Blackford Ducks

"Gaudy Night" is one of my favourite classic detective stories written by Dorothy L Sayers. It is set in an Oxford women's college. What makes it different is that no one gets murdered, but it is not without a great deal of suspense and psychological thrills. The narrative is interwoven with a love story and an examination of women's struggles to enlarge their roles and achieve some independence within the social climate of 1930s England.

Lord Peter Wimsey throughout is trying to woo the detective-heroine, Harriet Vane. They go punting on the river, and Peter feeds ducks which he insists are the very same ones he fed during his own undergraduate days at Baliol.

"How fleeting are all human passions compared to the massive continuity of ducks" he says. And, you know, he may be right!