Skip to main content

Do You Still Think You're Clever? review

John Farndon, the author of Do You Still Think You're Clever?: Even More Oxford and Cambridge Questions! is, very sensibly, a believer in 'If it ain't broke, don't fix it.' In this follow up to Do You Think You're Clever? he takes exactly the same approach of collecting a series of the more bizarre questions asked in Oxbridge interviews and providing his own suggested answers.

As Farndon says, you may not always agree with his answer - but that's part of the fun, because when you're dealing with questions like 'What makes a strong woman?' in a theology interview, it's really up to you how you answer - and what the interviewer is looking for (if he or she is any good) is not so much someone who comes up with a pat answer, but someone who can demonstrate how to think through a question, and this is something that Farndon excels at.

Thankfully, the reader doesn't need to know too much about the subject. In fact I found questions like 'Was Shakespeare a rebel?' much more interesting than more science-based ones like 'Why does a tennis ball spin?' I have both taken a Cambridge entrance interview and interviewed for a company that used a fiendishly evil question in their interviews (or at least did until it got too well known) - in the latter case, it was always the interesting answers that came at the problem laterally that were considered to indicate better candidates rather than the straightforward attempts at a solution.

(As an aside, the company interviews had a senior and junior interviewer. The first time I took part, other than being interviewed myself, the senior interviewer said to the first candidate 'If you need to know any statistical formulae don't worry, just ask Brian.' (B*st*rd.) I was taken totally off guard. I'm not good at remembering formulae, and it's a red herring - the question doesn't require it. But of course the first person said 'What's the formula for standard deviation?' and my mind went totally blank and had to ask for help. Next interview I had a cheat sheet.)

In the end, the reader's thoughts are as interesting as Farndon's answers. I found, having put the book down part way through, that I was thinking about how I would answer the next question up - in fact probably the best way to read it is one question at a time, then put it down while you think about the next one. This makes it a great loo book - but also a great gift book (I'm sure it's no coincidence it's going on sale this time of year) and it will certainly be one I'll be giving to a few people.

I feel I ought to say something negative about any book I review - all I can really find to say here is that I hate the cover. Please don't judge the book by it.

You can find out more or buy it at Amazon.co.uk and Amazon.com
Using these links earns us commission at no cost to you  
Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Why I hate opera

If I'm honest, the title of this post is an exaggeration to make a point. I don't really hate opera. There are a couple of operas - notably Monteverdi's Incoranazione di Poppea and Purcell's Dido & Aeneas - that I quite like. But what I do find truly sickening is the reverence with which opera is treated, as if it were some particularly great art form. Nowhere was this more obvious than in ITV's 2010 gut-wrenchingly awful series Pop Star to Opera Star , where the likes of Alan Tichmarsh treated the real opera singers as if they were fragile pieces on Antiques Roadshow, and the music as if it were a gift of the gods. In my opinion - and I know not everyone agrees - opera is: Mediocre music Melodramatic plots Amateurishly hammy acting A forced and unpleasant singing style Ridiculously over-supported by public funds I won't even bother to go into any detail on the plots and the acting - this is just self-evident. But the other aspects need some exp...
118 comments
Read more

Is 5x3 the same as 3x5?

The Internet has gone mildly bonkers over a child in America who was marked down in a test because when asked to work out 5x3 by repeated addition he/she used 5+5+5 instead of 3+3+3+3+3. Those who support the teacher say that 5x3 means 'five lots of 3' where the complainants say that 'times' is commutative (reversible) so the distinction is meaningless as 5x3 and 3x5 are indistinguishable. It's certainly true that not all mathematical operations are commutative. I think we are all comfortable that 5-3 is not the same as 3-5.  However. This not true of multiplication (of numbers). And so if there is to be any distinction, it has to be in the use of English to interpret the 'x' sign. Unfortunately, even here there is no logical way of coming up with a definitive answer. I suspect most primary school teachers would expands 'times' as 'lots of' as mentioned above. So we get 5 x 3 as '5 lots of 3'. Unfortunately that only wor...
25 comments
Read more

Why backgammon is a better game than chess

I freely admit that chess, for those who enjoy it, is a wonderful game, but I honestly believe that as a game , backgammon is better (and this isn't just because I'm a lot better at playing backgammon than chess). Having relatively recently written a book on game theory, I have given quite a lot of thought to the nature of games, and from that I'd say that chess has two significant weaknesses compared with backgammon. One is the lack of randomness. Because backgammon includes the roll of the dice, it introduces a random factor into the play. Of course, a game that is totally random provides very little enjoyment. Tossing a coin isn't at all entertaining. But the clever thing about backgammon is that the randomness is contributory without dominating - there is still plenty of room for skill (apart from very flukey dice throws, I can always be beaten by a really good backgammon player), but the introduction of a random factor makes it more life-like, with more of a sense...
6 comments
Read more