Post-graduation Pleasures

This past spring our fantastic editorial consultant, Colin Crabtree, graduated from LMU with his Masters degree. Shortly after graduation, Colin and I did what all bona fide book geeks would do, and puttered down to Barnes and Noble to sink some cash into pleasure reading. I can’t remember all of the books Colin purchased under the umbrella of pleasure reading, but I know they were all part of the Barnes and Noble Classics series, and that Les Miserables was among the choices. Only a former grad student could consider unabridged Victor Hugo for pleasure reading.

As a fulltime grad student myself, I rarely indulge in pleasure reading. Often the stuff I get to read for school (anything from Barack Obama’s Dreams from My Father to Oscar Wilde’s The Importance of Being Earnest to Sheridan Le Fanu’s lesbian vampire novella Carmilla) comfortably qualifies as pleasure reading, but for all of the fun reading associated with an English literature degree, there are also tomes of reading so dry and arcane that they leave you feeling parched and wrinkled. This is why it is imperative that grad students, particularly those in the literature and writing vein, continually read for fun. Grad students need to be reminded of why they’re packing in all of these long, painful efforts for a degree that usually results in financial pittance.

For me, the stuff that refreshes my zeal for studying lit are the books that I read as a kid, Anne of Green Gables being at the top of that list. The books that encourage me to write are the contemporary authors I admire most: Steve Almond, Ryan Harty, Annie Proulx, William Gay—the list goes on. Allotting time for the favorites keeps me from getting bogged down by the stresses of teaching and being taught, but it’s rare when I actually do get to read for fun.

I can’t wait to make my own post-graduation trip to Barnes and Noble and invest in the books that I haven’t been able to devote much attention to as a student. I doubt I’ll be following in Colin’s ambitious Les Mis footsteps, but at some point in my life I do intend to finish Anna Karenina. Perhaps I can do that in May 2009.