Recently I spent some time at a liberal arts college, doing close reading out loud with a group of the profs. It was lovely; stimulating, collegial, civilised. A little pocket of air outside history. But I was aware of being an interloper, of feeling inimical to them. But why? After all, I’m an obsessive reader – and they do little else. I’m uninterested in most kinds of worldly success – and, e.g., none of the six professors present had ever heard of YCombinator. We both love learnin...| argmin gravitas
Thou hast conquered, O pale Galilean; the world has grown grey from thy breath; We have drunken of things Lethean, and fed on the fullness of death. Laurel is green for a season, and love is sweet for a day; But love grows bitter with treason, and laurel outlives not May. Sleep, shall we sleep after all? for the world is not sweet in the end; For the old faiths loosen and fall, the new years ruin and rend. Fate is a sea without shore, and the soul is a rock that abides; But her ears are vexed...| argmin gravitas