Artist of the Week: Phoebe Holmes-Simeon
Phoebe Holmes-Simeon, also known as Phoebe Blue, is a singer, songwriter, bassist, and composer. Tell us a bit about yourself. I’m a first-year Classicist studying at Balliol. I mainly sing and play electric bass, but I write and produce music both for myself and other musicians too. I was kee
The Isis Interviews Robert Bristow
I’m sitting under two huge portraits of Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton, waiting to speak to Robert Bristow, theatre manager of the Burton Taylor studio. This is the space which serves all of Oxford’s budding dramatists, donated by Richard Burton, who performed at the Playhouse as a student.
Review: Entertaining Mr Sloane
As I take my ringside seat in the Burton Taylor Studio, I get the sense that I am about to witness a fight. The setting of chintzy sofas, ceramic lamps, and plated crumpets – the picture of dreary 1960s domesticity – seems an unlikely place for a brawl. But ‘My Generation’ by The Who crackle
Artist of the Week: Max Morgan
Max Morgan is a writer and director. Tell us a bit about yourself. I’m a second year at Christ Church where I study English. Since arriving at Oxford I’ve ADed two plays and directed Jez Butterworth’s Mojo and Fêtid, both produced through Nocturne Productions which I co-founded
In Conversation with Henry Dimbleby
What would it look like if you got fast food in heaven? What if food was not only accessible and affordable, but also really good for you and really good? This was the drive behind Leon, Henry Dimbleby’s restaurant chain, beloved by the British public. Now, Dimbleby is taking his ambitions for an
The Case of Karagarga
The modern cinematic experience faces a sustained dilemma. Once offering new models of seeing intended to tempt back waning audiences, the cinematic spectacle has become a parody of itself. An ethics of experience has supplanted film-viewing itself in the discourse surrounding the medium. Martin Sco
Giving Ukrainian Literature Its Due
As Ukraine faced renewed invasion by Russian forces in February 2022, the world’s gaze fixed on the nation with a new intensity. Swept into the spotlight amid a flood of battlefield reports, Ukrainian culture was recognised abroad in a way it had never been before. Exhibitions, concerts, bookshop
Itadakimasu
では、ゆっくり味わいましょう。 Dewa, yukkuri ajiwaimashō, or “Well then, let’s enjoy this slowly”, I recall my grandmother saying to me over tea before watching her daily dose of travel shows. While I was living with her, the two of us would sit down every afternoon on the zabu
Review: Blithe Spirit
Noel Coward’s Blithe Spirit is an entertaining reminder of why going to the theatre is so much fun. The writer Charles Condomine, seeking inspiration for his next novel in the artificial performance of the occult, invites the medium Madame Arcati to host a very theatrical séance in his living ro