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Adrian Hollis won a Classical Scholarship
to Eton, and took a First in Mods and
Greats at Christ Church before his
Assistant Lectureship at the University
of St Andrews, followed by forty
years at Keble, where he was Tutor in
Classics, Tutor for Admissions, Editor of
the College
Record
, and finally Sub-
Warden. He became an Emeritus Fellow
upon retirement and held an honorary
doctorate from St Andrews. He was also
a Correspondence Chess Grandmaster
representing Britain for five years
(1982-87) in the Ninth Olympiad and
winning the world championship, and
in 1998, a member of the British team
which won the World Postal Chess
Championship.
He was well ahead of his time in his
realisation of the importance of the
relatively untouched parts of ancient
literature. One can only imagine his
thrill as more and more tiny pieces of
Callimachus’
Hecale
were discovered
in Egypt. He himself described as
‘perhaps the most exciting episode in
my research career’ the Bactrian tax-
receipt which stirred his passion for
numismatics, and his commentary on
Ovid’s
Metamorphoses VIII
remains a
seminal work.
His students remember him grey-suited,
his eyes twinkling from under his grey
fringe, his razor-sharp memory for
any Greek or Latin quotation – and
his floor, covered with so much paper
that he struggled to locate the huge
dictionaries, or even the radio to hear
the latest cricket score. His charm,
gentle humour and genuine passion
make him sadly missed by all those lucky
enough to have been taught by him.
Professor Malcolm Parkes, FSA,
FBA, died on 10 May 2013 at the
age of eighty-two. Having taken an
Oxford research degree under the
supervision of Neil Ker, a brilliant
palaeographer who inspired his
equally brilliant pupil to follow in his
footsteps, Malcolm served as Fellow
and Tutor in English Language at
Keble (1965-97) and as a Lecturer
in Oxford’s English Faculty (1964-
71). In 1971 he became Lecturer in
Palaeography, a position he held until
1993 when he was promoted to
Reader, and in 1996 the University
gave him a personal chair.
Malcolm’s scholarship is
extraordinary in terms of its ambition
and scope. Throughout the Parkes
oeuvre
big ideas are brought to
codicology, scribal hands and scripts
being placed within the cultural
contexts that gave full meaning to
those marks on the page. As a thesis
supervisor he was without peer,
unfailingly generous with his time
and always ready with a witty quip
to help one through a difficult patch.
The relationships he formed with
his students frequently developed
into life-long friendships. Malcolm
died following a long struggle with
dementia, a particularly cruel end
to a life which was characterized by
acute intellectual perception and an
abundance of
bonhomie
.
Richard Thornton was a bold
international investor, and an active
philanthropist. He came up to Keble
in 1952 to read Jurisprudence, and
was tutored by Leo Price, the future
distinguished barrister who was to
become a life-long friend.
Richard began his career at the Minster
Trust and the Foreign & Colonial
Investment Trust, before establishing
his own investment management
company, GT Management, with
Thomas Griffin in 1969. GT offered
investors a novel inroad into the
growing Japanese market at a time
when the international movement of
funds was rare, and swiftly developed
a client base on three continents. GT
was notable for fostering young talent,
as well as for nurturing an academic
monetarist expertise that helped it to
emerge relatively unscathed from the
bear markets of the 1970s. Richard
later founded Thornton & Co., retiring
as executive chairman in 1991, and
subsequently led and built up the
Establishment Investment Trust.
Through the Thornton Foundation,
Richard supported a broad range of
educational, artistic, medical, seafaring
and Christian causes, including the
chaplaincy at Keble and several
development campaigns. In doing so,
he was proud to follow in the footsteps
of his Thornton forebears, notable
eighteenth century philanthropists, but
he did so with personal conviction and
a distinctive generosity of soul.
Richard was an unfailingly loyal and
courteous man, in possession of an
original mind, a warm and occasionally
exasperating wit, and illimitable
enthusiasms; he will be much missed.
Adrian Hollis
Emeritus Fellow
(1940-2013)
Professor Malcolm Parkes
Emeritus Fellow
(1930-2013)
Richard Thornton
Honorary Fellow
(1931-2013)
Note:
Full obituaries to be found from page 9 of
The Record 2013
