Professor Anthony Clifford Grayling is on top of the world. Well, Bloomsbury. Sitting in his office overlooking Bedford Square, the Master of the New College of Humanities can barely contain his self-satisfaction. ‘We have been more successful than anybody could have guessed,’ he informs me.
Two years ago, ‘one of the most hated men in academia’ was the target of eggs, smoke bombs and insults when he announced a new £18,000-a-year private university. His aim was to marry the tutorial teaching model with a challenging liberal arts course — with the help of some celebrity friends. Academics, foes and friends all rounded against Grayling and willed his experiment to fail.
Although the hatred has dissipated, the NCH’s master acknowledges both himself and his college provoke anger. ‘There are plenty of people that are cross about it but I hope there are worthier objects of dislike than my old self.’
Still, it cannot have been easy to see so many of his academic friends turn on him.
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