Other beneficiaries include Dieter Helm, an energy expert and government adviser, and Joseph Silk, an expert on dark matter and galaxy formation. Richard Dawkins, author of The God Delusion, will receive a bonus of £7,500.
The payments to 39 academics come from the sale of land in Buckinghamshire, donated to New College by the Bishop of Winchester in 1386, prompting complaints that a one-off gain should not be used to boost salaries. The vice-chancellor of one university in the southeast described the decision as a "bloody disgrace". "You should have a rational process for paying your staff. Endowments should be used for the benefit of the students at the college," he said.
At present, a typical 30-year-old tutor at New College - who might be a world-class scholar - earns about £26,000. The maximum is likely to be about £46,000. With the windfall, the college is giving £10,000 a year to academics that teach students. Those with no teaching duties, such as Dawkins, whose other works include The Selfish Gene, will get a basic £2,500 a year. The payments, initially over three years, might continue after that if the endowment generates a high enough investment return.
James Lawrie, treasurer of Christ Church, Oxford, one of the richest colleges, said: "Our policy - if we had land - is that the money would go back into the endowment. The endowment would cover a range of things such as grants for academics to give lectures." Professor Bernard Silverman, master of St Peter's, one of the poorer colleges, said: "Academic salaries are inadequate, I am glad New College is able to do something about the general level of theirs, but it will only benefit their own people."
Oxford's richest colleges - with gross endowment income of more than £7m a year - are Christ Church and St John's. According to Alan Ryan, New College's warden, any gripes within Oxford illustrate the difference in attitude between British and US academics. He has written "What I have never understood about Oxford - actually, about British academic life generally - is why so many people are happy with equal misery."
For Craig Raine, a fellow, tutor at lecturer in English at New College, whose works as a poet include The Onion, Memory, the £30,000 payment is just a lucky break. "No one expects you to share out your money if you manage to marry a rich woman. It is just a piece of luck." He said he was not motivated by money. "I don't look at my payslips. I'm a high-minded dreamer. The one thing that brings me down to earth is women's legs."
Among other beneficiaries, the historian Robin Lane Fox is father of the entrepreneur Martha Lane Fox and biographer of Alexander the Great.
Click for response letters and Times Higher, Daily Telegraph, Oxford Student and Cherwell versions of the same story. King Gnome explains: Who runs may read.
Land in the flood plain: New's New Orleans? QUIETLY FLOWS THE DONWEE.
Click for New College Statutes, Statute XVII Disposal of Revenue or Clause 12 Misuse of Windfalls or II.17/15 Removal ('Deprivation') of Warden. Also New College Accounts 2001/2 (html) and 2002/3 (pdf) and Fellows list (OU Calendar entry, 2005/6). The Visitor.