Downstream

mind, the rowers aren’t a
problem, and the fish like me,
I know because I have pike
nibble marks on my wetsuit
which I wear in the winter.’
As I leave Oxford and take
the train back to London I
wonder what Charles
Steedman, the Victorian
author, would have made of
modern-day swimmers
around here. I think he would
have loved it all; to know
how far we’ve come, that