Cape High literature students hold high tea
Seniors in Tanya Humes’ AP literature class brushed up on their Victorian etiquette while sampling Earl Grey tea and petit fours to mark their last class May 23.
“We are focusing on satire, specifically through Oscar Wilde’s ‘Importance of Being Earnest’ and how this play satirizes Victorian etiquette,” Humes said. “My students have worked so hard this year, with some taking the College Board AP Lit exam May 4, and we are ending the year with a high tea.”
True to the time period, students were seated in order of their social importance, or in this case, by alphabetical order. While classical music played in the background, seniors made conversation with people seated next to them, and not across from them, which they learned was considered rude in the Victorian era.
The butler or host serves the tea first, Humes said, then the women of the class were invited to choose from a selection of macarons, petit fours and scones donated by the Station on Kings, Edie's Bees and Fresh Market, before the men took their turn.
“Ladies were seen as the weaker sex, so they could start without the men,” Humes said. “Sometimes at tea, the men would have to stand up. The only reason a man would really attend a tea was because he didn't have any food or he was sweet on a girl.”
Loose tea leaves were very expensive in the Victorian era, Humes said, and cost $70 a pound versus $3 to $4 a pound now. The butler would reuse tea leaves, Humes said, so attendees would strive to arrive early to get the strongest tea.
