Clash Music

Amy Winehouse features in a final-year English exam at Cambridge University.

English students were asked to compare lyrics of Winehouse’s ‘Love Is A Losing Game’ to songs by Bob Dylan, Billie Holiday and 16th century poet and explorer Sir Walter Raleigh.

A university spokesman said English students had always been asked to compare writers of different times. He said the question was "interesting, but not news," reports BBC news.

They were asked to contrast aspects of the pop song with Bob Dylan's ‘Boots Of Spanish Leather’, Billie Holiday's ‘Fine And Mellow’ and Sir Walter Raleigh's ‘As You Came from the Holy Land’ in a practical criticism question.

Love is a Losing Game, co-written with Mark Ronson, won the award for best song musically and lyrically at the Ivor Novellos last week. Winehouse arrived at the ceremony too late to accept the award herself. Her father picked it up on her behalf.

Controversy surrounding Winehouse is nothing next to the turbulent life of Raleigh, who took part in the colonization of the New World. But after he married the Queen’s lady-in-waiting without permission he was locked in the Tower of London, and later sentenced to death after being accused of taking part in a plot against King James I. He was released but arrested again and beheaded after attacking the Spanish during an expedition to find gold in the Americas.

He probably never even went to Camden.

By Katie Weatherall

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