Maybe you’ve noticed I haven’t been a very faithful blogger of late. My apologies. I’ve hit paper-writing season—that dreaded time in the semester when I have to make all those fascinating ideas I’ve developed throughout the semester cohere into a clearly articulated, thesis-driven, original piece of prose. Ugh. Until I succeed, I always feel a bit like Rachel in Chaim Potok’s The Promise. She’s working on a paper on James Joyce’s Ulysses when her boyfriend Reuven, the narrator, calls her. As he relates,
She was working on an idea in connection with Bloom’s thoughts about Stephen’s thoughts about Bloom and Bloom’s thoughts about Stephen’s thoughts about Bloom’s thoughts about Stephen. It was a splendid idea, she said. I wished her luck.
That is so how I feel when I’m in the thick of a paper and, I’m sure, how I sound when I explain my work to my husband. Wish me luck.
Here’s my workspace at the moment:
yes … that’s how I feel when I write
Aaarrrgggghhh–looks like my desk at work.