Editors’ Letters
Stephanie
‘At Durham, tradition is inescapable. It resides in the old buildings, the formal gowns, and the quiet pressure to follow the paths of academic achievement that were laid out long before we arrived. In a space like university, where we are constantly becoming, it can feel like both a scaffolding and a cage, both comforting and claustrophobic. The theme of 'tradition' prompts such a personal response from each writer, and it has been so interesting to see how it was interpreted. Tradition, after all, is not static – it is rewritten each time we retell a story, reimagine the past, or choose to begin again. Working on this issue has been such a rewarding experience, and I am excited to imagine the thought-provoking submissions we will receive next term’.
Alexei
Near where I live, people have been celebrating the Festival of Fire for centuries. They will keep going long after we’re all gone. Tradition is what we leave behind, for better or for worse, and is what people remember us by - the maypole dance is all that’s left of a much larger Pagan ritual, the literary tradition the reason we remember Shakespeare as well as Seneca. Whether in a fond remembrance or as a sharpened spear of resistance to change, tradition is often the past made solid.
Nowadays, tradition is a call to a time pre-internet, when time didn’t move as fast, supposedly. But the “Good Old Days” are often viewed with rose-tinted glasses: who wants a return to tradition, and who would rather keep moving? An uncertain word, filled with nostalgia but also trauma; if it takes a village to raise a child, tradition is what the child inherits.