The Sheldonian theatre is one of the most beautiful buildings found in the centre of Oxford. It was the first major commission for an aspiring young architect named Christopher Wren, and was built in the late 1660s. Primarily, the Sheldonian is a university building, used for major meetings and ceremonies. At other times, it is used as a concert venue and public lecture hall.
Of more importance to Stand By Your Statue practitioners though are the thirteen statue heads of men with beards surrounding the theatre. The official name for these are the Emperors Heads. Other than that, historians haven’t got the foggiest as to who they are and what they represent. Basically, they are just a strange bunch of imposing looking men with beards! Personally, I think they probably represent the life and theatre career of this man. Can you think of anything better?
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"Gordon's alive!!?!?!"The theatre and its heads get a mention in Thomas Hardy's Jude the Obscure:
"As they went their names were called by knowing informants, and when they reached the old round theatre of Wren a cheer rose high.
"Let's go that way!" cried Jude, and though it now rained steadily he seemed not to know it, and took them round to the theatre. Here they stood upon the straw that was laid to drown the discordant noise of wheels, where the quaint and frost-eaten stone busts encircling the building looked with pallid grimness on the proceedings, and in particular at the bedraggled Jude, Sue, and their children, as at ludicrous persons who had no business there."
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