NO.119
T H E T R U S T Y S E RVA N T
A Housedon speaks
John Cullerne, Housemaster of Trant’s,
continues our series:
always understood by younger men.
However, invariably, by the time they have
entered VI Book, the conversation at
House lunch can be truly excellent. Indeed,
lunch often becomes an extension of the
div hour; or is the div hour an extension of
lunchtime discussion? This has caused me
to consider yet another meaning of the
School’s motto, Manners Makyth Man.
Housemasters give prospective
parents personal tours of the School with
lots of opportunity to answer questions as
they arise. Div, our USP, often figures in
these conversations.
During a div hour last term I came
across a remarkable illustration on the
cover of The New Yorker of October 1969.
It’s a Saul Steinberg cartoon of what looks
to be a shady figure of a man, rendered in
Pointillism, looking at a painting by
George Braque. Above the figure is a
thought bubble containing the stream of
mental imagery provoked by the picture:
‘Braque, baroque, barrack, bark, poodle,
Suzanne R., 68th Street,….’ begins a
stream of consciousness with association
after association, and if you study the
cartoon you learn quite a lot about the
man. It reminded me of how we are in
constant dialogue with our environment mapping ideas and meanings on to what is
external to us, which in turn alters the
meaning with which we imbue the
external. But of course, my own stream of
consciousness began to gather pace, and I
began to wonder how in two terms we had
passed from Don Taylor’s Roses of Eyam to
Daniel Dennett’s Consciousness Explained
and hence to the Steinberg cartoon.
And, just as the speech bubble in the
Steinberg cartoon told you a great deal
about the man, so our Div course informs
about our div – we have a couple of
historians and political scientists, modern
linguists, geographers, economists, natural
scientists and a medic. How we move from
one topic to another is due in part to the
div don’s prepared material, and in part to
the ensuing discussions and subsequent
conclusions. The Pointillism of the shady
figure cartoon suggests that the man is a
sum of parts; this is so true of the div as well.
This approach to learning can see
Wykehamists at their very best. By the
time they reach VI Book 1, many of the
boys are articulate and well read. The
potential for the mutual development of
both the don and the pupils is huge: the
preparation to teach a course of Div
involves reading all the possible books
you might want to use and it is an
immensely rewarding experience for
someone who loves to learn: you do your
research, then you try out your new-found
knowledge on an audience that will test it
and more than likely improve it.
But, I wonder if there is something
else that is less obvious, yet just as
important? Maybe Wykehamists develop
their distinctive self-confidence because
they are taught every day by a don, who
they know is a non-specialist making an
attempt to pick up the rudiments of an
unfamiliar field? That can-do attitude to
study and conversation comes to full
fruition at university: indeed, I often find
myself describing Winchester as a miniuniversity. Could it be that this is why we
call ourselves dons?
The convivial way we eat together has
much to do with this as well. This is not
6
The Headmaster wrote some time
ago that this motto tells us that ‘our task is
to remind the current generation of
Wykehamists that mental courage and
probity do matter and that society’s values
should not be accepted uncritically. Our
duty is to equip the men with the
confidence and competence they need to
help their society to recover its moral and
spiritual integrity, for their education will
bear no fruit if they are not imbued with
will and the will to action.’
This is an inspiring statement of our
aim, but I wonder if the motto also tells us
how to achieve it. When one enters into
a discussion there are rules for how things
proceed: manners have much to do with
these rules, and if we are to get the very
best out of each other in our discursive
approach, the way we do this is
paramount. We must also have lots of
opportunity: occasionally I pause at lunch
and look around and I can’t help thinking
that, as well as enjoying good food, the
men are also honing their skills to get the
best out of each other in the div room.
Indeed, so much importance is placed on
this up to books that the termly reports for
a quiet boy are full of pleas for him to
make more of classroom discussion.
Could it be then that House lunch
does for us what Harkness tables do for
some US schools? These are named after
the American oil magnate and
philanthropist Edward Harkness, who
described their use as follows: ‘what I have