Wanda von Knobelsdorff BY SIMON DUNGATE-JONES
Jeremy Green BY JACK SEYMOUR
Wanda joined us from the world of publishing in September 2022, arriving as maternity cover in the Religion and Philosophy Depart- ment. Despite being a teaching novice, she quickly established herself as an invaluable and pop- ular member of the department. Even though she was only with us for just over a year, her students can attest to the fact that she leaves behind her a legacy of aca- demic rigour and genuine schol- arship. Beyond the classroom,
Jeremy visited England briefly, insulted ‘Baz Ball’ – our cherished cricketing philosophy – and left. He will, in spite of this shortcoming, be remembered as a marvellous English Department colleague and dear friend. Jeremy and his wife, Kellie, arrived from Sydney in November and have made the most out of their European stint. They have
travelled, eaten in London’s best restaurants, seen shows, visited galleries and drunk pints of Guinness along the way (part of their Developing Cultural Capital Programme) – all the while, affectionately chastising England for its colonial past. The irony was lost in translation. Jeremy loves dogs, which is apt for a good- natured, open and enthusiastic man. He takes interest in his students and has a wide range of high and low cultural interests – from TS Eliot to memes. His self-deprecating anecdotes about coaching a football team while not knowing the rules – ‘kick it better’, ‘infiltrate the space’ – belie Jeremy’s excellence. He is a humble man and an excellent teacher: well-read, articulate and engaged in culture – demonstrated by his talk on Australian hip-hop (if ever there was an oxymoron) and LitSoc presentation on colonial (there it is again) undercurrents in Dracula and HG Wells. As a colleague, he is always eager for coffee or a pint; as a teacher he is inspiring and generous. Jeremy and Kellie return home to the waves and beaches of Sydney, their family and their dog, Cooper. We will miss his easy company and good nature and wish them both all the very best. ◉
this was best exemplified in the Philosophy Circle, the department’s philosophy discussion group. However, for many, their most lasting memory will be from the Upper School Symposium of 2022, at which she led a talk enti- tled ‘Nausea and Slime: Sartre on the Chaos of a World without Concepts’. Here students were privileged to gain insight into Wanda’s own area of academic interest, something that she will be researching further at Universi- ty College London, as part of an MPhil in Philosophy. As a native German speaker who had studied Philosophy with Italian during her undergraduate degree, Wanda’s talents were quickly snapped up by the German De- partment; here, she taught German to Middle School students and played a significant part in the department’s outreach work, offering after-school language sessions for local children. Whilst we were sad to see Wanda leave us, we wish her all the best with her academic studies. We have no doubt that she will be back as a visiting speaker in due course, as she rapidly becomes an authority on Jean-Paul Sar- tre’s phenomenological ontology! ◉
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THE ALLEYNIAN 712
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