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Parade Profile: Megan Vaughan parade profile: Professor Megan VaughanPHOTO: W. NOWIKOWSKIMegan Vaughan (KC 2003) is Smuts Professor of CommonwealthHistory and a Fellow of the British Academy. She has carriedout extensive field and archival research in Malawi, Zambia andMauritius. She tells Alison Carter about her work.4Creating the Creole Island: slavery in eighteenthcentury Mauritius brings to life the complexways in which a completely new societywas formed on the once-uninhabited island(then called Île de France). Megan providesclose readings of the fine human detail fromlegal records, correspondence and travelaccounts. The island went within a lifetimefrom being a slave destination to being itselfa place of origin. As she documents theincreasingly slippery definitions of freedom,race and ethnicity in use before and afterthe French Revolution, she reflects backsome of our contemporary concerns aboutmulticulturalism and identity.Megan Vaughan’s work has centred onthe social history of rural communitiesand their responses to slavery, famine,disease and labour migration, and hasalways involved oral historical research. “Ifsomeone tells you that the goats sold by afamine victim changed into snakes whentheir new owners took them home,” sheasks, “what weight do you give this kind ofinformation?” This kind of question is herbread and butter. Although she deals withslavery, famine and disease – her accountsof these several grim reapers always havehuman voices.We are talking in Megan’s study – herrooms are in one of the medieval buildingsbehind the façade of King’s Parade, allnarrow doorways, sloping floors, steep stairsand twisted timbers. I’ve just been readingher moving new book about slavery inMauritius, with its detailed reporting of thefears of slaves and traders, and I feel I’m atsea in an old wooden ship.She deals head on with the slave trade andits economic preoccupations with mortality.In assessing the evidence for contemporaryattitudes, she turns to a revealing account byM. Brugevin, the captain of the French slaveship Licorne in 1787. Reporting on the causesof mortality (to a member, incidentally, ofthe anti-slavery lobby in Paris), he says thatthe real cause was not so much the terribleand prevalent dysentery as a very particularkind of fear. “What is most detrimental is the prejudice, inculcated in them sincechildhood, that the whites come to theirshores to abduct them, to take them totheir own land in order to eat them andto drink their blood.” This belief, he says,led to slaves literally dying of fear. But,Megan contends, the slave trade really was abloodsucking enterprise.“In East and Central Africa there’s a longstanding trope, which is that rich peopleare sucking blood out of poor people,” sheexplains. People literally think the blood isbeing sucked out of them. “When you ask,

The book is subtitled, Gender and Famine in Twentieth CenturyMalawi, and it was through gathering oral history that thegender dimension came out. “Women were saying thingslike, ‘Oh, that was the year when all our husbands left’. And Ididn’t know about that.” She then addressed what she saw asShe talks about Malawi with deep familiarity and fondnessthe gap in the ‘entitlement theory’ of famine. Nobel laureate– she taught at the University there for several years afterAmartya Sen’s Poverty and Famines (1981) was and is still verydoing her PhD (on slavery in the 19th century) and has keptinfluential. “If you can have a famine in a place where there’sup her connection. But her first contact with Africa was asactually plenty of food around, what you have to understand isa school leaver –she did VSO in Swaziland. She grew up inhow people access that food – how do theyLondon and Surrey, attending a girlsgain their ‘entitlement’ to food. What thesegrammar school and then Atlanticwomen were saying to me was that men andCollege in Wales. Her father was a“If"If you can have a famine inwomen had different ways of getting accesslocal government officer from Southa place where there’s actuallyto food and that in a crisis, women wereWales, her mother from the East Endparticularly vulnerable because men hadof London, and she and her sister theplenty of food around, whatmore access to the wage economy. Womenfirst in the family to go to university.you have to understand iswere more tied to their home and children“There wasn’t much scope for doingand less mobile, and marital relationshipsAfrican history at the Universityhow people access that foodwere fragile.” Megan’s working definition ofof Kent!” she laughs. “So I did– how do they gain theirfamine is thus a more social one. “Peoplemedieval history but worked closely‘entitlement’ to food."themselves say ‘this was a period when wewith anthropologists.” In 1986 shedidn’t behave normally’. What was strikingbecame Rhodes Lecturer and then, inthen, and it’s the same today – when there’s1996, Professor of Commonwealthbeen a crisis, especially in rural areas, whereStudies in Oxford. She remains anthere are very strong social and economic obligations – is theEmeritus Fellow of Nuffield College. “My work has been shapedreal shame and anxiety people feel when they’ve been unableby Malawi – because it’s one of the poorest and most ruralto fulfil those obligations. People feel very, very unhappy. Incountries in Africa, I ended up working on poverty.” Megana famine crisis, people do things they wouldn’t otherwise do,has been a trustee for Oxfam, sat on an advisory committeeincluding abandoning elderly people and children, or sellingworking on food, land and gender issues and was involved intheir children.”the work of The Commission for Africa, which reported in2005. Her work has dovetailed with and informed evolvingShe had personal experience of the famine in Malawi in 2002.academic discourses and public perceptions of poverty and“The first sign I saw of it was a whole calendar year earlier.famine, its causes and cures.People were queuing to buy bran, which is used as a filler ifyou don’t have anything else. It was a sign that something“There was a period in the 1970s when Africa was a seen aswas wrong.” As a European, was it hard to find food? “No, no,continent in a crisis of food production. Now that work isthere’s food around, but if you’re poor you can’t get hold of it.”being heavily critiqued for misrepresenting what was actuallyShe thinks the corruption problem is insoluble for as long asgoing on.” Politically it matters whether you say there’s a foodAfrican countries are so dependent on aid. “Any mechanismshortage or a famine. You can cover it up – or decide to call itof accountability is intercepted by the aid economy. In thea crisis and try and attract attention to it. And then, she asks,Malawi famine, some politicians hoarded food and then soldfor it to be called a famine, do people have to die in largeit at very high prices. It was corrupt – this was the nationalnumbers? Now, with the HIV/Aids crisis, it’s almost impossiblegrain store. But on the other hand the IMF had been tellingto distinguish a famine death from another kind of death. “Thethe government to sell some of it, because they thought theyimages we have come out of the big famines, mostly politicallyshould be operating the grain store as a market institution.constructed, in the Horn of Africa, with camps and peopleNow the international agencies blame the politicians and thestarving and dying of disease. The famine in Malawi is muchpoliticians blame the IMF.”more typical – no big camps, no food aid until late in the day,no people congregating so you don’t see lots of emaciatedMegan is closely involved in the Centre for African Studiesdying people because they are at home, that’s where they die. Ifin Cambridge, an interdisciplinary centre supporting Africanyou’re really ill and sick you stay at home.”institutions with a visiting scholar programme, and her currentresearch includes an AHRC project with Goldsmith’s CollegeShe wrote The Story of an African Famine, in 1987. I read it theon the history of death in Africa. She’s also just given a paperweek the report on the UK’s obesity epidemic was published,on the history of romantic love in Africa. “Not,” she laughs,bringing home the fact that obesity and famine are relative“that it was necessarily any less depressing!”terms. The fieldwork had been interesting but not terribly easy.“The government of the time in Malawi was a dictatorship andwww.african.cam.ac.ukparade profile: Professor Megan Vaughanthe fiction was that no-one was ever hungry.” She was followedaround by special branch, monitoring her interviews. “I wouldask ‘Have there been any famines since 1949?’ And peoplewould say yes, yes! But then others would chip in and say no,no – you’re not supposed to say that!” now, who is sucking the blood, people say it’s agents of thegovernment, but that they’re not sucking it for themselves butto send to Washington DC in a pipeline.” In the Malawi villageswhere she was working recently a young man appeared with apin prick in his arm saying that people had come in the night,drugged him and taken his blood. “The village headman madea fuss and the government was forced into making a statement,saying rather comically, ‘No self-respecting government couldsuck the blood from its people’.”5

The road to AgadirTen years ago, former Chaplain Patrick Magee (KC 1934) took up the offer of a Moroccan friend to live en famille inAgadir. He reports on a very successful retirement option.My friend suggested that rather than livingalone, I join his family, and for the last tenyears I have lived with them in Agadir formost of the time, returning to England nowand then. Agadir is a vast industrial city andport (with a population about that of Leeds),but has a coastline of 5 – 6 miles withexcellent beaches, which is a tourist resort.People are friendly and warm hearted, andhospitable to strangers. Their great virtue isfamily solidarity, a valuable way of life whichin Britain is in decline! A foreigner is presentedwith no great difficulties as the differences betweenpeople of different cultures are minimal. You need toknow how people are thinking and feeling and fall inwith their customs naturally. The main differenceslie at meal times. Food is usually cooked on thetagine system, meat and vegetables cooked togetherin a dish out of which we all eat. Instead of knivesand forks, crusts of bread are used by which youcan scoop up the juices with your fingers. (Knivesand forks are offered to foreigners!) Our main dietis fish (straight from the sea) vegetables and fruit– very healthy. Islam also lays much emphasis onhospitality. Friends or relatives arriving at the housewill always be given a meal or a bed – at any hour ofthe day or night!Patrick Magee (KC 1934)Tile Panel, Tunisia, XVIIIth CenturyPresented by Professor Michael Jaffé (KC 1948) inmemory of his father Arthur Daniel Jaffé (KC 1899)Snooker for intellectuals?Tom Banfield (KC 1962) traces his interest in croquet back to his studentdays. He makes the case for taking it up again in retirement.Most Kingsmen will have enjoyed half-remembered afternoons andevenings on the croquet lawn (and sometimes even mornings in theLong Vac), surrounded by the delightful sights, sounds and scents of theFellows’ Garden. I played purely socially when at King’s, and was neververy good, but I always knew it was a game I could appreciate at greaterdepth if I ever got the chance.Two particular memories stand out from the 1960s.The first was whenthe Visitor, the Bishop of Lincoln, had come to College in some importantceremonial role – and I was one of those inveigled into playing a shortgame of croquet doubles with him after dinner. He was dressed to killin a frock-coat and gaiters (sic), and looked as though he had just comehot-foot from Barchester stopping only to pose for a Punch cartoon. Alashe was not as good a player as he imagined, though that did not preventus complimenting him on his skill: “Oh good shot, my Lord!”My second memory was of watching Keith Wylie (KC 1963), aWykehamist mathematician a year or two younger than me, practising his6The population of the country is two thirds Araband one third Berber; but you cannot tell thedifference. They are strongly Muslim (Sunni). Islamis evident, with mosques being more prevalent thanchurches in a modern western city; but it is in noway oppressive. Islam is most noticeable duringthe month of Ramadan, which is very strictly kept– no food or drink must be taken between the hoursof sunrise and sunset. During Ramadan, I jointhe family at their breakfast at 7 pm, which is mysupper; thereafter I am given a full midday mealseparately; and then sleep several hours!The Moroccans are a proud people with a longhistory of independence, for they never came undereither the Byzantine or Ottoman Empires – andthus have no ‘hang-ups’. The only foreign intrusioncame with the French who administered the countryfor some forty years (but never actually occupiedit), and are generally popular. Morocco is a goodbridge between the West and the Middle East; andI feel that the more people from both sides of thecultural divide can meet the less suspicion and moreunderstanding there will be.Patrick Magee (KC 1934), a Choral Scholar, read History.Chaplain of King’s from 1946 – 1952, he was Vicar ofKingston upon Thames, Chaplain at Bryanston, TeamVicar of Bemerton near Salisbury from 1973 – 84 and laternon-residentiary Canon of Salisbury Cathedral.croquet single-mindedly and with superb skill. It was only when I tookup the game again a third of a century later (after a very satisfying ICIcareer) that I found out what an impact Keith had had. In his day he wasthe Tiger Woods of world croquet, setting new technical standards thatlater players have had to emulate or fail. He was the world championseveral times, and his book Expert Croquet Tactics is still in print. Sadly hedied at an early age.Croquet has been described as “snooker for intellectuals” – albeit from allwalks of life. I for one enjoy the peculiar combination of the physical skill,demanded by accurate hand-eye coordination, with the mental planning,necessary to build a successful break and make several hoops in one turnon the lawn. And I do appreciate the fact that the ball is stationary whenI hit it! The sport has enjoyed a recent resurgence following the unwittingpublicity given it by the former Deputy Prime Minister. A high proportionof active players are retired graduates. Britain is the current worldchampion, having taken particular pleasure in beating Australia 19-2 alongthe way.I do urge retired Kingsmen (and women too) to consider revisitingtheir youth, as I did, and join a local croquet club. Many U3A groupsrun introductory sessions. You are assured of a warm welcome, and achallenge you will relish, so do contact www.croquet.org.uk to find outwhat is available in your area.

Ivon HitchensIn this definitive study of Hitchens’life and work, Peter Khoroche (KC1965) who knew Hitchens well, drawson the painter’s published writings,correspondence and conversation tocreate a critical reappraisal of his theoryand practice. Ivon Hitchens (1893-1979)is widely regarded as the outstandingEnglish landscape painter of thetwentieth century. His work, immediatelyrecognizable by its daring yet subtle useof colour and brushmark to evoke thespirit of place is to be found in publicand private collections throughout theworld. J.M.Keynes bought three of hispaintings, which now hang in King’s.Khoroche charts the journey fromconventional beginnings to ‘figurativeundermine good corporate governance,undercut security and the prospectsfor democracy. “For over a dozen yearsmy work has put me in positions whereI could observe both bribe-seekersand bribe-payers at close range.” Shepresents accounts of major public-sector(government)bribery, and of‘gift giving’ – beit fur coats,moon cakes orgoats. She thensurveys currentefforts toreduce briberyand makessuggestions forhow to restoretransparency, concluding optimistically:“Surely this is the century in which the toleration of bribery will come to an end,the way the toleration of slavery came toan end in the nineteenth century.”Alexandra Addison Wrage is the Directorof TRACE International, a non-profit, antibribery business association.www.TRACEinternational.orgCan a Robot be Human?abstraction’, and surveys the entireoeuvre, still-lifes, flower pieces, nudes,interiors and large-scale murals besidesthe landscapes, a huge legacy of workspanning sixty years. This revised andenlarged edition contains a new selectionof over 100 colour images.Ivon Hitchens. Lund Humphries, 2007. 35.00.Peter Khoroche is also the author ofBen Nicholson: Drawings and PaintedReliefs. Lund Humphries, 2002.Bribery and extortionThose who traffic in people, narcotics, andillegal arms pay immigration officers notto ask, customs officials not to inspect,and police officers not to investigate.Alexandra Wrage (KC 1988) draws onher work before and after studying Lawat King’s, and as international counsel fora major American aerospace company,to document bribe solicitation, collusionand resistance, showing how bribesIn this book ofpuzzles andparadoxes, PeterCave (KC 1972)introduces someof life’s mostimportant questionswith tales and tallstories, reasonsand arguments, common sense andbizarre conclusions. From how to get toheaven, to speedy tortoises, paradoxesand puzzles give rise to some of themost exciting problems in philosophy– from logic to ethics and from art topolitics. Illustrated with quirky cartoonsthroughout, the book takes the reader ona taster tour of the most interesting anddelightful parts of philosophy. This title isfor everyone who puzzles about the world.“If it doesn’t make you think, you’reprobably dead already.”Peter Cave teaches Philosophy at CityUniversity, ymondcave@aol.comBooks about King’sThe Bloomsbury BallerinaJudith Mackrell tells the storyof the splendidly unpredictableRussian dancer, LydiaLopokova, who ruffled thefeathers of the Bloomsbury setand became the wife of JohnMaynard Keynes.Judith Mackrell, the Guardiandance critic, gave a talk aboutLydia Lopokova to King'smembers at the KCA Day in 2005.The Bloomsbury Ballerina.Judith Mackrell. Weidenfeldand Nicolson, 2008. 20.00.Bloomsbury & British TheatreTim Cribb tells the story of the influence of The BloomsburyGroup on English theatre through the Marlowe Society. RupertBrooke (KC 1906) was an early member and his friendshipswith Virginia Woolf and Lytton Strachey linked the new Society toBloomsbury; links were developed by George “Dadie” Rylands(KC 1921), who directed productions from 1929 to 1966. JohnMaynard Keynes (KC 1902) built the Cambridge Arts Theatrein 1936, which was managed by Rylands. This is the theatre thatPeter Hall haunted as a schoolboy and acted in as a student, inproductio

of Music, Stephen Cleobury, took the Choir to the Istanbul Music Festival in June have provided an excuse to show you some King's Islamic artefacts as well as to juxtapose one iconic building with another. (King's Chapel, completed in 1547, took over a hundred years to build; the Blue Mosque, completed in 1616, took less than ten )