Lee and his canonical inventory of Keele gigs when you need him? Still, we had won the referendum, so there!
Thursday, 7 February 1985 – Lousy day – feeling very hung over. Went to forum in evening. Petra came over – cooked meal in evening – very nice.
Friday 8 February 1985 – got work out of the way. Went to London and got back quite late – ate and chatted.
Saturday 9 February 1985 – pottered around today – went over Highgate late afternoon – went to theatre and meal very nice – went back after.
That theatre visit with Bobbie was to see Saved at The Royal Court Theatre – I have separately written up our visit to see that astonishing production – click here or below:
Sunday 10 February 1985 – came home in morning – had Chinese lunch – left for Keele – travelled up with Petra – came over later,
Monday 11th February 1985 – lots to do today – meetings etc. Cooked Petra some food later – stayed.
Tuesday 12 February 1985 – busy with meetings etc – evening also. Petra came over later.
Wednesday 13 February 1985 – busy with meetings – very tired today (fell asleep in Senate). Cooked [for] Kate and went to meetings – early night.
Student Senator Falling Asleep In Senate-gate
I remember my “falling asleep in Senate” incident very clearly.
Earlier in our tenure, Kate Fricker had fought hard for me to join her as the student observer on Policy Staffing & Development Committee (PS&D), which was the sub-committee of Senate in which important academic decisions were really made. Some Senators had objected to my nomination as a student rep on PS&D, because the Education & Welfare Officer only had observer status on Senate. We argued, successfully, that I was eligible to be an observer on PS&D by dint of being an observer at Senate.
Why is the above tedious paragraph relevant? Because the week before my sleepy senate incident, I attended PS&D. One item had taken up quite a large chunk of the meeting. The subject of the debate was something quite dull, but whatever it was vexed Professor Denis Dwyer of the Geography Department, who made a rambling speech for some 15 minutes, expressing what was destined to be a minority view, which lost the vote by some distance.
Come Senate, the following week, I was self-confessedly very tired on the day, having spent the weekend away and then the first half of the week in back-to-back meetings, some running into the evening.
When that resolution from PS&D came up for “discussion” – which under normal circumstances would be a rubber stamp from Senate as the matter had clearly been scrutinised and approved by PS&D, Professor Dwyer stood up and said he wanted to have his objections to the resolution heard. He then unfolded his several pages of notes and started to repeat the self-same speech that he had made at PS&D.
I remember that several Professors made harrumphing noises, as all of us who had been at PS&D realised that Dwyer was going to repeat the exact same speech, with even less chance of success at Senate than he’d had at PS&D, given that the resolution had passed by a large majority at the appropriate sub-committee.
I found myself unable to do anything to keep myself awake during what felt like hours of repetitive droning to no purpose.
I remember Kate telling me afterwards that she realised that I was struggling a bit and nudged me a couple of times, but to no avail.
By all accounts, I visibly and rather audibly nodded off. I think Kate was more than a little horrified and embarrassed.
The good news, though, was that my gesture apparently went down rather well with several of the academic Senators who were, like us, suffering the sound of this speech for a second time.
Philip Boden informed us afterwards that he thought it to be one of the most succinct and incisive statements he’d ever heard or seen in the Senate Room.
To commemorate that historic moment, I have asked DeepAI to imagine the scene. I think it has done rather well with the following, which was its first and only attempt based on a 30-word description:
I looked shaggier than that. DeepAI has a very tidy image of what shaggy looks like
Thursday, 14 February 1985 – busy day – Valentines, casualties etc. Did surgery. Went to ball early – RingRoad – went well – Petra later – me v bad.
Yes, despite my fatigue and the fact that clearly I was going down with something, I rushed around like a nut the following day, performed in RingRoad and attended the ball. Divine was the main act that year.
In truth, I remember little about that ball and that gig. The phrase “me v bad” is expressing the fact that I was feeling poorly later in the evening.
Divine’s biggest hit was “You Think You’re A Man”, which, pop trivia people might like to know, was Stock Aitken & Waterman‘s first top 40 hit in the UK:
That’s pretty much all I can say about Divine.
Fortunately for readers here, Simon Brooke, with wanton disregard of pronoun etiquette, interviewed Divine at Keele and wrote it up for Concourse.
