Chronicle 687

46 ST EDWARD’S CHRONICLE

Malcolm Oxley’s book, A New History of St Edward’s School, Oxford, 1863–2013 , published in 2015 to mark the School’s 150th anniversary, carried this postscript, written (without his knowledge) by Professor Blair Worden OSE, Visiting Professor of History at the University of Oxford, and Chris Jones OSE, Chair of Governors at St Edward’s.

and assessment in which, in his senior years, he was so prominent, but which inevitably were often conducted behind closed doors. He came to St Edward’s with a strong First in History from University College, Oxford. He was recruited by Frank Fisher, who was eager to raise academic standards, though Fisher is unlikely to have sensed how much else Oxley would bring to the School. With John Todd he formed a formidable, even legendary partnership in the teaching of History. He also taught English and other subjects and was the School’s first Head of Economics. He was Housemaster of Segar’s from 1973 to 1985, when he succeeded Peter Church as Second Master, a post he held first under John Phillips and then, from 1988, under David Christie. In his final year he stood in for Christie while the Warden had a sabbatical term. On his arrival at St Edward’s, Oxley’s effect on its intellectual and cultural life was immediate. The prevailing mood of the School, among masters and boys alike, was conservative, conformist, and class-bound. Prowess on the games field, a sphere of activity at which he liked to poke genial fun, enjoyed far higher esteem than achievement in the classroom or in drama or music. It is a merit of his book that it does not underestimate the virtues of that environment. But his own priorities were different. So was his demeanour. In a community that took its norms of principle and behaviour for granted he seemed to question everything. To the pupils it was a startling approach, though it found its moment in the irreverent mood which spread in the outside world in the early 1960s and which was peeping through the gates of St Edward’s. He was an unconventional figure in another way too, for his Yorkshire vowels set him apart from the standard accents to which the boys were used. It was to the brighter pupils that his cast of mind appealed most. The edge and vitality and voraciousness of his intellect was a novel experience for them. With time he made working hard and intellectual curiosity what they had never been: fashionable. On his retirement a volume of essays by former pupils was printed in tribute to him, an honour normally reserved for distinguished dons. Though Cowell’s teaching methods were less bracing than Oxley’s, there are a number of parallels between the two careers. Both cared deeply for the Chapel

his activities but gain no sense of their scale. The book gives a strong sense of the values he brought to his work for the School, but scarcely chronicles their impact. Both of us have compelling memories of the charismatic impact of his teaching on our lives and on the School. Blair Worden was in the History Sixth in Oxley’s first year, Chris Jones nine years later. So our first-hand knowledge of him from a pupil’s perspective is confined to the early part of his career. Very many of the pupils who likewise think of him as a formative influence on their lives belonged to later generations. Jones became a governor in 1995, when Oxley had been Second Master for ten years, and so has witnessed his contribution from an angle different from a pupil’s. But it is easier to recall the sense of excitement generated by a dynamic young teacher than to penetrate the processes of strategic decision-making

On Malcolm Oxley’s retirement in 1999 the Warden, David Christie, wrote in the Chronicle : ‘When a new history of the School comes to be written he will bulk large in its pages. Unless, of course, he writes it.’ That prophetic allusion to Oxley’s invincible modesty, a trait that has compounded the difficulties facing all historians who write on subjects of which they have been part, was borne out in 2015 when Oxley published ‘ A New History of St Edward’s School, 1863 – 2013 ’. Oxley who taught at St Edward’s for about a quarter of its 160 years, from 1962 to 1999, had an influence on the School perhaps as great as that of any member of the Common Room through its history. Only Wilfrid Cowell, a dominant figure in the early life of the School who, like Oxley, served as Second Master, is his obvious equal. Readers of Oxley’s narrative could not guess at his stature. They get glimpses of

Malcolm with his parents in Wales, 1950