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1. Cross-Campus Conversations

   Compiled by SHOSHANA WASSER

   Mar 6 by

   I walked around campus for a week having strangers divulge the questions they get asked the most often, as well as those they least enjoy responding to. Unsurprisingly, we all get a lot of “What’s up?” and “How are you?” in our daily lives, and more than half the students I spoke to mentioned one of these as their most...

2. Night/Life

   ALEX NURSALL stayed up all night to capture an unscientific snapshot of our campus neighbourhood. Here are her findings

   Mar 3 by

   12.30 AM I’m standing in a bar on Bloor Street West. There are more people here than I thought there would be for this time of night on a Tuesday. I’m a little unsure of where I should start, so I take a seat at the bar and get, of all things, a Strongbow. Maybe it’s the fact that I’m...

3. Rethinking the architect

   Mitchell Joachim on why the people who design our world should play a bigger role in saving it

   Mar 3 by Sarah Rafson

   He’s not a typical architect, and he is certainly not a typical academic. With several degrees, he also has tremendous pop cred, having appeared on the Colbert Report and last year showing up in Rollingstone’s list of [100 People Changing America][1], Wired Magazine’s list of [15 People the Next President Should Listen To][2], and most recently presented at the TED...

4. Who wants to be the mayor?

   EMILY KELLOGG examines the rogue’s gallery of candidates for Toronto’s mayoral chair

   Mar 3 by

   It was late afternoon. I was sitting on a bench in a small park when a man approached me. He talked, bent with an incessant fervor and gripping charisma, clad in a tan sports coat and a red bow tie. I was an impressionable 15-year-old then, and though my parents had taught me not to talk to strangers, I found...

5. The strange and beautiful days of campus news

   KELLI KORDUCKI talks to Lewko Hryhorijiw about the way we were at U of T

   Mar 3 by

   Lewko Hryhorijiw was a student journalist and photographer at U of T from 1979 to 1983. From 1982 to 1983 he was the editor of The Strand newspaper. He is now a freelance photographer who can still be found photographing events on campus from time to time. This interview began with one question: “Tell me your stories from your university...

6. From the editors

   Mar 3 by

   Hey everybody! For our last magazine issue of the year, we at The Varsity figured we’d try something a little different. Instead of writing about ideas and bigger pictures, we decided we’d try and give you something a little less predictable, a little more dangerous: we decided we would give you people. Welcome to the profile issue. The thing that...

7. Rae Watch

   Mar 3 by Luke Savage

   Next September will mark the 20th anniversary of Bob Rae’s election as Premier of Ontario and the 43rd anniversary of the beginning of his tenure at The Varsity. Our conversation began here, as I asked him to share some recollections from his time at our newspaper and as a student at University College. Like most U of T students in...

8. Q & A: Michael Redhill

   In which we pretend to know what a lacuna is

   Mar 3 by Naomi Skwarna

   Michael Redhill: I should warn you, in interviews I usually just answer “yes” or “no.” Naomi Skwarna: That’s fine. I’ll fill in the blanks. M: You can make it up as you go along. N: All right, Michael, I have several interrelated questions. M: I’ll be the judge of that. N: You’re the 2010 Writer-in-Residence here at the University of...

9. Two authors in conversation

   STEPHEN THOMAS chats with Montreal-based author NEIL SMITH

   Mar 3 by

   Neil Smith was a late bloomer. “I didn’t start writing until I was in my mid-thirties. A university professor told me I’d need to study literature before I could write. Since I would have preferred to commit hara-kiri than go back to school, I didn’t attempt any writing for a long time.” When he finally started writing, however, he proved...

10. Being the Walrus

    Mar 3 by Tim Legault

    The Walrus magazine premiered in September 2003 with the intent of creating a national institution comparable to American publications such as Harper’s and The New Yorker. Currently, it produces 10 issues a year and has a circulation of approximately 60,000 (10-15,000 in newstand sales and 40-45,000 in subscriptions), and functions as a charitable, not-for-profit organization. When Ken Alexander, one of...

11. Crunching Numbers

    ALEX ROSS sits down with mathematician-cum author John Mighton

    Mar 3 by

    John Mighton is a fellow at the Fields Institute For Research In Mathematical Sciences at the University of Toronto, and the founder of JUMP Math, a non-profit organization that teaches math to kids. JUMP stands for Junior Undiscovered Math Prodigies. Mighton’s key message is that anyone can do math, that there are no inborn math geniuses. By resisting the school...

12. Speech Perception

    English rapper and Mercury Prize winner Speech Debelle confounds as she tries to break through

    Mar 3 by

    Rapper Speech Debelle is a complicated cultural figure to get your head around. Born Corynne Elliott, Debelle rose to global prominence last year after an upset victory at The Mercury Prize, a British music industry award that is subject to intense cultural scrutiny and curiosity. Because her first record chronicles her teen years spent sleeping in hostels and friends’ basements...

13. The Varsity Magazine: The Profile Issue

    Welcome to the latest installment of the magazine. This time, we bring you nothing but pure, unvarnished people.

    Mar 3 by

    Liquid error: no implicit conversion from nil to integer

14. Lunchbox Gourmet

    CHELITO MARTIN RUBIO and SARAH RAFSON take a look at the best brown-baggers on campus

    Mar 3 by

    *U of T is a bleak, foodless place. Wandering around at lunchtime desperately searching for nourishment is a disheartening effort. Do you dare brave The Trucks and all the greasy regret that follows consumption? Or pay $7 for a soggy, shrink-wrapped sandwich from Starbucks or Second Cup? Choosing what to eat without destroying either your waistline or your wallet can...

15. Let’s make a date

    The Varsity intervenes in the romantic lives of six students — with sexy results? TOM CARDOSO reports

    Mar 3 by

    Welcome to the Varsity Dating Game. More NEXT than Newlyweds, but still pretty damn wholesome. From an initial pool of over 25 interested people, we narrowed our selection down to six final (pseudonymous) lovebirds: Bonnie, Clyde, Thelma, Louise, Ross, and Rachel. Two of the couples were straight and one was queer. Matches were made based on what seemed to promise...