The Oxford Playhouse’s new audio tour for walkers gives Marc West an alternative slant on our City of Dreaming Spires

Having pounded the pavements around our historic city for most of my life, the incurably curious side of me still can't help but wonder what these ancient walls would whisper if only they could impart their centuries of wisdom. Well, now they can . . . sort of.

We live in a place of beautiful architecture and revered institutions. But, what really makes any place unique is the people.

Over the best part of a Millennium, more than a fair share of the good, the great and the downright dastardly have called this place home - and Oxford Playhouse’s new audio tour with a difference allows you to walk in the footsteps of many of these radical characters from town and gown.

I’ve always believed the best way to experience our city’s history is on foot and this unique production stands testament to that. Clutching my map and switching the MP3 player on, I stepped out of the theatre’s box office and entered into my own little world far far away from the Alice/Harry obsessed tourists - to be informed, educated and entertained for an hour or so.

Written and performed by a stellar team of artists including Anne-Marie Duff, Glyn Maxwell and Margaret Drabble, this experience brings history alive like no other before.

Rather than bombard the listener with - let's face it - meaningless facts and figures with every step, this novel tour chooses to deliver a more first-person collection of monologues - these angels and demons feel like they're sitting on my shoulders and working their way slowly into my head.

To begin, I’m led directly by the steps of martyr Archbishop Thomas Cranmer on his final journey. On that morning 450 years ago, like this, the rain is pitiful and the light forsaken.

The very same amber bricks on Brasenose Lane pass on either side during his passage to the stake. Today, an ornate memorial opposite the Randolph Hotel commemorates this moment in history and leads our eye to his place in the heavens, but an inconspicuous brick cross now beneath my feet in Broad Street marks the actual spot where he was burned for his religious beliefs and teachings.

Heading down High Street, I next hear the ‘voice’ of Emily Wilding Davison – as she recollects her memories of the nerves she suffered while standing outside the Examination Schools before collecting her finals result.

She actually attained first class honours, although degrees were not awarded to women at this time. However, on this particular day, a large group of young females wearing mortar boards are celebrating in that very doorway with confetti and Champagne.

As suggested, I enjoy a short coffee break in one of The High’s many delightful cafes – a welcome opportunity to soak-up and reflect upon the story so far. It was in Caffe Nero that poet Molly Naylor first ‘found God’ and, fittingly, it’s here that her character recalls a piece inspired by Percy Bysshe Shelley.

The rebellious student’s controversial pamphlet rejecting Christianity was sold just a few doors down in what was then Slatter & Munday’s Bookshop and resulted in his expulsion from University College more than two centuries ago.

But, looking across the busy room, I’m sure I can almost see the young Romantic sitting in the window sipping the fashionable drink of his era.

“It was a thrilling invitation to take part and have a total freehand in creating my character,” said Molly.

“I hope participants will take away a sense of Oxford not as “the home of last causes”, but as a real hot bed of new ideas, innovation . . . and, of course, rebellion!”

CHECK IT OUT
The audio tour, £3, is available from Oxford Playhouse ticket office, Beaumont Street, Mon-Sat 10am-6pm, or 4.30pm when no show.