The Sex Files

The library; a refuge for the damned, deadlines and, over at Oxford University, a bit of how’s ‘yer father. The university’s illustrious Oriel College was forced to close its library after incidents of students caught having sex, bookcases being moved and books found scattered in the Theology section.

In an exemplary demonstration of British restraint, the Senior Dean Julia Kercheker sent an email to the students saying, “this is not acceptable. The library is not being treated with appropriate consideration.”

Boasting a rich list of alumni, including explorer Sir Walter Raleigh, Oriel College has been forced to close its library during weekends and shut after 5.30pm on weekdays. Prime coital time, by the calculations of the librarian.

Kercheker’s email made reference to the mess in the Theology section as the principle reason for closure, describing the whole affair as a “disregard for the library and its rules and a lack of a sense of responsibility to the community.”

However, inside sources reveal that the main motivation was students being caught by the porter bumping uglies between the bookshelves. The primeval state one enters into under marathon library shifts appears to serve as an aphrodisiac for the blue brigade.

The sordid history of Oriel library comes as no surprise to second-year Oxford student, Fred Alliot. “I had to get a book on political theory from the bookstacks there once, and the combination of seedy lighting and an abundant supply of women’s fiction had me perusing the shelves at half-mast.”

One Oriel student, Robert Flick, was not hit by cupid’s arrow. “It is irritating that some students feel it acceptable to behave in a way that threatens to take the privilege of the library away from all members of college,” he reportedly commented.

While there is suggestion of Oxford’s innovative approach to incorporating sex into student life with their traditional ‘Bump Supper’. This is regrettably a celebratory dinner if a rowing team manages to successfully bump another boat on every day of Eights Week.

There is some semblance of respectability intact for the Durham University Library. Despite suggestive reports of students bringing bedding to their studies, hand shandies in the emergency exit staircase, The One has been reliably informed, are an urban myth.

There are dire consequences for anyone looking to get their leg over in the library warns Deputy Librarian Pete Maggs. “If students want to engage in that behaviour we cannot prevent them, but there is an extremely high-risk of getting caught and we would regard it as a very serious matter.”

Whether this concrete bastion soon falls to sword of the Durham doggers, who have previously restricted themselves to nighttime establishments, is another question.