Hi dear Ken,
I dug up this mail because I wanted to add a couple of words before but I
didn't have time, and my answer to you was back when I was trying to get
something to eat (I burnt the pan with boiling potatoes in it... the last
time was 3-4 years ago, I thought I had learned by now)
I am referring to this:
> My dream for years was to live inside Academe, not because I'm madly in
> love with most academics I've met, but because I might have some space
> in the day to do my own work, teach it if I'm lucky, connect with and
> maybe even "inspirit" a group of students, and get tolerably paid for
> it. It beats working for most corporations...unless I'm being
> unbearably naive again.
Yes, I think you are a little naive here, even if I wish you well. I
remember when I worked for a library and comparing it with Dante's Inferno,
so many books without the possibility of reading them... Sometimes you end
up just correcting homework when you teach, even if I _love_ teaching. But
you can't finally _read_ as much as you would like, or read what you would
like. It is _read_ and sometimes there is a difference.
What I wanted to tell you is that I think our personalities interfere with
what we would like to be. My colleague for example (I have one here handy)
is thoroughly satisfied with the level of culture she has reached, it seems
almost when you see her that she is so well educated that it sort of becomes
redundant, that it overflows her, she is all round, you could draw her face
with a compass (I swear it).
I don't think that people like you or me will ever observe our lives with
that peaceful satisfaction, profound sense of accomplishment, high
self-esteem this colleague of mine has. I think we would be terribly bored,
take care,
Anny Ballardini
http://annyballardini.blogspot.com
http://www.fieralingue.it/modules.php?name=poetshome
The aim of the poet is to awaken emotions in the soul, not to gather
admirers.
Stalker, Andrei Tarkovsky
----- Original Message -----
From: "Ken Wolman" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Friday, January 21, 2005 4:22 PM
Subject: Re: down with the down with poetry crowd
> Rebecca Seiferle wrote:
>
> > out of university could be the best thing that could happen to it. He
was
> >
> >>only half joking.
> >>
> >>
> >
> >Neoconservatives like
> >Bob Novak talk about the 'fringe element' of 'some academic,
intellectual,
> >artistic types at some universities," and I suppose it bothers me to hear
the ease
> >with which poets adopt certain rhetorics so that one group may denigrate
the
> >other by calling them "academic' poets.
> >
> Novak is suspect if only because he "gave up the anonymity" of a CIA
> operative as a way to get at her husband, who was perceived as disloyal
> to Bush. Novak is a journalistic prostitute. Academic poetry when was
> in college was considered an expression of praise--I have no idea who
> was being talked about. Actually I don't much care.
>
> >On the other hand, I am and
> >know a number of poets who teach at universities or colleges and yet
while they
> >are 'academics' in the sense of working at an institution, none of this
pertains.
> >
> The late Milton Kessler, our visitor Basil Bunting, another visitor
> Philip Dow (whatever became of him?), Bob Kroetsch (though he wrote
> fiction back then). Most recently, talking with Stephen Dunn, who is on
> the faculty of Stockton State College in South Jersey: he's learned the
> art of the staged temper tantrum to get the department higher-ups to do
> what he wants. Stephen, Pulitzer winner, Famous Man, has twisted the
> REAL academics around his little finger to get his own way. It may not
> be nice but it works. I suspect he plays these games to make Academe a
> tolerable way to make a living.
>
> My dream for years was to live inside Academe, not because I'm madly in
> love with most academics I've met, but because I might have some space
> in the day to do my own work, teach it if I'm lucky, connect with and
> maybe even "inspirit" a group of students, and get tolerably paid for
> it. It beats working for most corporations...unless I'm being
> unbearably naive again.
>
> Ken
>
> --
> Kenneth Wolman
> Proposal Development Department
> Room SW334
> Sarnoff Corporation
> 609-734-2538
>
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