You may be wondering why sixth form students from Wilson's travel all the way to Cambridge for a classics trip. Well, for a very good reason: to see two Greek plays (Persians and Cyclops) performed by Cambridge university students. This was a very rare occasion, as it is unusual for them to perform two plays at the same time. As we study the Greek Theatre as one of our A Level modules, the trip had a clear educational benefit too.

Accompanied by Ms Banner and Ms Cohen, we started by leaving Wilson's at around 1:30 pm and taking the 154 bus to East Croydon station. Once we got there, we made a quick stop at Sainsbury’s for some lunch, then boarded the direct Thameslink train to Cambridge. The excitement of going to Cambridge led to a long but fun-filled train journey.

After about an hour and a half, we finally arrived and were greeted by former Wilson’s students. They gave us a great tour of the lovely Downing college grounds and the nearby Cambridge town centre. We were then left to wander around by ourselves and get dinner before the play started at 7:30pm.

The play did start slightly late and was to be performed in Greek (a surprise to some of us). However, luckily there were subtitles on the screen next to the stage. Persians, the tragedy, was performed first. The play is about the Persian King Xerxes and his military expedition to Greece. The Cambridge students put on a great performance and the staging was brilliant. After a short interlude, the second play, Cyclops, was performed. This was a comedy (satyr play) about Odysseus’ adventure with Polyphemus, a cyclops. Arguably, this was the better play (at least in my opinion) and was extremely entertaining. The main character who played Odysseus was great and the costumes, especially of the chorus and the Cyclops were fantastic.

I would recommend to anyone interested in Classics to go and see one of the plays performed by the Cambridge students; they were brilliant.