Babel : Or the Necessity of Violence: an Arcane History of the Oxford Translators' Revolution (9780063021440)

Those were the happiest days of their lives. They had picnics of ripe, bursting grapes; fresh rolls; and Camembert cheese on the hills of South Park. They went punting up and down the Cherwell – Robin and Ramy got passably good at it, but the girls could not seem to manage the art of pushing them straight ahead instead of sideways into the bank. They walked the seven miles north to Woodstock to tour Blenheim Palace, but did not go in, as the sightseeing fee was exorbitant. A visiting acting troupe from London put on some excerpts of Shakespeare at the Sheldonian; they were undeniably awful, and the heckling from badly behaved undergraduates probably made them worse, but quality was not the point.

Near the end of June, all anyone could talk about was the coronation of Queen Victoria. Many of the students and fellows still on campus took coaches to Didcot for the train to London the day before, but those who remained in Oxford were treated to a dazzling lighting-up show. There were rumours of a grand dinner to be put on for Oxford’s poor and homeless, but the city authorities argued that the richness of roast beef and plum pudding would put the poor in such a state of excitement that they would lose their ability to properly enjoy the illumination.^* So the poor went hungry that night, but at least the lights were lovely. Robin, Ramy, and Victoire strolled with Letty down High Street with mugs of cold cider in hand, trying to conjure up the same sense of patriotism visible in everyone else.

Near the end of summer they took a weekend trip to London, where they drank in the vitality and variety that Oxford, suspended centuries in the past, so lacked. They went to Drury Lane and saw a show – the acting wasn’t very good, but the garish make-up and the ingenue’s pitchy warbling kept them fascinated for the full three-hour run time. They browsed the stalls at New Cut for plump strawberries, copper trinkets, and sachets of supposedly exotic teas; tossed pennies to dancing monkeys and organ-grinders; dodged beckoning prostitutes; perused street stands of counterfeit silver bars with amusement;^* had dinner at an ‘Authentick Indian’ curry house that disappointed Ramy but satisfied the rest of them; and slept overnight in a single crowded townhouse room on Doughty Street. Robin and Ramy lay on the floor swaddled in coats while the girls huddled on the narrow bed, all of them giggling and whispering until long past midnight.

The next day they took a walking tour of the city that ended by the Port of London, where they strolled down to the docks and marvelled at the massive ships, their great white sails, and the complex interlacing of their masts and rigging. They tried identifying the flags and company logos of the departing vessels, speculating on where they might be coming from or going. Greece? Canada? Sweden? Portugal?

‘A year from now we’ll be getting on one of these,’ said Letty. ‘Where do you think it’ll be sailing to?’

Every graduating cohort at Babel went on a grand, fully compensated international voyage at the conclusion of fourth-year exams. These voyages usually corresponded with some Babel business – graduates had served as live interpreters at the court of Nicholas I, hunted for cuneiform tablets in the ruins of Mesopotamia, and once, accidentally, caused a near diplomatic breakdown in Paris – but they were primarily a chance for the graduates to simply see the world, and to soak in the foreign linguistic environments they had been sequestered from during their years of study. Languages had to be lived to be understood, and Oxford was, after all, the opposite of real life.

Ramy was convinced their class would be sent to either China or India. ‘There’s simply so much happening. The East India Company’s lost its monopoly in Canton, which means they’ll need translators for all kinds of business reorientations. I’d give my left arm for it to be Calcutta. You’ll love it – we’ll go and stay with my family for a bit; I’ve written to them all about you, they even know Letty can’t take her tea too hot. Or perhaps we’ll go to Canton – wouldn’t that be lovely, Birdie? When’s the last time you were home?’

Robin wasn’t sure he wanted to return to Canton. He’d considered it a few times, but couldn’t summon any feelings of excitement, only a confused, vaguely guilty dread. Nothing awaited him there; no friends, no family, just a city he only half remembered. Rather, he was afraid of how he might react if he did go home; if he stepped back into the world of a forgotten childhood. What if, upon return, he couldn’t bring himself to leave?

Worse, what if he felt nothing at all?

‘More likely we’ll be sent somewhere like Mauritius,’ he said. ‘Let the girls make use of their French.’

‘You think Mauritian Creole is anything like Haitian Creole?’ Letty asked Victoire.