Monthly Archive for October, 2005

combinational delight, and when my private universe scans right

Published
by
Alfina the Vague
on October 31, 2005
in Academia, Books and Paedagogy
. 29 Comments

For all y’all who have asked how it can be possible that my students are as bad as they are, I guess the only real answer is that Zembla U is a public school.  The minimum GPA for admission here is frighteningly low, and I have the sneaking suspicion that high school English teachers just sort of sweep the masses through with a friendly pat on the back.  Thanks, guys. No really. It’s not that I in any way disdain public education or high-school English teachers.  If it weren’t for my 12th grade English teacher, I probably would have stuck with my plan to major in art, and I’d still be working at that coffee shop.  (Actual, earnest, non-sarcastic thanks to Mrs. B, wherever you are.) It’s just that, if I were stuck teaching high school English, you can bet I would be packing a flask and whisking them out of there as quickly as possible. 

The best thing about grading papers is how fucking wonderful everything else seems after.  My own academic writing flows more easily; food tastes better and wine sweeter; the words of whatever book I am reading seem to sparkle a little brighter on the page (unless that’s just the booze; who can really say).

At the moment, I am enjoying the sparkle of Sharon Olds, thanks to the always-reliable recommendation of Clarabella.  Other sparkle on my bedside table includes David Foster Wallace and the not-for-leisure but still-always-seismic Vladimir.  Here is a thing he wrote one time:

Now I shall speak of evil as none has
Spoken before. I loathe such things as jazz;
The white-hosed moron torturing a black
Bull, rayed with red; abstractist bric-a-brac;
Primitivist folk-masks; progressive schools;
Music in supermarkets; swimming pools;
Brutes, bores, self-conscious Philistines, Freud, Marx,
Fake thinkers, puffed-up poets, frauds and sharks.

today in zembla

Published
by
Alfina the Vague
on October 31, 2005
in Books
. 7 Comments

As one of our sillier Zemblan proverbs says, the lost glove is happy.

case of the good-bad paper

Published
by
Alfina the Vague
on October 31, 2005
in Gumshoe and Paedagogy
. 5 Comments

Although inundated by one mundane mystery after another, this detective has finally come upon a case of particular interest: namely, the case of the good-bad paper. 

While slogging through a malodorous stack of pap that found its way to my desk last week, I found myself face to face with the one chunk of prose I had most dreaded reading.  Its author, a soi-disant man of the streets with more ice in his ears than this detective can ever hope for unless she marries outside of academia, had not previously displayed himself in an intellectual light.  One notable encounter involved the futility of responding to the question "is this paper supposed to be facts, or a story?"

I must admit entertaining the hope that this essay would be so obviously plagiarized that I wouldn’t have to deal with it.  One quick glance over the first page told me this was not so: it was, undoubtedly, his own original work. 

The mystery surrounding this paper is as simple as this:  the essay was terrible.  About that I make no bones.  Oddly, though, it was so bad I enjoyed reading it.  The sheer fresh-faced na?vet? and straightforwardness of thought were almost charming, in a sort of folk-art way.  It was so bad it surpassed the boundaries of bad and went right past terrible, horrible, nauseating, and head-poundingly depressing and right back around to good.

How could this be?  Have I no standards?  Have I not claimed countless times that one more to/two/too mistake and I would stab out my own eyes in the manner of an ancient Greek?  Clearly, I decided, I would need to call for the help of my faithful assistant, Jameson. 

Upon gazing into the shadowy white depths of my freezer, I came to the conclusion that the real mystery was why I had not had any whiskey in the house in weeks.

Case Status:  Pending

elevator notes

Published
by
Alfina the Vague
on October 26, 2005
in Uncategorized
. 8 Comments

7:40 am.  I get on from the basement, a cup of coffee in hand necessitated by the indecorous hour.  The seam in the paper cup creates a tiny gap between the lip and the lid through which hot coffee drips with stunning regularity, pooling in the indentation between my thumb and forefinger. The ride to the fifth floor is interminable.

11:55 am.  Loopy and distracted after two hours of teaching, I get on from the first floor.  A pear-shaped girl in lesbian shoes pretends to glance around her looking for the stairwell.  When the car’s arrival dings, she fauxpologizes, "I’m only going to two."  In my pocket, the track advances to "Baby Got Back."

12:03 pm.  As I negotiate two armsful of books wondering how I will hit the down button, the film school’s new hire strides past, makes eye contact, passes by. He is a yankee, I remember. The wait for the car back down to the first floor extends as, in a Proustian moment of reflection, I test myself to see whether I can name all 14 of the books in the stack I am carrying.  I can’t.  I curse the library’s in-person-renewal policy. 

12:21 pm.  On the way back, I think if I had the board-flat torso of a twelve-year-old boy the books would balance better. Instead they want to tip off the top, so I walk swaybacked.  Two lunching ladies join me at the first floor.  They do not select a number.  My overcooked noodle of an arm can’t help them.  Two obvious freshmen get in on the third floor, thinking we are going down.  The ride is interminable.

undelivered lecture: modernism and rummy mctypewriter

Published
by
Alfina the Vague
on October 24, 2005
in Books and Paedagogy
. 13 Comments

Good morning everyone!  I hope you have been enjoying Important Novel by Mr. Rummy McTypewriter this weekend.  Ahhh, you have.  Excellent.  Very good then.  So, as you know, this is a fine example of Modernist fiction.  Who can say a little bit about what that means?  Anyone know any characteristics of Modernism?  Yes, that’s right, Lyle, it comes before Post-Modernism.  What’s that, Phillippe? 

You have a question?  Uh huh.  Yes, I did say when papers were due.  In case you missed it, due dates are listed on the syllabus.  So, back to–

Yes, Phillippe, I did hand out the syllabus.  Uh huh.  On the first day of class.  And where were we…oh, yes, Modernism.  What is it about Important Novel that makes it so–

Phillippe!  Are you going to help us identify the Moderni–

No.  No, I do not have any extra copies, but you may feel free to download it from the class website.  Okay then.  Now put those away, we do not need to see pictures of your pet bird.

No are you people ready to discuss Mr. McTypewriter’s novel, or do we need to clear up any more procedural questions?

Yes, Molly, you were supposed to have read it for today’s class.  Right.  Uh huh.  It’s listed beside today’s date. 

Look people, you all have a copy of the syllabus, on which are listed all of the reading assignments, due dates, and the grade-weighting breakdown for the whole course.  I fail to see why we have to discuss those things in class each and every bleak, depressing, godforsaken day. 

One of the skills you are supposed to be developing in here is close reading!  I have no clue how you are going to achieve even a basic understanding of Important Novel if you cannot even manage to comprehend a list of titles and dates.   Rummy McTypewriter’s prose is a complexly –

Raymond, please put your cell phone away.  No, I can see you texting on it right now!  Are you arguing with me?  Is this because I wouldn’t let you bring your Sony AIBO robot dog to class last week?  IS IT? Because that is just ridiculous.  No, I do not think McTypewriter would have found it an inspiring technological advance!

Speaking of technology, however, does anyone have any thoughts as to how the technological advances of the early twentieth century might have influenced the Mode–

Oh, fuck it; I am going to the bar.