Oxford English Students and Applicants

So they don't make you work on a piece there and then at Oxford?
God I actually wish I hadn't applied, I'm THAT stressed!

So they don't make you work on a piece there and then at Oxford?
God I actually wish I hadn't applied, I'm THAT stressed!

Hello! I've had interviews at my first choice college. Is it a bad sign if you've been asked to hang around for another day or so in case another college wants to see you? Some of my cohort have been sent home.
ie Does your first college send home all their dead certs? Then pool the rest?
THanks!

This happened to me- literally everyone was sent home apart from me and I got extra interviews at Lincoln! I was told it's not an entirely bad thing because it means your college hasn't decided you aren't at all good enough for Oxford.. But who knows.

Hiya, so I'm in year 12 and want to apply for Oxford to do English next year, I was wondering about what colleges to apply to that are helpful for studying English? And I was also wondering if anyone here was already studying English at Oxford, and if yes what does the course offer and are you enjoying it? Sorry for all the questions!


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So every college does English at undergraduate level to my knowledge. St Anne's to my knowledge has excellent tutors, while St John's have excellent resources including a book budget for each student (fluteflute can corroborate or deny that). However, I really do recommend St Edmund Hall - I'm studying there and the tutors are outstanding. Lucy Newlyn and Jennifer Nuttall are both world leaders in their field (the Romantics and Medieval English respectively; Jenni wrote the authoritative guide to Troilus and Criseyde (alongside Barry Windeatt's of course) and Tom MacFaul is utterly outstanding. I'll let you perhaps do your own research on the course (it can be easily found on the Oxford website with a bit of searching), but I will tell you it's been superb. Intense and exhausting at times, but always stimulating and comprehensive, and a delight to be part of. Couldn't recommend more highly.

It sounds brilliant! Thank you for the recommendations, I'll definitely research further into them and the course, I need good tutors and access to books obviously so they sound ideal I'm just a bit worried about the entry process, I've heard it's quite daunting and the interviews are quite intense. How did you find it?


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I'm really paranoid because I got sent home, loads of people had interviews at other colleges and I didn't. Probably didn't get a place because I f***ed up my second interview.. Ah well, aiming for UCL anyway. Whatever will be, will be.

The interviews are intense, but that shouldn't worry you. Intensity is something to be embraced and enjoyed, not shied away from: none of the intellectual rigour and progress that occurs at Oxford could occur if it weren't an intense environment. I'd also add that intensity doesn't mean unpleasantness - the tutors are looking for people they can work with for three years (or more), not just throw on the scrapheap. If you've done your groundwork and your thinking for the interviews and come prepared and ready, 'intense' will mean a lively, thought-provoking forty minute discussion, not the sort of intensity one might get at an army training camp. I loved my interviews. It was such a pleasure to sit in a room with the tutors and get a chance to have in-depth discussion about literature - my favourite texts - with people that actually wanted to! I mean, I think I messed up a couple of times but it's not about being perfect or impeccably fluent; it's about taking that moment to sit and consider and assimilate a different perspective into your worldview.

Sorry, that was a very long reply. Are there any worries in particular? I just wanted to illustrate as unequivocally as possible that there's no way that they won't be intense but this isn't a bad thing, and the tutors are looking to bring the most flair and insight out of you as possible.

Oh good, that's a big comfort actually! I love literature (obviously haha) so I definitely wouldn't mind discussing that with professionals for a while! I think my biggest worry would be that maybe I wasn't prepared enough, or as well there are obviously rumours about Oxford maybe looking down on people from working class backgrounds like myself (not that I fully believe them, but when a doubt is there you can't help but worry)


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Sure. But let me clarify what 'prepared' means. It doesn't mean that you need to have read every piece of canonical literature ever from Beowulf through to Heaney. Nor does it mean you need to have formulated unshakeable beliefs about texts, literature as a whole, or what a piece means. 'Prepared' means:

-Make sure you've read an interesting variety of things, not just contemporary literature.
-Make sure you've thought about how these texts link to each other in depth - it's important that you show a sense of how literature does come together as a whole, not just be able to analyse one text to death (a la A-Levels)
-Make sure you're confident close-reading texts in detail and at short notice. It'll be essential for the ELAT and essential for your interview. Be able to say sensible, insightful, and supportable things about a text at short notice.
-Make sure you've read and discussed all texts mentioned on your personal statement. You'd be stunned at those who don't. And though I've just said 'be prepared to discuss things with little time', your personal statement texts are the ones you get weeks and weeks to consider and discuss. Make the most of that.
-Practice the ELAT.
-Practice being interrogated on your personal statement texts.

I can't speak for all of Oxford but the St Edmund Hall tutors couldn't give a damn what your background is. Hell, so long as you show that you're talented at analysing and discussing literature you'll be fine. I'd love to deny that background is an issue for all tutors, and I'm sure the majority counter against all bias, but it would be silly to assert unequivocally that biases don't exist at all when dealing with interpersonal matters. However, the main thrust of this is that being from a state school/working-class background, for the majority of tutors, won't be even remotely an issue.