I was a liberal arts student before the humanities came to be seen as the ‘soft’ option, the refuge of dreamers and dilettantes fleeing the rigours of the hard sciences and the professional schools. I studied English because I loved words. They were English words primarily, of course, but also the words of those linguistic cousins Latin, Spanish, and French; the latter two I could speak and read after a fashion. It was English in its cultural dimension, as the study of the language and literature of the culture that has done so much to shape the modern world and is today its lingua franca, that was and still is my passion. I had at the time only vaguely thought of my future in terms of a job, perhaps in the diplomatic service or in some cultural agency. I did not believe a degree in English, or two or three of them, would advance my career prospects—such qualifications were for doctors, lawyers, and engineers—but I did believe that reading and examining the works of great writers would expand my horizons in some indefinable way, helping me to understand the world and others more sympathetically, and, as I told a skeptical friend at the time, ‘show me how to live.’ This belief has sustained me, despite occasional misgivings and a serious crisis of faith in graduate school, ever since. In retirement, I have continued to read widely, to speak publicly, to write, to judge student writing, and to contribute to a vibrant discussion group. The study of English is more a way of life than a career option. It has been a lifelong connection.
At university, then, I looked for a widening of horizons, but found only a narrowing. This was no community of scholars. Social life for undergraduates revolved around the beer hall. Academic emphasis was on specialization, on heavy-handed application to literature of an alien and esoteric vocabulary of critical theory, on novelty and arbitrariness, on selections reflecting the prejudices of the instructors, on the furtherance of jealously-guarded academic reputations, on the subordination of the spirit to the letter. Posing and pretension, aloofness and distance were too often in evidence. Only in the case of one enthusiastic teacher did I come across a love of literature for its own sake, and a desire to share that enthusiasm with his students. In the anesthesia of the heart apparently required there, literature was not to be enjoyed or celebrated, or shared with a wider public, but merely to be the means by which its self-appointed guardians secured tenure or promotion. The literary canon and those works currently in fashion among the chattering classes were not to be publicized among those unfortunate enough not to have heard of them, but to be protected from the common herd’s acquaintance. On one memorable occasion I recall, in a vast lecture hall, undergraduates scribbled down notes on such obscure terms as ‘anagogical’ and ‘tropological’ interpretations of allegory without ever asking what the words meant, or how they applied to the works then under discussion, or ever having a need, or even an interest, then or later, to find out. My thesis supervisor at the time once offered to show me an article he had written, holding it out to me in his hand, ‘but only if you’re not going to write about its subject.’ I had no intention of doing so, but never regretted declining the article, which swiftly disappeared into a desk drawer. He was able to keep his secret, much good may it have done him. He died unexpectedly three years later. His replacement could not wait for the end of winter to pursue his real love, bull-fighting in Spain.
