Presence of great minds

SIR: I very much enjoyed Harry Mount’s memoir of Norman Stone (August issue).

When I was at university in the Eighties, I was supervised (a very loose term) by Maurice Cowling, whilom editor of the Salisbury Review. Supervisions were erratic and irregular but usually took place at 11pm in his book-lined study in Peterhouse. He would pour a generous whisky before dismissing the content of my weekly essay in the course of a few pithy sentences. This generally took about five minutes, after which we would both feel more comfortable and would be able to gossip about what was going on in the University (this was the

time of the Hitler ‘diaries’, a situation that caused him much satisfaction).

At the same time, one was able to steal glances around his rigorously organised library. All authors were ordered according to dates of publication and his shelves were a tribute to his omnivorous and catholic thirst for knowledge. I was particularly pleased to note that there was a section devoted to Barbara Cartland (though far from her full oeuvre).

Like Mr Mount, I benefited enormously from exposure to a true mind, and the actual subject of my theoretical studies (there is only so much one can take of the Corn Laws) was of much lesser value than evenings spent with someone who was generous enough to share his knowledge and take an interest in the young.

This was in the days when a university education was free and was not constrained by the need to clock in to lectures. It seems to me that this gifted us the presence of giants like Stone and Cowling, and that the current focus on grades and standing has left us so much the poorer – and none so poor as the students who now face years of paying off student loans at usurious rates. David Abberton, Chester, Cheshire