Fictional colleges are found in many modern novels, films, and other works of fiction, probably because they allow the author greater licence for invention and a reduced risk of being accused of libel, as might happen if the author depicted unsavory events as occurring at a real-life institution. Below is a list of some of the fictional colleges of the University of Oxford.
Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials novels feature a number of fictional Oxford colleges, most notably Jordan College,[1] [2] including:[3]
The Inspector Morse series of books by Colin Dexter is predominantly set within Oxford and its environs, including the University. Consequently, many fictional colleges are named. The derived television series, Inspector Morse, Lewis and Endeavour, continued this practice.
T=TV series
| Name | Source | Details | Filmed (College) |
|---|---|---|---|
| Alfreda's College | Endeavour T: "Fugue" | Trinity | |
| Arnold College | Inspector Morse T | ||
| Baidley College | Endeavour T: "Home" | Last episode of Season 1 | Keble |
| Beaufort College | Inspector Morse T; Endeavour T: "Girl" | Named after Henry Beaufort, a Plantagenet royal and Chancellor of the University of Oxford from 1397 to 1399 | |
| Beaumont College | Inspector Morse novelsInspector Morse episode”The Last Enemy”Series 3 Episode 2 | Beaumont Street is a short street in central Oxford. One end emerges opposite Balliol's side entrance, and it extends to the front of Worcester. Beaumont Street was formerly the site of Beaumont Palace, perhaps the "location" of the college. | |
| Benison College | Lewis, episode "Intelligent Design" Series 7 episodes 5/6 | ||
| Carlyle College | Lewis, episode "The Soul of Genius" | Exeter | |
| Chaucer College | Lewis | Based on Merton College. Named after Geoffrey Chaucer, whose son Thomas also managed the affairs of Henry Beaufort, Oxford's Chancellor. | |
| Courtenay College | Inspector Morse T | Based on Oriel. Nuneham Courtenay is a village 5 miles south-east of Oxford; in the 14th century, the village belonged to the influential Courtenay family. Nuneham House now belongs to the University. | |
| Gresham College | Lewis, episode "Dark Matter" | Stand-in for Lincoln. The "Invisible College" was a group of Oxford scientists (including Robert Boyle, Robert Hooke and Christopher Wren) who went on to establish the Royal Society. The group met at Gresham College in London. | |
| Hescott College | Endeavour T: "Confection" | Oriel | |
| Lady Matilda's College | Lewis episode "Old, Unhappy, Far-Off Things"; Endeavour episode "Home" | Amalgamation of Lady Margaret Hall and St Hilda's | Lady Margaret Hall |
| Lonsdale College | Inspector Morse novels and subsequent Lewis T | College attended by Endeavour Morse. | Brasenose |
| Lovelace College | Endeavour TV series; "Game", the first episode of Season 4 | St Catherine's | |
| Mayfield College | Lewis episode "Life Born of Fire" | Mayfield Press is based in Cowley Road; the nearest college would be Greyfriars on Iffley Road. | In and around Brasenose |
| Penville | Lewis episode "Old School Ties" | The leader of the Oxford Union says she usually lives here; this is presumably a reference to her fictional college. | |
| St Gerard's Hall | Lewis episode "Wild Justice" | Fictional permanent private hall Exterior of college filmed at New College, with a barn entrance in New College Lane. | St Edmund Hall and Christ Church |
| St Jude's College | Lewis episode "Generation of Vipers" | date=November 2021 |
Thomas Hardy's novel Jude the Obscure is set in Christminster, "Wessex", a thinly fictionalised version of Oxford, and mentions the following colleges of Christminster University:[4] [5] [6]
Loss and Gain by St John Henry Newman tells the story of the conversion of Charles Reding, an Oxford student, to Catholicism. In the novel, Newman creates the following colleges:
| Name | Details | |
|---|---|---|
| All Saints College | North and South by Elizabeth Gaskell. Stand-in for All Souls College | |
| Apocalypse College | Private's Progress by Alan Hackney | |
| Baillie College | Yes Minister and Yes, Prime Minister, attended by successive Cabinet Secretaries, Sir Arnold Robinson and Sir Humphrey Appleby. A very thinly veiled stand-in for Balliol; in several episodes Sir Humphrey Appleby is seen wearing a Balliol tie, and in the 2011 stage play version, Appleby is stated as having gone to Balliol, not "Baillie" | |
| Bartlemas College | Kate Ivory detective novels by Veronica Stallwood. Takes its name from St Bartholomew's Chapel, which belonged to Oriel College | |
| Bede College | Operation Pax by Michael Innes (pseudonym of J. I. M. Stewart). Allusion to the Old English polymath Bede, whose histories give us the account of St Hilda, from whom St Hilda's College, Oxford takes its name[10] | |
| Brazenface College | Verdant Green by Cuthbert Bede.[11] Very thinly veiled reference to Brasenose College | |
| Cardinal College | A Yank at Oxford.[12] Based on Christ Church, which was founded by Cardinal Thomas Wolsey as "Cardinal College" in 1525 | |
| Clapperton College | The Oxford Virus by Adam Kolczynski. Based on Christ Church | |
| Episcopus College | Where the Rivers Meet and Comedies by John Wain | |
| Hacker College | The Complete Yes Minister | |
| Judas College | Zuleika Dobson by Max Beerbohm.[13] Based on Merton College. Referenced in William Peter Blatty's 1960 semi-autobiographical comic novel Which Way to Mecca, Jack? | |
| The King's College | (Known as "Dick's" after its founder Richard II) – Colonel Butler's Wolf and Our Man in Camelot by Anthony Price. "The King's College" is another name for Oriel College; Richard II has no historically significant involvement with Oxford | |
| Kingsbridge College | World Without End and A Column of Fire by Ken Follett | |
| Lancaster College | Incense for the Damned, a Peter Cushing horror film set partially in Oxford, based on Doctors Wear Scarlet by Simon Raven | |
| Lazarus College | Barchester Towers by Anthony Trollope | |
| Several novels by Angela Thirkell, beginning with Summer Half (1937) | ||
| The Secret World massively multiplayer online role-playing game | ||
| Magog College | A Study in Sorcery by Michael Kurland/Randall Garrett | |
| Mandeville College | "The Crime of the Communist", a Father Brown story by G. K. Chesterton[14] | |
| Old College | Lot No. 249 by Arthur Conan Doyle | |
| Pelham College | The It Girl by Ruth Ware | |
| Pentecost College | Montague Egg short story "Murder at Pentecost", in Hangman's Holiday by Dorothy L. Sayers. On the north side of Broad Street, to the east of Trinity | |
| Persephone College | Death on the Cherwell by Mavis Doriel Hay. Women's college based on St Hilda's, Hay's old college[15] | |
| Pitt College | Black Chalk by Christopher J. Yates | |
| Plymouth College | North and South by Elizabeth Gaskell; alludes to Exeter College[16] | |
| Raleigh College | The Oxford Inheritance by Ann A. McDonald, and Sophomore Switch (published as Life Swap in the UK) by Abby McDonald | |
| The Royal Institute of Translation | Babel, or the Necessity of Violence by R. F. Kuang. Known as Babel. Not strictly a college, as the undergraduate members of the institute live at University College, however Babel is a part of the university | |
| St Ambrose's College | Tom Brown at Oxford by Thomas Hughes. Probably based on Oriel College | |
| St Bride's College | Michaelmas Term at St Bride's, by Brunette Coleman (Philip Larkin), St Bride's is recognisably based on Somerville College[17] | |
| St Christopher's College | The Case of the Gilded Fly and The Moving Toyshop by Edmund Crispin. Located on the north side of St John's (Crispin's old college) at the junction of St Giles' and Banbury Road | |
| St David's College | A Study in Sorcery by Michael Kurland/Randall Garrett | |
| St Frideswide's College | What Men Say by Joan Smith | |
| St George's College | Yes Minister television series. There was a late-medieval establishment of this name[18] | |
| St Jerome's College | Endymion Spring by Matthew Skelton: on St Giles', with echoes of Somerville College (Skelton's alma mater) | |
| The Reluctant Cannibals by Ian Flitcroft (south of the High Street) | ||
| St Joseph's College | Rumpole series by John Mortimer (in "Rumpole and the Younger Generation", Rumpole is said to have attended the real-life Keble College) | |
| St Jude's College | Formosa by Dion Boucicault; August Folly by Angela Thirkell (also in Lewis; see above) | |
| St Margaret's College | Fire and Hemlock by Diana Wynne Jones. Probably based on Lady Margaret Hall | |
| St Mark's College | The Pursuit of Love by Nancy Mitford; Patrick Grant crime novels by Margaret Yorke; The Stars' Tennis Balls by Stephen Fry | |
| St Mary's College | Sinister Street by Compton Mackenzie (based closely on Magdalen College, Mackenzie's old college, named after St Mary Magdalene) | |
| The Poison Tree by Tony Strong (based on St Peter's College); and Rough Justice by Charles Edward Montague | ||
| St Matthew's College | The Dimension Riders by Daniel Blythe | |
| St Paul's College | Ravenshoe by Henry Kingsley | |
| August Folly by Angela Thirkell | ||
| St Sebastian's College | Arden St Ives books by Alexis Hall; Hut 33 | |
| St Severin's College | The Late Scholar by Jill Paton Walsh using Dorothy L. Sayers' characters. On Parks Road, next to Wadham | |
| St Sexburga's College | Horace Sippog and the siren's song by Su Walton | |
| St Simeon's College | Death on the Cherwell by Mavis Doriel Hay. Located approximately on the site of Lady Margaret Hall | |
| St Thomas' College | An Oxford Tragedy and The Case of the Four Friends by John Cecil Masterman. St Thomas the Martyr's Church is located near Osney, and belongs to Christ Church | |
| Scone College | Decline and Fall by Evelyn Waugh; Something Nasty in the Woodshed and The Great Mortdecai Moustache Mystery by Kyril Bonfiglioli, in whose novels Scone College represents Balliol College. John de Balliol was crowned king at Scone, Scotland in 1292 | |
| Shrewsbury College | Gaudy Night by Dorothy L. Sayers. Women's college, based on Somerville College, Sayers' old college, but located on the site of Balliol's cricket ground in Jowett Walk[19] | |
| Simon Magus College | Let Dons Delight and The Footsteps at the Lock by Ronald Knox | |
| Stendell College | The Gentlemen directed by Guy Ritchie. Mickey Pearson (Matthew McConaughey) attends the college on a Rhodes Scholarship and begins selling marijuana while there | |
| Tresingham College | The Oxford Virus by Adam Kolczynski. Based on Keble College | |
| Warlock College | Landscape with Dead Dons by Robert Robinson | |
| An unnamed college in A Staircase in Surrey, a quintet of novels by J. I. M. Stewart, based on Christ Church, but never named; Surrey is the name of a quadrangle within the fictional college |
. James Runcieman Sutherland. What are Mr Hale's 'Doubts'?. The Literary Detective. Oxford University Press. 2000. Oxford World's Classics. 978-0-19-210036-8. 600–10.