It's that time of year. Yes, when the world falls in love, but also when I am grading research papers. This is a solemn and noble duty, and, as Inspector Clouseau once said, "A part of life's rich pageant." :)Based on what I've read so far, I can assure anyone reading this that young people can still think like scholars and write intelligently--that wasn't exclusive to our generation, although I have chatted with some adults who believe it was.
I say, if an eighteen-year-old can push away the cell phone and the text messaging, the computer, the television, and sit down to write a paper which assures me that Dostoevsky's Raskolnikov and Camus' Meursault share an existential isolation, and can proceed with a lucid argument supported by examples, then the world of scholarship is in good shape.
So I am grateful for my scholars, even if I am not grateful for the pile of papers that seems never to grow smaller. Maybe I am the one in existential isolation . . .
