![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
They got a badge too
Aug. 6th, 2008 10:10 pmI read The Prefect by Alastair Reynolds about a week ago and I haven't really been able to think of anything to say about it. Its an in-fill title plugging a gap in a bigger story arc Its perfectly satisfactory for a Reynolds work - neither best nor worst. Just another title.
But then the title triggered a memory. The local high school had a prefect system - senior pupils who were given the title and power that went with that title. It is a tradition that existed ever since the school was established in the 1880s and extends back to English traditions that go back much further. Then one day the student council, a body of elected student representatives, asked the school headmaster to abolish the prefect system. And he did! Just like that.
We are talking about the early 1970s here, a time of great social change. I may be wrong, but I can't see that sort of thing happening these days - schoolkids actually making a difference to the traditional structure of their school. I was rather young at the time and when told that the prefect system was being abolished I just accepted it as the sort of thing that happened. Hindsight gives a different perspective on an old institution going and perhaps it was inevitable that it would go anyway. Interesting that the book title triggered that memory because I'm sure I haven't thought about prefects at any time in the intervening years.
But then the title triggered a memory. The local high school had a prefect system - senior pupils who were given the title and power that went with that title. It is a tradition that existed ever since the school was established in the 1880s and extends back to English traditions that go back much further. Then one day the student council, a body of elected student representatives, asked the school headmaster to abolish the prefect system. And he did! Just like that.
We are talking about the early 1970s here, a time of great social change. I may be wrong, but I can't see that sort of thing happening these days - schoolkids actually making a difference to the traditional structure of their school. I was rather young at the time and when told that the prefect system was being abolished I just accepted it as the sort of thing that happened. Hindsight gives a different perspective on an old institution going and perhaps it was inevitable that it would go anyway. Interesting that the book title triggered that memory because I'm sure I haven't thought about prefects at any time in the intervening years.