Test taken: None
Number of interviews: 3
Time between interviews: About an hour between the first two, then 2-3 hours before the final one
Length of interviews: 30-40 minutes.
Online interview: No

I had multiple interviews: two subject-based, and one translation. The translation was fairly straightforward: a short passage of Caesar that was on the desk in front of me. I asked if the interviewer wanted me to 'translate out loud' as it were, identifying parts and words, but he said he wanted me to provide a finished translation I could read through in one go. So he did his emails (I think!) and I sat thinking quietly to myself, marking a few things in pencil, and about ten minutes later I said 'I think I am finished'. I read through my translation; where I made an error he picked out a Latin word and asked me to think again. It was a bit weird that I was sat in silence for most of it, but he seemed pretty relaxed. I was definitely the most nervous for the translation, but it was okay!

The subject-based interview ones were more expansive. In the first, the interviewer asked me about my submitted essays on Homer's Iliad, asking me what I thought about the representation of the gods and whether it was pious or impious to show them as fickle, adulterous and selfish creatures. We talked in general about classical literature, as I'd written a lot about it in my personal statement. At times it felt like a conversation, and an enjoyable conversation, but at other points she was very focussed and precise, and pushed me to justify or think about specific things I'd said in my essay or personal statement.

My second subject-based interview was at another college (which is common practice for Classics, as it gives a 'second-opinion'). This one started off with questions about classical tragedy, about the staging and context of plays  which were on my A-level syllabus. We talked about the content of the play but also its visual effect on the audience. Then the interviewer gave me an image of a vase from Athens, and asked me to talk about it. I had not seen it before, so I started obvious (it's a vase, it looks really big, suggestions based on the bulding it came from) and then zoomed in on the painted details. We talked about the meaning of the imagery, with the interviewer suggesting various interpretations in addition to mine (some of which I agreed with, and others not).

I was very lucky to have one-to-one mentoring from my Classics teachers at school: we used to have weekly sessions where I'd read a classical text that was new to me (e.g. Aristophanes' Birds or similar) and we'd talk about it, as well as practising Latin composition and translation. The text-based sessions were designed to help me deal with something unseen and unknown, so sometimes I would read a text in advance of meeting and sometimes I would be given a short passage in translation to read and respond to. My teacher asked some Oxbridge-style questions - very open-ended, sometimes quite provocative or forthright - and I would answer. This was, in effect, the best preparation because it helped me become comfortable with unseen material, taking a moment to think and consider before answering, and actually articulating my thought process as I went through it. Once I realised that delivering a super-polished, 'finished' answer was not the point of the exercise, it was a lot easier to relax and talk more openly and fluidly, which provided more for my teacher to pick me up on and get a discussion going: 'you mentioned x, what about y ...' etc.

The Latin sessions were to ensure I could handle translation in the interview, thinking on my feet, so we worked on brief passages of Latin prose (e.g. Caesar, Tacitus, Livy) and occasionally poetry. The trick, for me, was learning to stay calm and to articulate my translations out loud: so identifying the verbs, the subject and object, particular grammatical constructions, before providing a translation of the full sentence. This means the interviewer can understand how your brain is working and give you prompts if you do get stuck on a word or misrecognise a tense/noun/etc. The Latin composition was really to strengthen my grammar and recall, so my teacher gave me simple stories to translate back into Latin.

In my free time I tried to read as much as possible outside of the A-level courses I was taking; I was really interested in Greek Comedy, which wasn't part of my Classical Civilisations A-level, so I read most of Aristophanes' plays and a small amount of secondary scholarship in the school library. I also went to art galleries and looked at things, classical and non-classical, and thought about them; I was really interested in theatre, so I saw productions of classical plays whenever possible and thought about them in terms of their style, form, effect. I was really lucky to have resources available to me such as kind, generous teachers and indulgent parents, but I also used to talk to myself, even just to become comfortable with the sound of my own voice. This really helped me get over any insecurity over articulating my thoughts.

My advice would be to go in with an open mind, and respond to the interviewer and discussion rather than recite something pre-prepared! Don't be afraid if you have to look at something unseen; breathe deeply, stay calm, and work systematically from the most obvious points to the more interesting or obscure ones: even if it means saying something that seems so obvious it's dumb. Thinking out loud helps the interviewer to understand how you're approaching the problem/image/text and how to prompt and help you out if you do get stuck. Be confident in your opinion and thoughts, but don't be so resolute that you can't react to suggestions made by the interviewer. If they disagree with you, they are not trying to prove you wrong but open up a different door of the discussion or a new perspective. Engaging with them (even if it is to explain why you don't think one playwight is as important as another, for example) is an important part of the interview as it shows willingness to accept new information, think about it, assess it and respond.

Think critically about questions and statements, and any assumptions within them. This is something that's easier to do if you make it a force of habit and start doing it in everyday life: remember that any information (news story, TV show, podcast, etc) comes with implicit bias, assumptions, and sometimes and agenda, so think about what those might be and how they affect the presentation of the information. Don't ever be afraid to take a moment to think about a question or statement, or to ask the interviewer to rephrase it. Not understanding the question is not a crime or proof that you are not intelligent, worthy and important! Approach the interview as a conversation, not an interrogation: you and the interviewer are both interested in the same topic and ideas. Remember also that the interviewer is not trying to trip you up but wants you to do well, and to see you at your best.