Down With Books !
I spend a good deal of my life writing articles for academic psychology journals. And if you have no idea what that involves, plough on, dear reader (I guess it's plow on if you're on the other side of the Atlantic, but you know what I mean). The academic publishing business involves two stages. The first (I'll call it (1) since we're being academic) involves having something to say; the second (in this case, (2) for consistency) involves getting it published and knowing how to manage that. Obviously, (1) causes problems, but they are so embarrassing they are rarely discussed. In contrast, when the going gets hard, the blame gets heaped on (2).
The climax of the most recent effort to evaluate research in universities (called “The Ref” for reasons that escape me) draws nigh. I’m bound to mention it – so I will. It has its own peculiar problems relating to both (1) and (2). And believe me, they are getting worse and worse. Problems threatening to overwhelm intellectual life as we know it. I exaggerate, but only because I'm finding my blogger's feet. So yes, I admit I exaggerate - but not as much as you may think. The other reason I want to write about it is that (2) bears an uncanny similarity to a preoccupation – one could say, obsession – of what, for a distinct want of a better word, we’ll call real writers, or writers of literary fiction. Hence the theme today - books and the publication thereof.
But first a digression on universities and writing. And for that I have to go back a bit.
It used to be really nice working in a university. Of course, those with dreaming spires and magic casements opening on limpid punt-strewn streams were particularly nice. But virtually any university could get you somewhere on the scale of general niceness (where, I ask you, is a word like "niceitude" when you want it?). I won't tell you exactly how nice, because if you don’t know already you'd be jealous. Of course, the pay is terrible, and that’s a handicap if you start off poor. When I entered the sacred grove (in far off Oz) my pockets were pretty empty. I stood on Flinders Street Station with the address of the place where I (erroneously) believed I had a job, three suitcases, a bewildered new wife, a ten pound note and some loose change. A tenner would last you a fair while in those far-off days before Australia had its own currency, but you can see it really wasn’t enough. Nonetheless, I was bowled over that I was actually going to be paid for doing what I would do anyway (actually, I wasn’t going to be paid, but that’s another, altogether less romantic, story).
Imagine some benevolent old chap coming along, looking not at all like Mephistopheles, fixing you with his twinkling eye and saying with a merry chuckle: "I'll pay you in solid coin of the realm to do exactly what you like for as long as you feel like it. No catches." That’s how your first job in a university makes you feel. Just lots and lots of: ‘Fancy that,’ and the occasional skip in the street when you think nobody’s looking. One thought in particular you hug to your breast - fancy actually being paid to read books! As many as you can cram into your life. Mind you, you quickly learn that if you go at it at a rate of about one a day, you'll have taken no more than a gnat's bite out of those available – all a bit disconcerting, because that’s quite a rate and doesn’t leave you much time for other things, like living.
Nonetheless, fancy being paid to do that. As I said - fancy that.
I may be wrong but I think it was Thomas Hardy who coined the aphorism to cover the progress of mankind: "things get worse". Somebody well before Eminem, anyway. Hardy was, of course, a sour old fox; so, if he it was, we have to discount the pessimistic tone. But when it comes to universities I think he got it about right. Spot on, in fact. The good times couldn't really last, could they? And believe me, they didn't. It was all bound to get spoiled, wasn't it? Yes - and it was. Mind you, I'm not talking about centuries ago: just a few golden summers was all it took. You don't have to have grey hairs to be nostalgic about universities. Which brings me to why universities now are generally horrible places in which to live and have your being. Ranking somewhere between peat-cutting and cattle-knocking in terms of life-enhancing fun. Too big a question, reader dear, save it for another day. File it along with concerns like the death of honourable conduct. Well, alright, I’ll come back to it, I promise. But some other fine day. Let me just say this: roughly speaking, the answer is easy. It is because of (1) and (2) above.
The ancient, and apposite, image of the scholar is of somebody who studies a subject, endeavours to understand it a bit, and then, but rarely, adds a little jot (or indeed tittle, take your pick) to its understanding. That’s the image you get in Chekhov. The scholar is the one with the steel-rimmed glasses wearing those funny gloves with the finger-ends cut off. The one shivering by the stove clutching a sheaf of papers. Somebody not exactly pushing the boat out, more settling for inching it down the beach a little.
Yes, the scholar’s quantum of jots and tittles is generally small. Even vanishingly small, for reasons to do with giants that we’ll come to in a second. Until quite recently this j or t was a life’s work in the form of a book (there, you’ve noticed, I’m creeping up on my prey). The scholarly life consisted of reading, and then writing, if the fancy took you, books. Books that perhaps advanced understanding: something to be determined by readers yet to come. For the scholar, fame is certainly not the spur. So there you have it. The process is simple, if a trifle recursive.
So you’re writing a book? I just thought I’d ask. Well, in that case I assume you have already discovered somebody else already had your idea. You have? I thought so. Usually several somebodies else. The best you can do is hope the particular bastard who had your idea has not been all that long dead. At least then you have the consolation of coming a recent second; breasting the tape, as it were, as it flutters to the floor. But most ideas, including yours, dear reader, and certainly including mine, have been about for longer than that – for an awfully long time. Indeed, the bigger the idea, the more likely it was known a long, long time ago. Way back in the time of giants.
Please don't despair. I'm talking about BIG IDEAS here, demanding capital letters. Frankly, your chances of finding one of these are much worse than winning the lottery. In fact, rather like winning the lottery, winning it again on the way to collect your money, and then finding you’ve won it a third time when you get home. Those sort of odds. It could happen I suppose, but, as they say, don’t bet on it.
Doesn’t all this talk of betting make you feel a bit awkward? Are these big ideas really things people (albeit not the likes of us) just find? Things to stumble across like a wire in the grass. Were they there all the time? Hiding, like the figure in the block of marble. And is that why there’s none left? That’s a notion to keep you awake at night. Because it’s not much of a life, is it? Just looking for things, hoping you’ll find them. You can’t even plan to be good at finding things; it sounds like a very accidental occupation.
In any age, in any discipline, the settled view is that the days of giants are over. They existed, but a long tine ago. In science as in the arts, nowadays writers of books hang around wondering that giants ever were and praying they might return. Secretly, of course, praying they might turn out to be a bit giantly themselves. But I ask you, are they serious? As Byron put it,
I've stood upon Achilles' tomb, and heard Troy doubted;
Time will doubt of Rome.
He got that literary turn to work because the very idea one might doubt of Rome seemed at the time absurdly fanciful, a quaint conceit. But, in fact, who now does think of Rome? You may well ask. The point about giants is they know all about Rome, and still manage to come up with something else. A trick few can pull off. Indeed, that’s how you end up as a giant. It really is silly to expect two golden thoughts before breakfast every day. Well, yes, put that way, not just silly, more like criminally stupid. But that is exactly what that fearful behemoth “The Ref” demands. If you work in a university, your additions to the mountain of jots and tittles are regularly counted and assessed. Now you won’t believe this, but each is measured for its importance, on a scale from the grim point of little significance, all the way up to gianthood itself.
“Good God!” you exclaim. “That’s wonderful. The days of giants have returned – and to excess. Who’d have thought it?”
Well, before you get too agitated, first marvel how this miracle was achieved. Innumerable additions to the sum of knowledge have been graded like eggs, for size, colour, artfulness of display, weight and so on - given that enough were laid, of course. Universities have bred a whole universe of committees and subcommittees to do little else but count and grade, groaning under a permanent injunction to keep a straight face while doing it.
Counting’s a wonderful game. Little wonder that every few years the fight to take on the counter’s role becomes quite savage. After all, not simply a giant, but an enumerator of giants: that’s something to boast about to the kids. And the game itself now consumes such a great deal of time there’s little room for other things – a bit like the Ouroboros gnawing away at its own tail. Long ago, when I was involved in these weird rites, I would estimate about a quarter of my time was spent readying what I was about to do for its evaluation by a nested hierarchy of egg-counters. There are surely many more of them now. Indeed, surely some symbolic Rubicon has already been crossed and more time is spent evaluating the doing than doing the doing. Don’t laugh - this may indeed be an entirely desirable state of affairs: it is high time the essentially anarchic process of creating something was brought to heel. And this is an excellent means to that end, finding harmless occupation for literally thousands. It brings to mind the last days of the Qing Dynasty where civil servants became so numerous they had little to do but write bad poems. But I mustn’t talk of last days.
Here’s a question that must have struck you. That period of time, a few short years, it seems awfully brief a span in which to write several books; how on earth is that managed? And another question: how come anything at all is ever placed in the giant category - doesn’t it take a giant to know one? I hasten to add your questions, while sensible, are not original. Furthermore, the second might be thought of as rather rude. But the answer is easy enough. Books don’t count. That’s right, in universities, books don’t count. You still find people who write them, of course: yesterday’s people, keeping alive a quaint craft. Something to be done with the left hand, as it were. Don’t you always get people like that holding back the march of time? Think of all those sad souls given to maypole dancing. But, in general, what you don’t do now in universities is write books. Serious people don’t do that. It is to be discouraged – and, indeed, it is discouraged.
I can see you’re getting puzzled. You thought that was what universities were for. If not that, then what? you’re asking. If it’s a trend, could it possibly catch on? Fishmongers told they can’t sell fish no doubt also feel flummoxed. But there’s always a way. So what do you do instead? You write articles for journals. I did warn you that was what I spent my time doing. As I said, if you’re a psychologist, you write for psychology journals. And for all disciplines generally ditto. And item (2) above presents no great problem because it’s not that hard to get published. You see there are hundreds of journals and their numbers grow by the hour. There’s a market and publishers can’t bear the sight of work lying unseen (or possibly profit untapped, it’s one or the other, I can’t think which). You remember those days when every postbag brought you a new Visa card. Well, now each brings news of a new journal, usually with a plea to submit your work.
Writers of literary fiction must curl the odd lip at this. What about that insane merry-go-round of synopsis plus three chapters, you ask? What about those endlessly ignored submissions? Those circular letters or perfunctory emails saying not for us? Where, you ask, are the publishers soliciting stories?
These are interesting questions. They’ll keep for another time. And remember, I’ve still to talk about (1). Now there’s a thing.
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