Font Lines

Last Tuesday, my work iMac had a meltdown. I felt like having one too: it's been a stressful month, trying to keep my major seasonal project rolling while filling in the gaps that open in the absence of a departmental assistant. But there is no time for hard drive failure, mine or otherwise, so I… Continue reading Font Lines

Get Excited, and Get Lucky

Hello friends. Have a poem for this hot, hot summer day: Getting Lucky With Jamie by Nicole Steinberg If you want to go a tiny bit hipster, here’s how: Grab a romper and go to town on the all-natural train from Jackson Heights to lower Manhattan; mask any contempt for the matchy-matchy girls under your… Continue reading Get Excited, and Get Lucky

The Flight of the English Major

A recent NYT opinion piece gave some pretty surprising statistics on English majors: "In 1991, 165 students graduated from Yale with a B.A. in English literature. By 2012, that number was 62. In 1991, the top two majors at Yale were history and English. In 2013, they were economics and political science. At Pomona this… Continue reading The Flight of the English Major

Judging books by their covers

As I've described, my office occasionally receives galleys of forthcoming books, usually fiction directed toward women (although last month we got something that looks like a mash-up of World War Z and Sex in the City). Sometimes they come addressed to the marketing department, sometimes to me or to the marketing assistant. Usually, publicists send galleys… Continue reading Judging books by their covers

NaPoWriMo Week Four Point Five: Sarcastic Sonnets

This is a short week at the end of a challenging month, so I decided to treat myself to some sonnets by Edna St. Vincent Millay. As I used to tell my literature students, Millay offers great break-up poetry--she gives a great kissoff, as in "I being born a woman and distressed," but she also conveys the… Continue reading NaPoWriMo Week Four Point Five: Sarcastic Sonnets