No, not Paris, but the University of Essex – where, in early to mid-1968,
students rallied angrily against Vietnam and all that. The situation was aggravated when three students – including David Triesman, later Lord Triesman – were summarily suspended from
their studies, and The Spectator duly dispatched a correspondent to investigate. The resultant article came in the issue dated 24 May 1968; a few pages on from an editorial headlined
“How to deal with the student problem”, and alongside coverage of events in France. Here it is:
The truth about Essex, Ian MacGregor, The Spectator, 24 May 1968
The first thing that strikes you about Essex university is the architecture: four great black slabs of brick rising into the clear East Anglian air – the residential towers – and the
teaching buildings lying low into a gentle ravine. The juxtaposition of aggressively functional modern buildings with a pastoral landscape is at first as jarring as the architect meant it to be.
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