/lit/ - Literature

>>17497865
I dropped out of college twice because I hated it and my family forced me to go. Academia is gay and anyone who spends their life pining for a shitty job of university politics, teaching half retarded undergrads and failing to fuck your students is a fool. Why don’t you just write actually good books and save the literary world from mediocrity? Its better than being an adjunct for life and being poor and miserable.

I did get into my PhD program in fancy Ivy hell and I'm not here to mog you I am here to tell you that every single one of my peers was a fucking mentally handicapped moron who didn't even know their own subject and certainly didn't care about it. I know your life plans have been disrupted but it might be a blessing in disguise man. I spent my entire 20s surrounded by pieces of shit I not only despised but I had to specifically watch them drag the thing I loved through the dirt and get rewarded for it, while the two or three cool people I lucked into meeting had nervous breakdowns and dropped out because there was nothing for them amid all the brunches to masturbate over our "Queering Austen" papers with the horrible prose and the typos on the first page even though you've had 6 months to prepare. The professors are not any better, they are just "Queering Austen"-writers with 10+ more years under their belt who fell through the pachinko machine of the job market and got hired as permanent unfirable high school teachers to another generation of "Queering Austen" writers who don't even do the fucking assignments. Don't even get me started on teaching. I cannot emphasize this enough. Ivy League universities are high schools. I am just teaching high school students. They are all entitled and spaced out.

Academia fucking sucks. Law might not be much better since you are in constant competition with sociopaths to be the most sociopathic if you want to survive at a major firm, and the "winner" is the one who sees his own children and wife the least by age 50. Thriving in law will crush your soul, not just on its own, but because failing to sell your soul will make you a target for more eager lawyers who already didn't have one to begin with.

If you were making a decision of whether to try for academia or law school I would be more gentle but since you're already well past the point of no return I'm being honest. It's a pile of shit full of morons. It selects for "Queering Austen" people, not against them.

>>17497865
Have sex, incel

>t. khv who attended mediocre Canadian universities and law school with mediocre grades

>>17497937
The only good part of ivy league schools is if you have a thing for asian or jewish girls. I live near upenn and its a goldmine for hebrew milkies.

>>17497937
Thanks for the insight anon. While I was an undergrad I got the feeling that the hell of English academia might not be quite so fiery at the graduate level but I guess I was wrong.

Law certainly feels like selling your soul. At this point I'm hoping that I can get out in 10 years with a few millions and then move to Jamaica or some shit and drink rum and write my >novel

>>17497903
I am trying to write a good book. I worked in publishing as an undergrad and discovered that the only way to get published these days is to:
1. already be famous
2. be a professor and write some "guns germs and steel" type non-fiction

Literary fiction is almost completely dead in today's market. I think the only legit course to having your novel get exposure is to publish a short story in the New Yorker or something like that and then ride that wave into a book deal.

>>17497865
it simply means that you probably didn't have the real chops, friend

of course academia is political--as is most professional carrerism at any public, visible level. you don't seem to know how to play the game well, e.g. be able to preserve your own integrity while also submitting to more general social constraints.

i, too, went to top ivy-league institutions; only i found plenty of legitimately brilliant people pursuing legitimately brilliant ends--ends diverse in their political and social targets/goals/ideologies.

there is another side to academia, and it is remarkably wonderful.

>>17497865
Start a reading group with some bros. Try to impress each other with your writing and thoughts.

>>17497937
Why is this? Has it always been like this? What has academia become?

>>17498113
that may be true! I hope you find everything you're seeking in your academic career. I certainly don't mean to imply that academia is bullshit in toto. I just thought it was very strange that all of my peers studying certain types of bullshitty topics found success in academia even though they certainly didn't seem to deserve it.

I was just a bit flabbergasted as to how I was essentially shunned out of academia but accepted into law so readily. I was very confused as to how I wasn't "good enough" for PhD programs but was good enough for law programs...but perhaps I am deficient in ways that only apply to academia or perhaps it was just an unlucky roll of the dice.

I went to a shitty law school.
You’ll probably fail the bar.
Life sucks
I wish I could kill myself.

>>17498192
I think I misunderstood—sorry

What is it that you studied and were interested in that you thought didn’t make the mainstream cut? What is it you are passionate about studying or knowing now?

>>17498272
>inb4 he replies "studies of the negro specimen and the failures of its genealogy"

>>17497937
I loved reading this!

>>17497865
Just find a bf/gf to fill that void with excitement and romance, but the real kind. I’ll volunteer.

>>17497937
Thanks for the read, glad I decided on not going to an Ivy this year and went with a school that better fit my interests and demographic

>>17498113
Yikes, this is such a shit take. Just because he didn’t bend over and confirm to the shitty ideologies doesn’t mean he didn’t have the smarts. If anything Anon is probably smarter than most of the people who went on past him in lit programs. I don’t want to hear your bollocks.

>>17498765
>anon is probably smarter...

What proof at all do you have of this? Any at all? And by “take” you mean that my experience is what—false? Do you think i am lying to myself?

Holy hell man, you are perfect example of gutter-level thought. Truly braindead filth. You operate on the thinnest assumptions and cant process that experiences might exist beyond your narrow frame of reference.

Confirmed not educated at a top school.

>>17498113
>brilliant people pursuing legitimately brilliant ends--ends diverse in their political and social targets/goals/ideologies.
such as? all papers/books i've read from academics are the most pretentious and mediocre texts i've encountered
(i'm legitimately asking)

>>17497865
>Am about to graduate, recruited to a top firm with a huge salary but I feel empty inside because I only ever have cared about literature and art.
Then create literature and art.

>>17498886
the final redpill is getting the most of money out of the least work so you can go out and live, and write

>>17498847
dude just peruse through what i myself read/read over the last couple of years (updating as we speak): pykewaterlibrary.squarespace.com/config/pages

the last works by i read by colleagues were essay on nationalism by Arash Abizadeh, essay on ranciere by Jason Frank, book on development of 19th century american law by Aziz Rana, essay on gerrymandering by Charles Beitz, essay comparing Schmitt and Baitaille's notions of sovereignty by Martin Jay, a book on legal realism by Robbie George, book on rise of populism by jan-werner mueller, book on apocalypticism by Alison McQueen--all are world class scholars who are at top institutions and are recognized as being at the top of their game. i know, have studied with/under them, or am personal friends with them.
this is what i mean: that's just off the top of my head. nothing to do with identity politics, etc.--just quality political thinking. i could go on and on, but this is all real-time where the field currently stands sorta discourse.

ironically, it's in the very self-same echo chamber of the identity-politics-only crowd that criticisms like OP's tend to be launched. do identity politics matter in contemporary academia and at top institutions? absolutely, no question. but there is a wide, wide world of incredible conversation and healthy debate occurring outside those enclaves.

>>17497903
This is what I did too. I went to 3 schools in 3 years. Hated every one of them.
My mom and dad made it abundantly clear I would be a pariah and loser in the family if I didn't go. Made it seem like not going was such a egregious hurt to them.
Now I have an art degree from a second rate art school with no prospects or real skills and more than $35,000 of debt.
Thanks mom and dad. Sure is nice having that piece of paper on my wall.

>>17498804
>>17498113

go away bait. anon is having serious issues we all had in the past or still have, might have in the future, and you're just being a cunt. if you're one of those 'legitimately brilliant people' then lord have mercy on America--it's fucked.

>>17498272
I was applying to programs with an emphasis in comp lit with ancient Greek and Latin. I think that perhaps the whole " deeply into Classics" thing is regarded unfavorably by English departments now because of the correlation between those who are into Classics and those who are fervent nationalists/those who glorify the whole "western civilization" kind of thing. I don't hold those unfavorable views, I just happened to be interested in Classics.

I am now going to be working in litigation, so I've been studying the practices of that area of law. Outside of work I've been into learning more about linguistics and ancient languages that aren't Latin and Greek.

>>17498912
>dude just peruse through what i myself read
>bro its totally legit discourse bro
>bro were so smart in academia bro its totally great

>>17498945
...so you applied to graduate programs in English lit, hoping to study the classics? You didn't apply to classics programs?

>>17498928
see above. glad what you call "bait" is answerable simply by saying: OP applied to the wrong program and expected the wrong thing, and somehow blames it on identity politics.

good job, anon. you super smart, too.

dig a little bit and you all turn out to be pathetic piece of shit morons. SURPRISE
but keep telling yourself whatever lie you want.

>>17498765
>>17498804
I wouldn't assert that I'm any more/less intelligent than my more academically successful peers. I'm just shocked that students who seem to put very little effort in their work (never really read the texts for class, write essays about the low-hanging fruit that I described in the OP, don't know many languages other than English) ended up being rewarded by academia. I guess that many English departments want to emphasize certain forms of lit crit that just aren't in my wheelhouse.

>>17498912
thanks fren
and what do you have to do to get into that "level"? i'm majoring in music but want to do a phil or lit degree

>>17498963
come back when you've read 5% of what you find on there.
sweetie, you simply aren't ready for big-boy conversations yet.

>>17498912
are you at a canadian university? i have the strange hunch that you are.

>>17498969
No, I applied to comparative literature programs. I wanted to study certain English texts that were very influenced by classical texts and were written partially in Latin. It would have been very stupid of me to apply to English programs to study Classics, kek. I think that comparative literature depts might be shying away from students interested in classical languages for aforementioned reasons.

>there are ivy/prep students on /lit/
Are there socialites on here too?

>>17499014
I suspect that there are a lot of ivy students on here. When I was at Harvard I found out that 5 of the friends I made in English classes browse /lit/

>>17498985
this >>17498963 isn't me (>>17498847), and i'm also >>17498980
i honestly like the idea of researching and doing other "academic stuff", but, at least in my area, I feel everybody is incredibly mediocre/corrupt. I guess that's just a LatAm thing

>>17498995
no, i fucking hate canada. only decent parts are the klondike and butchart gardens.

i am american and live/teach in america.

>>17497977
death to upenn kids
t. native philadelphian

Academia shilling thread.
Don't bother with those cucks.

>>17499039
You actually went to Harvard? How did that work out for you? I’d love to interview you, for writing purposes of course.

>>17497937
>>17497865
Thoughts on Law School as an intellectual pursuit (assuming I have the funding)? I'm doing theological studies and will be getting an M.Div + MA, and feel like the rhetorical aspect of a law degree would be quite fun. My dad recommends it, even if my career is in ministry, because he believe I would thrive when challenged.

>>17499144
i know someone who goes there, elaborate and i'll pass it on to him

>>17497865
Being a lawyer with literary inclinations is infinitely more true to the soul of beauty than being an academic. You're on the right path, anon, I promise

>>17498901
Don't get too excited about his high-paying salary. He's going to have to work 70-100 hour weeks plus he'll have to be on call.

>>17499414
>assuming I have the funding
Right now, law school attendance is so low that schools are giving out generous financial packages to people with high GPAs and LSAT scores. If you don't have a high LSAT score, forget about it. The debt is not worth it. If you have a high score, you can sometimes get almost a full ride.

>>17499568
I thought law was an oversaturated field?

Reading this thread is like having a million tiny needles flying up from the past to stab at me

>>17499568
I could probably get a solid score, but I'm still preparing for grad school religious studies. I would mainly pursue law school as a means of making myself a better apologist + interesting theologians went through legal training so it seems NEAT. GPA-wise I'm fine (sitting at a 4.0), and I'll have to see about the LSAT. If I was doing law school for purely self-effacing reasons, do I need to go to a T14 school, or is the "tier" of law school less about education and more about the name on the paper?

>>17497865
I am a frog who is studying philology and its been going very well. Many professors have introduced me to brilliant minds in the field like Festus, Poliziano, and Scaliger and developed highly interesting insights into classical literature. My students actually have brains, compared to when I went to Stanford with American students who were obsessed with the identity politics angle, and add a lot to the literary discussion. Feels amazing to thrive in the world of Belles Lettres without the pollution of the uncouth political rabble that has taken hold of the less rigorous humanities departments.

>>17499611
It would be ideal to go to a T14 school, but you may not get any financial package from those institutions.

>>17499577
Depends on what you mean and where. Some people go to utter toilet schools and still find a great job right after graduating (before taking the bar).

>>17499611
My gf who works in big law tells me it's all about the name, what you learn in law school rarely applies to the job. Big Law interviews most heavily at the top tier schools, probably the most important part of getting into Big Law.

What are liberal universities like? I'm finishing my degree in wildlife science so I've met a couple of hippies, but the school is generally unpopular with those types. My school has a lot of /k/ types and used to be a military academy. Sometimes I walk to H.W.'s grave or the Confederate General statue. But I don't want to go to grad school here because I want to see more of America. Does anyone go to a cali school or Oregon State?

>>17499617
where

>>17499705
A grande école

>>17498912
Don't have access to your Squarespace list.

>>17499987
Sorry, editing the website right now and sent the link from my page.
Here’s the real one: https://pykewater.com/pykewater-seminar-master-list

Whatever i read i annotate heavily with my own method, then i scan/upload so i can re-read/access titles from anywhere electronically and also so i can share with my students and colleagues, should they choose to follow along. I run a series of private seminars and am about to branch out to more public/online offerings, so i try to make available to any would-be participants any and all texts that might be relevant to a given seminar.

I also just upload for general digital archiving on a personal level.

>>17499001
Anon, I am sorry to break this to you but comparatively literature, at least as far as I am aware, is not what you think it is. Comparative literature is where universities send all of the immigrants, poors, easily duped, the libtards etc in order to make easy money and teach easy stupid shit. A genuine, ambitious comparative project would be completely out of place there. In fact, contrary to what that other anon said earlier, I'd expect a truly high quality, non-professorial comparative project to be done either by an English lit or Classics student, but not by a comp lit student. You could do good comparative literature work as a professor who already has previous credentials, but I doubt you'd get anything good from it as a student.

>>17499665
I wouldn't be going into law, it would be mainly to engage in debate over casebook type stuff. My broader goal is to be an apologist.

>>17498912
>quality political thinking
Your reading comprehension is not very good for an ivy-leaguer. Of course political scholarship is accumulating talent and producing (comparatively) engaging work--it's the densest and most attractive field in academia, and has infected every other discipline in the liberal arts. OP is talking about *literature*--which should be, by nature, apolitical. The act of politicizing it is not only an interdisciplinary bastardization, but currently the lowest-hanging fruit of scholarship.

>>17498924
Lol they did the same thing to me only I didn't listen. Now I'm writing every day and just vibing. Don't be a square, be your own owner.

>>17497865
For someone of such apparent intelligence you should have been smart enough to know which way the wind was blowing.

>>17497865
we are brothers anon, but i wasnt as clever and went to my local university of science instead. i have very decent salary for a 26 yo, but the job leaves me jaded and crushed. i wasted my early 20s playing vidya on computer, because i am an ugly autist. i did not have enough money to buy books (local libraries had some decent books, but you know how it is), but i love them.
i feel like it is already too late to change things up
i feel betrayed

>>17500249
>no money to buy books
>buy books
>in 2021
>no money to buy books
kek

>>17498912
>All works of Political History as opposed to English Literature
You come across as the epitome of the self entitled know it all. OP is clearly talking about English Literature specifically.

>>17500467
>>17500192

Can you either of you uneducated pieces of trash fucking read? OP begins by talking about English lit and by >>17498945 admits that he is focused on the classics and by >>17499001 admits that it was through an attempt at comparative lit. Are either of those “strictly English lit”? No? I didn’t think so. Try and read before commenting. I know it’s hard, but...

Jesus Christ you are dumb, just plain fucking dumb.

>>17500510
The only dunce here is you. You've made that painfully obvious. Who blunders into a thread so desperate to be known and thought about that he signs every one of his posts with faggot modernist art? You - that's who. You come across as the worst kind of simpering egoist.

Why on earth would you expect everyone to follow along with baited breath? It's a fucking 4chan thread. OP clearly put an emphasis on his English degree as an English degree specifically; you then fart along and start waxing lyrical about Political History and how OP must certainly be far less than you are for not being able to engage in a field that has little if anything to do with your chosen field. You're an idiot and an obvious histrionic.

>>17500606
long post just to admit you didn't read, complained about me not reading, and now are revealed to be the hypocritical piece of shit you are.
fun talk, glad we had it.

>>17500655
I read the OP, which was clearly sufficient given the thrust of his problems. You failed to do even that properly. Go fuck yourself, poof.

>>17500681
You come across like someone who is actually retarded

>>17500735
>>17500681
lol

>>17500735
You come across like someone who is actually like literally retarded

>>17500735
>>17500749
>samefagging this hard
Take your meds, poofta. You need them.

>>17500761
you don't even know how to read poster count, huh bud?

this is where we part ways. you've proven actually illterate.

keep posting though. it's super cute seeing someone like you try so hard :-)

>>17500777
>you don't even know how to read poster count
I have to assume an ass bandit like you would be petty enough to switch to their phone.

>>17497937
>and the "winner" is the one who sees his own children and wife the least by age 50.

kek

>>17500788
omg you are ADORABLE i can hardly even take it just STOP before i eat you up with a spoon!

>>17500813
>https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Histrionic_personality_disorder#:~:text=Histrionic%20personality%20disorder%20(HPD)%20is,an%20excessive%20desire%20for%20approval.
Meds. Now. Take them.

>>17500788
Not him, you just seem like a cunt

>>17500877
If you can read through all of *his* posts and still think that, I don't know what to tell you.

>>17500606
>baited breath

>>17500973
>falling for the bait

>>17497865
... Classics PHD program?

>>17500813
you are making me sad. i imagine you as a sad piece of man. overintellectualized and proud of it.
you dont talk about literature at all... i suppose you dont even know what it is without essays about literature. its sad. you remind me why academy is and always will be some kind of church.

>>17497865
Law school is pretty big brain, you don't need to get a phd with the state of education nowadays

>>17497865

>tfw no Ivy League bf/gf to talk about literature with
why even live

>>17501053
what? i talk about literature all the time. i make threads about literature all the time. i do not underline literature like i do nonfiction in an effort to appreciate literature on its own terms, even. that i dont talk about literature in this thread means to you that i don't at all?
whatever, you're just bait at this point.
it's honestly hard for me to imagine someone as dumb and full of idiot assumptions--assumptions you take as certainty, for some reason--even exists.

ima extrapolate and guess you aren't a successful, happy or very admired man. just log-off, bro. even other anons are making fun of you at this point. oh but wait, im sure that's me, cause only i could see you for the braindead filth you are. bye!

>>17501053
He’s literally raping you, lol. BTFO faggot

>>17498973
Surprised that an English graduate program doesn't care that you speak languages other than English? Yep, I'm thinking you're retarded. Good luck with Law School. I'm planning on becoming a lawyer myself, but I'm not gonna be a soulless litigator.

>>17499275
I don't know if this is a joke but yes I went to Harvard I'm also OP so you can see how it worked out

>>17499537
thank you anon

>>17500060
lol if this is true it explains a lot

>>17499665
I am also going into Big Law and this is 100% true

>>17501182
English graduate programs literally require you to know other languages you silly goose

>>17501111
>i make threads about literature all the time but i dont talk about it now because they are saying bad things about my beloved and totally useful and highly incredibly intelligent academy.

Hey, fren. I also ended up going to law school and regret it every single day. Law will destroy your soul unless you're extremely careful. I wish you luck in not falling for its traps.

>>17501335
How did it destroy your soul if I may ask?

>>17501111
That last poster wasn't even me. See >>17500832 for my final word, faggot. You are in need of evaluation. And I mean that seriously. You do a disservice to your students by continuing to teach as you are.

>>17501297
Not a joke, I’m writing a character that wants to be an intellectual but can’t afford being put through an Ivy League school. I’m sorry it worked out like that for you. I’m going to be honest, I have a learning disability that basically hindered my ability to ever go to a nice school so I went into physical labor to save up and put myself in school. It’s fascinating to me that one of the things someone could dream of having could become such a burden on someone else. I really would love to interview you if you would have me, do you have a discord possibly?

>>17501335
tell me (to any anon who attends/attended law school): what is law school like? what do you learn? what do you do?

>>17501297
>lol if this is true it explains a lot
If you think what I am saying is more credible this way, I should add that one of my friends applied to a top grad uni for English lit and the uni reserved him a place in comp lit instead, so he had a two hour hysterical, rage fuelled panic attack and then wanted to rope.

>>17497865
Are euro universities, and in particular German universities as bad? I've been teaching myself latin/greek and want to major in philology there.

>>17501351
>final word
Posts again
>faggot
Says i am a social disservice

Dude. For real. I am going to stop responding to you now not because it hasn’t been fun (it has), but because your stupidity is now starting to bore me. Just be happy i, or anyone, gave you the attention you got.
Take care!

>>17498113
I'm 4 years into one of the top 5 English PhD programs in the US. You're right that there are lots of brilliant people in academia—but that's not thanks to academia. Over the last few years I've seen the system grind people in my cohort who I used to genuinely admire into the blandest of idealogues and careerists. Academia attracts brilliance, but only to destroy it.

Worse, I can feel the same thing happening to me. Early on, while I was doing coursework, I felt like I could say something close to what I wanted to say by disguising it as something more fashionable. And I told myself that I was at least encountering genuine alterity in primary texts (I work on 17th C British lit), if not in the braindead 21st C criticism they force you to swallow and regurgitate. But over time, a life built out of bad faith becomes intolerable. If you spend all day pretending to be something that you're not, you either become that thing or you revolt.

If academia weren't wonderful at all, it might be more bearable—but those little tastes of what-could-be make what-is even more horrible to contemplate—especially when you know you're as complicit as everyone else.

>>17501397
>Posts again
If you're this literal in real life, I do not for one second believe you actually work at a reputable university.
>Says i am a social disservice
Faggots like you are absolutely a social disservice, yes. This will never not be the case. I don't care if this is not a popular opinion at this point in time.
>Dude. For real. I am going to stop responding to you now
Whatever you say, poof. I can see you're rattled. Maybe have your boyfriend stick his whole fist up your ass to calm you down :^)

>>17501361
I would be interested in shooting you an email to talk provided that you're willing to drop it in the thread. Always happy to help someone that's writing a novel.

Anyone here who went to a Polish university?

>>17501396
Why would euro universities be bad? LOL.

>>17501396
German unis are considered #1 for philology. They haven't been dethroned since the 18th ce.

>>17501427
>Worse, I can feel the same thing happening to me. Early on, while I was doing coursework, I felt like I could say something close to what I wanted to say by disguising it as something more fashionable. And I told myself that I was at least encountering genuine alterity in primary texts (I work on 17th C British lit), if not in the braindead 21st C criticism they force you to swallow and regurgitate. But over time, a life built out of bad faith becomes intolerable. If you spend all day pretending to be something that you're not, you either become that thing or you revolt.
This is the purpose behind being assigned essays on weird shit like queer theory btw. When you write something, you are accepting it in your mind and soul in order to engage with it. Therefore, by assigning essay topics to unsuspecting people who just want to "write something that works", you can debase them in various ways. Chicoms literally used essay competitions as a brainwashing tactic on American pows during the Korean War.
>t. accidentally memed myself into developing a taste for postmodernism and Marxism despite being as reactionary as they come
>I'm still holding onto my beliefs tho

>>17499001
If this is true, then of course you got rejected. Nobody gets into top comp lit programs to study Latin. Your project is just not viable in today's academy.

>>17501435
*histrionics like you

I should say.

>>17501479
The good news is that the most fashionable work being done in the humanities is actually full of reactionary insights. All you have to do is swap "White" for "Black" and you can pretend you're reading a book about the emancipatory ontology of the KKK.

>>17501438
shoot me an email on my spam it’s av0cad0.th0t@gmail.com let me know so I can try to delete this comment

>>17498017
nigga this crocodile dude has a decent amount of readers and he doesnt even have his grammer together. just write a book and worry about that shit later.

>>17501371
I haven't attended law school in the US or the Anglo world, so my experience might be different from what you will encounter, but I highly doubt it since law is the same everywhere, and steers people into the same types of behavior. In my (European) country, you can go to law school directly after high school like a normal undergraduate major, so at least there's that.

When you study law, you'll basically spend all of your time reading and memorizing
three different aspects of several branches of law: past cases, legal codes (statutes), and legal doctrine. If you're in the Anglo world you'll spend more time studying cases, but in my country we spent more time studying legal codes. These three things form the basic building blocks of law.

With this in mind, it's time to apply "the legal method" to different scenarios: administration law, inheritance law, family law, torts (civil liability), contracts law, business law, tax law, criminal law, real estate law, etc.

Let's take inheritance law as an example. Your professor will try to teach you how inheritance works in your country. In my case, we first consulted our legal code and some doctrinal books. You read a bunch of "articles" which "define" the "legal phenomenon" at hand.

You will memorize a bunch of definitions and a bunch of conditions for inheritance to take place ("a percentage must go to the deceased's wife depending on their marriage agreement"; "a son or daughter may only be excluded from benefitting from the deceased's estate if they did X, Y or Z against the deceased"; "the will must have been signed by two witness and registered at the notary's office for it to take place"). Then you will throw all of this knowledge in the garbage when you get to study the cases, which are basically the stupid ramblings of oafish judges who get to decide however they want because the law is a joke and legal arguments are nothing but semantics or "no real scotsmen" type of discussions.

You will also throw your knowledge in the garbage because you will do as your client says. It doesn't matter if you advise him not to litigate on a certain issue, because it's basically retarded. If he wants to bear the cost of litigation, you'll have to come up with whatever bullshit excuse your by now feeble and entirely depressed mind can muster. Oh, and all your workmates are borderline psychopaths. Enjoy.

>>17500832
i know this is out of my ass in this thread. but how this is a "disorder"?. sound to me like nazi shit saying to that dramatic theatratical people they have a sickness.

>>17501427
this is what i don't understand. here's my experience: i'm a white male who has attended/taught at princeton, nyu, stanford, cornell. i've never once turned in an assignment that deals with identity politics and have been at the top/among the top of my classes/programs since day one. i concentrate on writing sophisticated, original and critical takes on whatever interests the most in any given class. this has never once not been rewarded--and this includes plenty of professors and teachers who are certainly liberal, certainly on the politically "diverse" bandwagon, etc.

WHO THE FUCK IS MAKING YOU WRITE THESE THINGS? that is my question. i know people who study these things, but because they themselves are diverse, have some political stake, etc.--i know plenty more, in poli sci, english, anthropology, classics, etc. etc., that simply dont study politically correct lit, who study this or that random topic.

why are you under the impression that this work doesnt happen, that it cant happen? it simply does. when i was at stanford, the english lit grad students i hung out with were pursuing things like a dissertation on the cross-over of science fiction and comic books in the late 20th century, or the use of color in the works of dickinson, or the emergent role of artistic "perspective" in the development of late renaissance literature, or the role of the letter "K." in Kafka, Mann and Musil, etc. again, sure there were some things like "slave imagery in the works of Melville" but this was part of a massive curriculum and incredible spectrum of academic interests.

how do you all just strawman academia so goddamn much? do you all really just have no original thoughts that arent just regurgitated alt-right conspiracy theories?

jesus my experience is just so radically different from yours. how the fuck did you all fuck up your education so badly? how did you not find people with different interests? be honest with yourselves: did you truly even try?

>>17501438
>>17501539
ya get it homeboy?

>>17501510
LOL. I do a similar thing, whenever I see "Eurocentric" I just replace it with "liberal capitalist" or whatever. Works like a charm.

>>17501558
kek thanks

>>17501618
>people whose experiences differ from my own MUST be wrong and in some sense inferior
Meds. Now.

>>17501618
>WHO THE FUCK IS MAKING YOU WRITE THESE THINGS?
Anon, my university offers a limited set of essay questions for my program. Half of those are some sort of woke and very easy to respond to. The other half are "standard" historical questions. Most of those are about subjects and ideas I don't care about, but rarely there are some that are about something interesting. I have to write multiple essays in a year. Either I have to write about all the non-woke questions, including much dry, stupid bullshit, or I have to write some ez grades woke shit. The problem with woke shit is that it limits the pool of good questions and helps those who take the easy way out by writing about it. Additionally, exam questions are entirely at the discretion of the university staff, so if they want me to write about the history of lesbian emotions in early Renaissance Italy, then I have to do that or get a shit grade. Before you ask, yes, that is a real example and yes, I wrote an exam on it.

>>17501618
you are bland. and probably you are slick enough to notice what is the principle notion of thinking in your college.

>>17498017
>Literary fiction is almost completely dead in today's market.
if what you wanted was to easily publish fiction you should've gotten an MFA, something that probably any retard could do. You might say that most of what gets published by MFA types is shit, and that is true, but that's also true for what gets published in the literary market. In both there have always been exceptions though. I imagine that publishing short stories in literary quarterlies and the likes should be far from impossible too even if you didn't study a MFA, have you tried that?

>>17501361
Congrats on overcoming and doing well anon, good luck with your novel

I have my own gay backstory of dropping out at 12yo or so, becoming a NEET hikki crazy man, and later getting an ivy league phd, but all I feel is disappointment with academia and insane hatred of the upper class that monopolizes it

>>17501448
well I was talking more about british unis and how american cancer seems to have seeped into there to

>>17501618
Sorry, maybe I should have been more clear. My work isn't politically fashionable at all, and I've never been punished for that—good papers tend to be received well, good articles tend to be published (at least in period-specific journals).

With that said, the general intellectual climate on campus is poisonous. If you are white, professors and other graduate students will literally tell you not to criticize anything written by a person of color. I've seen other graduate students who are vocal about their views (one guy who's a hardcore class-reductionist, another guy who defends the "canon") excluded from both social and academic events. Some people in the department refuse to talk to them at all.

When I was still taking classes, probably ~50% of reading and discussion revolved around race, colonialism, (anti)capitalism, queers, crips, etc. In the last year, things have gotten a lot worse: we are now required by the department to include "underrepresented narratives" in every class we teach—it's supposed to be at minimum 20% of the reading. There are weekly mandatory "inclusive pedagogy" lessons. Probably ~80% of speakers invited to campus for roundtables and workshops are primarily interested in identity politics. If you don't think this stuff is hegemonic, look at Chicago—they're only admitting Black studies specialists into their English PhD program this year. Or look at tenure-track job listings: I'd say every English department that can afford it is currently trying to hire a specialist in the Black diaspora.

It's certainly possible to fly under the radar producing work that's merely scholarly—but it's absolutely suicidal to produce anything that's critical of the dominant discourses in the academy. And it's very hard to get anyone (besides your advisor and a few specialists at Oxbridge who are going to retire soon) to care about your work if you're not engaging with those discourses.

>>17501427
Seconding this from depths of soul

Can I recommend something that might seem totally trite to you: resurrect criticism, rather than literary theory, as an intellectual form and vocation. I know someone like you who is some weird fucking adrift fragment of an alternate dimension where the world produced more Riskins and Eliots and Fryes over time, not fewer, where it didn't collapse into postmodern horse's ass faggotry, and the best way I can describe him is as a critic (in the high, philosophical sense). It's a lost art.

I think academia is going to contract and collapse soon. All these rich wiener kids will relocate to some other finishing school, or the graduate research model will be replaced by a private lib arts model that emphasizes teaching at least. I think we ought to be making connections and networks for a new scholarly world that can't yet exist but may come in 20 or 30 years. Maybe it won't be funded by corporate money, maybe it will be closer to monastic life than the arbitrary 4 year degree model, but people who care should be ready to help it and shape it if it arrives

>>17501618
The system forces mediocrity on people through competition for jobs and prestige

This attracts people who should have been "facilitators" or "curators," meaningless jobs that reward networking and curating of popular public engagement sorts of things. Unfortunately these careerist airhead lower management types who have been on adderall since third grade have replaced all the people who give a shit, and they gelatinously form to whatever cynical cause-grubbing slacktivism bullshit the system rewards

>>17501823
I wouldn’t say I’m doing well I almost became homeless and am mentally ill, but I’m lucky I’m alive and art is a good coping mechanism for me. If you’re not OP still feel free to get in touch too, you seem chill.
>>17501438
my spam email is av0cad0.th0t@gmail.com thanks in advance

>>17501618
>I'm not going to post in this thread again!!!
>shits it up again with his namefagging
go roll your chair somewhere else

>>17501853
>my work isnt politically fashionable

what is your concentration? what are you interested in studying?

without disclosing too much: where, roughly, do you study? what type of institution are you at?

>>17501894
this isnt inaccurate. cynical, but not inaccurate. are you in academia? what are your interests?

to be honest i can see where at least you two are coming from. i am curious: are you not interested in providing an alternative? would a legitimate opportunity to participate in an alternative be of interest to you?

>>17498113
Friendly reminder that this is the same trust fund kiddie that plastered "BLM" all over his website during the height of the craze.

>>17501954
>trust fund kiddie
Why am I not surprised? Of course he thinks there's nothing wrong.

>>17501954
what was his website again? can't recall off the top of my head.

>>17497865
PhD admissions are fucking retarded. I have a friend in undergrad who did an entire PhD curriculum of economics coursework in undergrad and had 4 years straight of research experience with two different professors as well as a senior thesis and a one year post-grad of research. He got rejected from all programs. Meanwhile, I looked at who got in at stanford and some guy with a degree not even in economics and only one publication to his name in an unrelated field was accepted.

With academia it's not what you know, it's who you know. Cliche but true.

Also, they don't want people to do actual research in English. They only want trendy grievance studies bullshit.

My advice, be a lawyer for a bit and take advantage of the biglaw salary. Then go back to school, get an MEd. or MAT, and teach at a fancy private school Latin, Greek, literature and help run debate club. With the Ivy background you have the pedigree and you can write on the side.

>>17498113
>t. probably actually wrote a paper on "queering austen"

>>17501894
There's already a new scholarly world. There are kids hitting a bong in a garage right now talking about metaphysics, there are middle-schoolers arguing about politics in TikTok comment sections, there are people writing poems and novels they only share with their friends, there are yuppie book clubs, there's /lit/, etc. Even in the university, there are secret ideas, quiet conversations, drunken exclamations, a whole shadow network of free thought. We're already free, we just need to notice (which also means learning not to notice). But it's so hard not to notice.

>>17501980
Pykewater com. The guy's name is William Pennington

>>17501995
i already posted my site so you can see the types of works i read/tend to teach: pykewater.com/pykewater-seminar-master-list

i couldn't care less about that queering austen crap. i am classically classically conservative/roman catholic and am interested in redeveloping a classically conservative/roman catholic ideology.

>>17501700
>>17501853
>>17501894
Just fucking nuke the muttland

>>17502069
>roman catholic ideology
Please take this in the spirit it was intended: you are not a great representative. You come across as unbelievably arrogant and self satisfied. Two traits no Christian should ever possess because they are ugly in the real sense of the word. Your clear and explicit infatuation with status does you no favours whatsoever. A lot of what you have written in this thread, though well conceived technically, is clearly written with your own comfort and self aggrandisement in mind -rather than the benefit of the reader. Please, please, please don't just view this as a shitpost and take on board what it is I am trying to say.

And drop the tripcode.

This thread is absolutely fascinating. I’m just a lowly undergrad at a NESCAC but I’ve learned a lot from reading this.

>>17502119
trust me, i agree that you and i would not be friends IRL.

>>17502147
If you continue to act like a child all your life, don't be surprised when you only get the rod.

What is the solution for the current state of academia?

>>17501940
I might be completely paranoid, but I don't want to give too much detail. But it's a major US university, similar in status to those you mentioned (but not one of those you mentioned). And my dissertation deals mostly with Milton.

I'm glad I'm getting an English PhD. They literally pay you to read novels and poems—it's hard to complain too much about that. And like you said, there are lots of smart people doing interesting projects that have nothing to do with "grievance studies." And even grievance studies can be cool! But dominance and dogmatism tend to produce bad scholarship. There weren't a lot of great Marxist critics coming out of the Soviet Union in the 1980s.

What's exhausting is the constant self-censorship. That's hardly a problem unique to academia—but somehow it feels more unbearable in academia. Probably precisely because of those aforementioned glimpses of utopia academia still offers. Bad faith only hurts when you care; I'm trying not to care, but it's not easy.

It makes sense to shut up about your opinions around your boss—it sucks having to do that not only in seminars and at conferences, but even in small social settings. It's not like I want to shout "NIGGER!"—but you can't even say you don't like Aphra Behn without getting wierd "is he a misogynist?" looks.

As for alternatives, I think they already exist. I do a lot of reading I can't cite in a published paper and a lot of writing I can't even share, let alone publish. People are thinking all the time—and arguing, writing, reading, looking, criticizing. I feel at once hopeless and optimistic.

>>17502169
i don't believe you are this dumb
you see me as arrogant and self-satisfied, i see you as weak, pathetic and stupid.
you would never sit at my table.
let us now part company. are you strong enough to do at least that?

>>17502210
Catholicism is not an aesthetic for you to bandy about. You are a hypocrite.

>>17502197
this i can sympathize with. you seem like a careful thinker, ultimately. send me a email, friend: pykewater@gmail.com. you should join my discord/participate in some of my seminars.

>>17502227
William, if you're such a great scholar why have you made no impact?

Why are the two career options discussed on this board always Law and Academia? You do realize that there’s other careers out there, right?

>>17502069
Your website has an awful vibe, but I have to admit that the content is pretty great.

>>17502258
Because Law is seen as the only way out for those who spent money in a humanities degree. In some ways it is true, but only because we're very uncreative and talentless people.

>>17497865
>he didn’t take the public interest pill
no sympathy

>>17502258
>Priest
>Writer
>Lawyer
>Academic
>Marketing Executive
>Middle Management
>Finance
That's about it.

>>17502277
And Law and Academia (at least in its current state) might be the two worst career paths on that list for someone who likes to write in their free time

>>17502225
Didn’t think you were strong enough.

>>17502232
Pancreatic cancer. My model is Socrates at this point, not Plato. I’m now focused on producing quality seminars and having good conversations. Beyond what i publish on my website, i very much doubt i will ever publish to the greater public; its simply not what I’m interested in.
I’ll admit, this is the attitude of someone who is coming from the luxurious position of wealth and is already well connected in the industry. My disease has provided me the extremely rare and case of someone who doesn’t have to publish in order to secure their comfy positions.
My seminars and conversations are bar none the best that exist in academia re: that topic, though, and i will fucking stand behind that any day.

>>17502259
What do you not like about the vibe/how would you change it? Genuinely curious. Thanks for the content comment.

>>17502277
Teacher, private or public high school.

Overlooked IMO. Apparently the first few years are rough but once you have lesson plans down it's a 35-40 hr/wk job with summers off to write or do whatever you want.

>>17502295
>Didn’t think you were strong enough.
I am sorry to hear you have pancreatic cancer. In spite of this thread, I hope it is lifted.

>>17502277
>>17502297
Yeah, I suppose I should also have included government work.

>>17502314
If you are the same poster that above criticized my Roman Catholicism, then i apologize.
Your ability to move from criticism to compassion is indicative of a true Christian mentality. You may not think i possess one, and that may be true, but i can at least recognize one. I am someone who tends to live in sin, not ignorance.

Thank you.

>>17502295
>My seminars and conversations are bar none the best that exist in academia
Then you mustn't be familiar with mine.

>>17502341
That was me. Thank you for your post.

>>17497937
Hey man. I just finished grad school and was lucky to get a job. I share your pain. But you're taking it too seriously. These people are retards. Carve out your own space and find your own people.

>>17502295
Can anyone join those seminars?

>>17502342
Actually or are you just being an ass? If actually, what are your seminars on? Are they open? Would be super interested to hear how you structure/pursue the effort, etc.

>>17502376
I;m about to open them up fully to the general digital public through my discord; yes, anyone who isn’t pathological, who isn’t a conspiracy theorist, who just wants to understand and talk about X topic with other thinkers—anyone is more than welcome and encouraged to join at that point. I have kept IRL seminars small and will most likely do the same for digital seminars, but that is only for logistical reasons and to keep conversation tight.

Building the topics lists now, would love to hear any insights or possible interest. In the past its been things like “Homer: Iliad 1” or “the aesthetic state: Kant, Schiller, and German ideology”

I’d love to do a seminar on architecture and the sacralization of Ancient Rome, for instance. Have a great playlist for that and its at the forefront of my mind right now. Or a seminar that compares Kantorowicz’s notion of continuity to Schmitt’s notion of political theology—that type of thing.

>>17502380
Humanities in the broadest sense; private, invite only; reading-group structure, with opening remarks from the guest lecturer; we use custom voice chat software (discord is not conducive to a professional seminar); effort is obtained from mutual interest and our donors--the seminars are just one aspect of a broader poltical project.

>>17501481
alas

>>17501540
that's probably the plan at this point

>>17501618
I don't mean to strawman academia, sorry if my post came across like that. There are plenty of people doing interesting and unique work in academia unrelated to idpol. It's totally possible to have a great career doing something different and interesting; I just meant to say that I think that less spots are reserved at grad programs for non idpol people these days. Nobody is forcing me to write that kind of stuff, but I wonder if I could have gone farther in academia if I did. No hate though, I think it's great that the literature of more marginalized groups is getting the attention it deserves.

That being said, it's easy to underestimate how suffocating neoliberal academia can be. I got absolutely lambasted for saying I enjoyed Ulysses in a Joyce class. One girl asked if I was a fascist simply because I admitted to enjoying modernism, and several classmates dogpiled onto that insinuation. Of course I recognize the historical correlation between fascism and modernism, but my classmates acted as if liking modernism automatically means you're on the Ezra Pound side of the political spectrum (which I by absolutely no means am).

>>17502007
This makes me happy anon

>>17502418
Based rapture
One thing, I think your aesthetics list is incomplete without Schopenhauer.

>>17502418
will you post the discord link once it goes public? I majored in Classics and would be really interested in these conversations.

>>17497865

>many good postgrad programs have admit rates lower than 5%

>institutions stay the same over time, including academic standards and number of admits

>applicant pool is like 60% foreign or more

OP you just happened to not win the lottery, you were likely more qualified than most of the admits. It doesn't matter, if your test scores were typical of admitted students or superior and you had other basic qualifications like professional references and could list research / something published (what kind of academic work to Eng majors do??? Get published?). To have a decent chance you would have needed to really know the right people, like someone popular in the field and really sucked their dick

>>17502490
i think you are ultimately correct. i see what you are now saying. im sorry if i misunderstood you before.

>>17502502
what of schopenhauer would you include? seminar has shifted a number of times, here is the current reading lists split across two long sessions. 1st (foundations):
BURKE, EDMUND. A PHILOSOPHICAL ENQUIRY INTO THE SUBLIME AND BEAUTIFUL. NEW YORK: ROUTLEDGE, 2008.
DEWEY, JOHN. ART AS EXPERIENCE. NEW YORK, NY: PERIGREE/BERKLEY PUBLISHING, 2005.
HEIDEGGER, MARTIN. THE QUESTION CONCERNING TECHNOLOGY AND OTHER ESSAYS. NEW YORK, NY: HARPER PERENNIAL, 2013.
KANT, IMMANUEL. CRITIQUE OF THE POWER OF JUDGMENT. EDS. PAUL GUYER AND ERIC MATTHEWS. NEW YORK, NY: CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY PRESS, 2000.
NIETZSCHE, FRIEDRICH. THE BIRTH OF TRAGEDY AND THE CASE OF WAGNER. TRANS. WALTER KAUFMANN. NEW YORK, NY: VINTAGE BOOKS, 1967.
SCHILLER, FRIEDRICH. ON THE AESTHETIC EDUCATION OF MAN IN A SERIES OF LETTERS. EDS. ELIZABETH M. WILKINSON AND L. A. WILLOUGHBY. NEW YORK, NY: CLARENDON/OXFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS, 2005.
WAGNER, RICHARD. ART AND POLITICS. TRANS. WILLIAM ASHTON ELLIS. LINCOLN, NE: UNIVERSITY OF NEBRASKA PRESS, 1996.

and 2 (German application):
BISHOP, PAUL. GERMAN POLITICAL THOUGHT AND THE DISCOURSE OF PLATONISM: FINDING THE WAY OUT OF THE CAVE. NEW YORK, NY: PALGRAVE MACMILLAN, 2019.
CHYTRY, JOSEF. THE AESTHETIC STATE: A QUEST IN MODERN GERMAN THOUGHT. BERKELEY, CA: UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA PRESS, 1989.
KINSER, BILL AND NEIL KLEINMAN. THE DREAM THAT WAS NO MORE A DREAM: A SEARCH FOR AESTHETIC REALITY IN GERMANY, 1890-1945. NEW YORK, NY: HARPER COLOPHON BOOKS/HARPER AND ROW, 1969.
VIERECK, PETER. METAPOLITICS: FROM WAGNER AND THE GERMAN ROMANTICS TO HITLER (EXPANDED EDITION). NEW BRUNSWICK, NJ: TRANSACTION PUBLISHERS, 2007.
WILLIAMSON, GEORGE S. THE LONGING FOR MYTH IN GERMANY: RELIGION AND AESTHETIC CULTURE FROM ROMANTICISM TO NIETZSCHE. CHICAGO, IL: UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO PRESS, 2004.
SELECTIONS FROM: GOEBBELS, JOSEPH. THE GOEBBELS DIARIES. ED. LOUIS P. LOCHNER. NEW YORK, NY: CHARTER NEW YORK, 1948.
SELECTIONS FROM: KIM, ALAN, ED. BRILL’S COMPANION TO GERMAN PLATONISM. BOSTON, MA: BRILL, 2019.

>>17502517
i most definitely will, thanks so much for the interest! i'm already planning an intensive 2 or 3 session seminar trajectory on the presocratics and am retailoring the homer seminar to specifically look at the role of immortality and the "image of the god-man" in the iliad/odyessey, but are there any classics topics you'd particularly love to parse out and dive deep into? would love any and all feedback

>>17502577
It's this. You have to be "in the club" from what I've seen. You have to know someone and have famous rec letter writers to get into the top programs. There are just too many qualified applicants.

Of course, there are many many programs that are not "the top programs" and are just as good if not better. for example at the Catholic universities (excluding Georgetown) you would probably avoid a lot of the grievance studies bullshit. It's just that, from what I hear, you have to be OK with not being able to get the tenure track job in the end. You may get one across or outside the country, may end up adjuncting (not really sustainable), or teaching high school (could be ok).

>>17502600
>what of schopenhauer would you include?
Don't know man this is some big boy shit. I have only read a Plato Stanford introductory article on Schopenhauer's aesthetics and I thought his ideas were really cool. Also Schopenhauer's essays on literature are pretty cool too.

>>17502456
Ok say more
What topics in the humanities have you covered/interest you? What’s the broader political project?
Very cool stuff, anon. Would you ever be willing to coordinate or collaborate on some front?

>>17502781
Obviously I can't say too much for opsec reasons--we've got some high-profile academics and scholars on board. All I'll say is that we're working with a particularly advanced form of mimetic theory, and that the political project is the practical application of the latter--we're already involved with a couple of funds and thinktanks. If our guys think you're on to something we'll reach out to you.

>>17498804
Cringey faggot