Saturday, December 12, 2009

Why The Principal Knows Everything

I’m always the last to figure things out. But the clues were all around me:

Fact 1: Dame Fiona, the principal of Somerville college Oxford, seems to know everything that goes on within college. I always attributed this to her particularly acute perception –- on account of the fact that she was trained as a Psychiatrist.

Fact 2: Dame Fiona’s cat, Pogo, freely wanders the entire college, frequently unobserved. Yesterday he was sitting amongst the high school students as they waited for their admissions interviews.



Fact 3: I have never seen Fiona and Pogo in the same place at the same time... except in this very famous painting of the two of them that hangs in the great Hall.

Yes, now it is obvious: Pogo is Fiona’s alter-ego. With appropriate credit to J. K. Rowling, Fiona is obviously an Animagus, akin to one of my favorite characters Minerva McGonagall who also turns into a cat, and who also is the head of a house… coincindence? Hmmmm...

The painting is painted by Susannah Fiennes, who is the cousin of Ralph Fiennes, who plays Lord Voldemort in the films. Another coincidence? Hmmm... See correction in comments section.

[Photo Credit: Christiane Riedinger].

4 comments:

Unknown said...

Hmm. So how about that day Pogo was sitting outside your office when you arrived, and then spent a long time sitting on your shoulder inside your office. Still think that was a lucky coincidence..?

Steve said...

Obviously Pogo needed the appropriate vantage point to be able to see what I was doing! Can't see much from the floor, now can we?

Anonymous said...

The painting is actually by Thomas Leveritt.

Steve said...

Thank you for correcting my error. There is another painting of Dame Fiona by Suzanna Fiennes, which you can see here

http://www.susannahfiennes.com/Dr%20Fiona%20Caldicott%201997%20Royal%20College%20of%20Psychiatrists,%20Lond%20%282%29.jpg