There’s thousands of students at our university, each with a unique and creative soul. Getting these people together to publish a literary anthology can be no mean feat, but an old edition of one of these collections shows just what is possible.
Rubicon No.3 is the third collection of writing and artwork from students of The University of Sheffield, as well as guest writer Sophie Hannah. Released in the spring of 1997, the collection features a poems, short stories, photography and other media from a range of different topics and subject matters, each telling their author’s views of life and the world around them through creativity and exploration of language.
I’m not much of a poetry enthusiast, so it’s very likely that a lot of the subtleties and meanings didn’t come through to me, but this collection was enjoyable enough. The variation of writing styles and forms kept the anthology exciting and everchanging, and the fact that the writers were all University of Sheffield students makes this even more impressive. My favourite piece in the collection was Going to the Moon, a short story by Katrina Ferry about single motherhood and raising young children. However, this collection being dominated by poetry left me struggling to understand what the authors were trying to communicate at various points, which was definitely a barrier when reading this.
Rubicon No.3 is a commendable collection from our very own former students and is a testament to their skills, even if I struggled to follow some of it! It’s unclear when editions of Rubicon stopped being published, but it is a shame that it is no longer being produced, and hopefully it may return in a new form one day.
Rating: ★★★☆☆
Rubicon No.3 was published in 1997. A copy is available to borrow from the LGBTQ+ Lending Library in the LGBTQ+ Lounge
