No time for short cuts
Kevin Fong gives the revision lecture that his students need but don’t want

Kevin Fong gives the revision lecture that his students need but don’t want

The coalition has angered many in higher education by raising the fees cap, cutting grants, making market reforms - and that's all before its White Paper. Here, David Willetts explains its rationale...
With not only Bleak House but even Peter Rabbit seemingly too long for a texting, tweeting, attention-deficit generation, Valerie Sanders scans her shelves for a lightweight literary canon and asks:...
We need constructive discussion of ways to get government higher education policy out of its current muddle ("Fears that Willetts' hellish week may leave debate in limbo", 19 May). However, it would...
It is time for the government to be more bold about university fees. British students who have benefited from private education should perhaps be charged non-European Union fee rates. In some of...
For once, I find myself in disagreement with Ann Mroz ("Since when is debate a bad thing?", Leader, 19 May). While I agree that debate is something that should be protected against the "anti-...
Any policy that allows the rich to buy university places should be vigorously resisted. Article 26 of the 1948 United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights requires that "higher education...
Peter Mandler asks specific questions and raises important issues ("'Big Society' a small part of our anxieties", Letters, 19 May).The Arts and Humanities Research Council allots about 35 per cent of...
The imposition by employers of detrimental changes to the Universities Superannuation Scheme signals their disdain for USS members ("War possible as USS battle is lost", 19 May). Their refusal to...
I would like to clarify that I do not "prize civic engagement above academic reputation" ("The lesson of hardship: focus on what matters - the people nearest", 12 May). Nor do I prize academic...
Roger Luckhurst's preview of the Out of this World: Science Fiction but not as you know it exhibition ("Other-worldly wise, 12 May) engagingly presents science fiction as "a device for 'othering' the...
Plaudits to Gary Day for his ungainsayable verdict on the UK ("Love hurts", 19 May). "Was it all to end", asked William Morris, "in a counting-house on the top of a cinder-heap?" Morris would have...
I suppose it was inevitable that a professor would write a history of chairs one day ("Sitting targeted", Campus round-up, 19 May).Peter B. Baker, London

Duncan Wu is charmed by a plot inspired by Pythagoras and a star-studded cast of goats

The high drama of the Icelandic sagas reminds us how little we have changed, Gary Day learns