If you have read
'Porterhouse Blue'
And want to know where it most rings true
Take King's Parade
Past the fudge shop
And when you reach the junction, don't stop
Go on straight ahead
And across the street
Upon your right hand side, what will your eyes meet?

This is Peterhouse
Much mythologised
By the odd few loved and by the rest despised
If you visit there
Don't commit the sin
Of asking what century they're living in
There have been no major changes
Since it opened up its doors
Thought of as quite modern when it started in 1284

Look at Peterhouse
And externally
It is all a Cambridge College ought to be
But because it looks
Like a chocolate box
It believes it never need pull up its socks
Propping up the Tompkins Table
As it has for countless years
Eldest it may be, but it's no good example for its peers

Oh, down at Peterhouse
That's what life's about
How it looks is all and how it is, is nowt
Hear Petreians talk:
How they flap and fuss
Trying to skirt round the bleeding obvious
You can lie and cheat and back-stab
Several hundred times a day
Do your reading in the chapel and they'll all think you're OK

Quite jolly fun
Studying here
No pesky work to come interfere
First year students
Take no exams
They're boozing while the rest of us cram
Unsurprisingly
All this time left free
In an odd College breeds odd activity

This is Poofterhouse
Raising funds for RAG
With a beauty pageant of men dressed in drag
Nothing wrong with that
But the College style
Pushes to extremes the phases of denial
Even when they are seen snogging
Petreian men will still say:
"Shock horror, such rumours! Why does everybody think we're gay?"

Hacks from Peterhouse
In the Union bar
Drunkenly say that they are the Mafia
But because they're known
To lie and defect
They're the ones the candidates will all reject
As revenge they've set up their own
Politics Society
Which is even worse for nepotism and notoriety

Oh, some at Peterhouse
Riding for a fall
Think it fine to boast about their dining hall
Old and picturesque
Fancy oaken roof
But of decent cookery there is no proof
Costs a bomb for formal dinners
Lousy value for the dosh
Why rave over your location when you can't get proper nosh?

I've heard of keeping up appearances
But down at Peterhouse it really takes the piss

Down at Peterhouse
Pricey wine and beer
And some of the most expensive rent per year
Observation says
Other Colleges
Use some of their rent for bar-room subsidies
Where is all the money going?
Finding it's an uphill task
Must be one more thing Petreians are just too afraid to ask

Oh, this is Peterhouse
How long will it last?
Anyone can see its glory days are past
But as yet we can
Bid it no farewells:
It still thinks the joke's on everybody else
With their care for reputation
Petreians will never grouse
Though they're a pain in the rear
Literally, from what I hear
Final curtain's nowhere near
For the farce of Peterhouse