Letters from Oxford — Summer Reading 2023

Summer is nearly here and I’m counting down just four months until I officially start my MSt program in October. It’s been 31 years since I graduated from college with a BA Music, but reading from a wide variety of genres has always appealed to me. I was excited to receive a list of suggested reading and ready to get started right away.

The list sent to us has a caveat: read what interests you or what you feel you need to know, but don’t try to tackle the entire thing before the term begins. I find book restraint a challenge, but then there are only so many days ahead of me. I needed to be selective. What you see in the photo are the books I’ve chosen, with The Blazing World being the exception—it wasn’t on the list. It’s a brand-new publication, covering England’s revolutionary era from 1603-1689.

The books

Philosophy: A Very Short Introduction, Edward Craig

Architecture: A Very Short Introduction, Andrew Ballantyne

Eighteenth-Century Britain: A Very Short Introduction, Paul Langford

Nineteenth-Century Britain: A Very Short Introduction, Christopher Harvie and H.C.G. Matthew

Dictionary of Literary Terms and Literary Theory, Penguin Reference Library

The Art of Art History, Donald Preziosi

The Oxford Handbook of Interdisciplinarity, Robert Frodeman, Julie Thompson Klein, Carl Mitcham

Unfinished Empire: The Global Expansion of Britain, John Darwin

Have you read any of the books I’m reading? Would you like to join me and discuss any of them? Let me know and we can read together!

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Letters from Oxford - How This Middle-Aged Woman Got In

Go back briefly with me to the spring of 1992. Married for just over 9 months, I stood graduating with a bachelor’s degree that would be used mildly in its specificity, but broadly in its influence on my life and the education of my children. The plan was to pursue a master’s degree after Fletch finished dental school, but by then we were raising two little boys and hoping to have more.

The story gets complicated from here — deep dives into religiosity and an emphasis on playing by the rules of a narrow and extra-Biblical paradigm. For a decade, our lives were bound by what we were being told within that legalistic community, but there were nudges and gentle reminders and really loud wake-up calls that finally moved us out of the weird worlds of homeschool-only, big family, one-way-to-do-life Evangelicalism. Thank God.

I spent 25 years homeschooling our 8 to one extent or another, and I loved most of it. I mean, there were days I wanted to walk out the door and sit poolside with a margarita, but that’s indicative of the long range of any career.

And then the timing was right. Our youngest two (now 16 and 15) are in high school, and I have worked myself out of homeschooling. The potential for a new path suddenly opened up and here I am, at 52 years old, heading to graduate school in October.

I was accepted by the University of Oxford. It wasn’t out of the blue by any means, but it still stunned me the morning the email arrived and I spent that week tripping through my disbelief. My plan at this point in the journey is to record the next two years of this experience here, and I’d love for you to come along.

HOW IT STARTED

It started with a search for courses that could help me boost my experience in literary analysis and theory, which led me to Oxford’s Continuing Education offerings. As I read the site, I quickly realized that I could eventually apply to a master’s program there, but that I needed to make sure this was a school and department I really wanted to be a part of. Both my late brother and a dear friend who chairs the art department at a prestigious university encouraged me to think about where I wanted to be—a master’s program needs to fit you, the student, as much as you need to be a good fit for the program.

After four literature courses, I knew the Master of Studies in Literature and Arts was a program I was highly interested in and probably well-suited for.

How it’s going

Along the way, I’ve had cheerleaders. Don’t minimize the impact of friends and family who will be there to encourage you when the reading is overwhelming and the essay is due. In my case, I married a guy who told me that I’d given 30 years serving our family and now it’s my turn to follow my passion. He even told me I should consider moving away for the year if I needed to—lots of couples live apart to accomplish a short-term goal and he wanted me to be able to dive in unencumbered. I chose a two-year part-time program that requires me to be at the university several times a year, but I’ll be studying from home where I can stay close to a few high schoolers who still need their mom.

There’s a lot more to say about the process, from coursework to passing points/grades to applications and interviews. If you’re planning on applying to grad school as an older or returning student, I’m happy to share. In the meantime, I’m reading a wide variety of books, from those I don’t think I’ll have time for over the next two academic years to those I think might help me as a grad student. If you are a grad or doctoral student, drop me your hints in the comments, please!

Radcliffe Camera, Oxford - Oct 2006, wikicommons

Want to read Anna Karenina with me this summer? I’m offering a free online book club for anyone who would like to tackle Tolstoy. You can send me an email to join the group here.

Until next time,

Kendra

Hello and Let's Keep in Touch a Different Way

Happy holiday weekend, if you’re in the States. If you’re not, hey! Enjoy the weekend.

I have enjoyed writing and connecting all these years through my various blogs and the podcast, but I am just not turning out as many posts as I used to—only four this year. All the marketing people loudly proclaim that we must maintain email lists because social media platforms are fickle (Twitter ***cough), so I’ve held on to mine for years now, despite the fact that I’m not building anything. I don’t need a platform and I’m not selling anything except freedom.

As of this week, I’ll be discontinuing my email newsletter. This is purely an economic decision because the money out doesn’t equal the number of posts I’m writing and sending. I will miss connecting here, although I will likely continue to post when there is something to say or some way to help. If you ever think about it, pop over here and see if there’s anything new.

You will still be able to contact me through my email, so don’t hesitate if you need to connect. I’m not really active on Facebook and we’ll see where Twitter goes, but I do post pretty regularly on my Instagram accounts:

@kendraefletcher (general life stuff)
@kendrafletcherteaches (all about classes I teach, help for parents and students, and bookish content)
@marmeemakes (knitting projects because it’s my one skill)

Please comment below if you’d like. I so appreciate all of the connections I’ve made here over the years, and I still passionately believe in vibrant, living faith without the mess of religious rules and behavior. More of Christ, less of a platform ;)

That’s a pretty impressive taco tongue.