Hello, my name is Michael Arthur, but you can call me Michael Arthur. I am the Provost of this university and you are one of my children.
Provost is a bit of a funny word, isn’t it? It sounds like it a small town in mid-Wales without broad- band where the locals fuck leather sofas on the village green. Let’s get rid of this troublesome ambigu- ity. I am not a small town in mid- Wales. I am a man. I am only very occasionally in mid-Wales. When you think of me, you should think of a light aircraft smashing into a church fete. I am the light aircraft and your univer- sity is the fete. But in a good way. Every September, I like to watch the freshers through my office win- dow as I sit cross-legged on the floor. Then I go for a shit.
As I shit, I watch Chucklevi- sion on my phone. I wonder if you are proud of yourselves. Your hard work has taken you not to the suc- culently cloistered Oxbridge col- lege which you thought would finally validate your clumsy, rac- ist, sexless half-life, but to this: the (joint fifth) best university in the world (according to that one league table from China).
This is all yours now. This place where I shit and its glorious legacy - Ghandi, Gervais, Margaret from the Apprentice, that guy who put a bomb in his underpants and tried to blow up a plane, some people who still live with their parents - their lives are yours. It’s going to be a fun three years. I can taste the excitement on my concrete fingers. Put a coat on and wear sensible shoes, because Michael Arthur isn’t coming with you and doesn’t fuck- ing care.