Strontium Dog wrote:"Quick, bump Nineteen Eighty-Four off the curriculum and replace it with 50 Shades of Grey!"

Or instead keep Nineteen Eighty-Four and add Middlemarch. Why do you suggest 50 Shades of Grey as the example of women's literature when it's as shit/popular as anything by Dan Brown?

As for the OP - he's also allegedly said that he only teaches works by serious heterosexual men but in fact he includes Truman Capote so maybe he WAS just being flippant in his interview?

.

What?! Are you saying Truman Capote is gay??

orpheus wrote:.

Out of popcorn?

Depressing. My lit degree began with a term on the history of the novel, obviously heavily populated by women because they had such an influence on the genre. I'd go so far as to say you can't really teach such a course without teaching some work written by women for this very reason. It seems either sheer ignorance or mischief is on display here.

Lol...wow, he hasn't just read Proust, oh no. He's read Proust twice. AND listened to it twice. Respec.

Edit:

And when I try Virginia Woolf, I find she actually doesn’t work. She’s too sophisticated. She’s too sophisticated for even a third-year class.

Fallible wrote:Lol...wow, he hasn't just read Proust, oh no. He's read Proust twice. AND listened to it twice. Respec.

But - but - wasn't Proust gay?



Anyway, I'm finding that I'm thinking far more about Mick's choice of thread title and slant in the OP than anything I've read about Gilmour. I'm just - fascinated, and trying to decipher the reasoning behind it all.

Is there something wrong with me?

I spent the whole thread wondering how a guitarist got a job teaching English at a university.

Yeah, unfortunate.

I'm With Stupid wrote:I spent the whole thread wondering how a guitarist got a job teaching English at a university.

Time for a musical interlude, methinks.

Shrunk wrote:

orpheus wrote:.

Out of popcorn?

Being literary. Minimalism. (I want to be one of the cool kids.)

Shrunk wrote:He's also being taken to task for this part of the interview:

Keeler: So do you teach mostly, I guess classic lit, or Russian?

Gilmour: I teach modern short fiction to third-years and first. So I teach mostly Russian and American authors. Not much on the Canadian front.

Keeler: That’s too bad.

Gilmour: I know, it is, but I can only teach stuff I love. I can’t teach stuff that’s on that curriculum, and I just haven’t encountered any Canadian writers yet that I love enough to teach.

Now I feel sorry for the guy. Canada has Alice (frickin') Munro.

Spinozasgalt wrote:

Shrunk wrote:He's also being taken to task for this part of the interview:

Keeler: So do you teach mostly, I guess classic lit, or Russian?

Gilmour: I teach modern short fiction to third-years and first. So I teach mostly Russian and American authors. Not much on the Canadian front.

Keeler: That’s too bad.

Gilmour: I know, it is, but I can only teach stuff I love. I can’t teach stuff that’s on that curriculum, and I just haven’t encountered any Canadian writers yet that I love enough to teach.

Now I feel sorry for the guy. Canada has Alice (frickin') Munro.

Yes! the poor guy seems to be living in some desolate alternate reality of Canada with no Munro and no Atwood.

I feel we should approach him in the street and throw her books at him until he's buried in her. I feel that's the rational course of action here.

But yeah, his reading list doesn't surprise me in the least. It's pretty predictable in my circles. I've been on sites like Goodreads and seen how a good number of readers select their books. The Russians are what the "hip" kids read, as are Chekhov, Proust, and others. Woolf gets a look in, but mainly for her links to other authors like Joyce (she had good things to say about Tolstoy, too).

I have a large number of women in my list, so I tend to be compared to an aged lesbian (in a friendly way). The only person I've seen compare on this is funnily enough a women studies teacher.

It's not obvious that all of these people are averse to women authors either. I know a young gay man, for one example, who keeps asking people to recommend women to him and has had no luck finding what he's looking for. I wonder if how women authors are marketed or seen to be is relevant. There's something about women only writing romance (or bad romance) and also something about women writing about special women's knowledge and women's "issues", but I think those miss so much else that women authors have contributed. The former discounts both the women who write on other topics than romance and the women who write really excellent romances. Whereas the latter, and especially how it's marketed, always makes me feel like I have to read for ideology if I want to read women. It can limit their contributions in ways.

I almost make it a point to not try to find out anything about the authors I read and love, and that goes for all forms of art, not just literature. What matters to me is what they put out there not who or what they are. I know it sounds trite, but it's absolutely true in my case.
The art and literature that I enjoy the most are generally self-referential. I detest the idea that art "should" be about promoting an agenda.

Shrunk wrote:

I think it's instructive to read his comments in context, and compare that to the quotes that are being disseminated and which have led to this kerfuffle viz:

Thank you, Shrunk. It is very instructive. There are some seemingly minor points that I don't think have been properly addressed; they've either been missed, ignored, or glossed over. I'm going to highlight some of them.

First point:

I’m not interested in teaching books by women. Virginia Woolf is the only writer that interests me as a woman writer, so I do teach one of her short stories. But once again, when I was given this job I said I would only teach the people that I truly, truly love.

If the University knew this going in, and they hired him anyway, they have no right to complain.

Then, a few comparisons:

Edited:

Unfortunately, none of those happen to be Chinese, or women. Except for Virginia Woolf. And when I tried to teach Virginia Woolf, she’s too sophisticated, even for a third-year class. Usually at the beginning of the semester a hand shoots up and someone asks why there aren’t any women writers in the course. I say I don’t love women writers enough to teach them, if you want women writers go down the hall. What I teach is guys.

In context:

And, unfortunately, none of those happen to be Chinese, or women. Um. Except for Virginia Woolf. And when I try Virginia Woolf, I find she actually doesn’t work. She’s too sophisticated. She’s too sophisticated for even a third-year class. So you’re quite right, and usually at the beginning of the semester someone asks why there aren’t any women writers in the course. I say I don’t love women writers enough to teach them, if you want women writers go down the hall. What I’m good at is guys.

The two sentences in red are different from one another. It may seem a trivial change, but it's not. What he was portrayed as saying was a flat-out, no explanation, no rationale "this is what I do" (teach guys). On the contrary, what he actually did was define the limits of his abilities as a teacher, and say he's staying within them. One could see this as being a cognizant and responsible educator.

Edited:

What I teach is guys. Serious heterosexual guys. F. Scott Fitzgerald, Chekhov, Tolstoy. Real guy-guys. Henry Miller. Philip Roth.

In context:

Keeler: And guys’ guys, too.

Gilmour: Yeah, very serious heterosexual guys. Elmore Leonard. F. Scott Fitzgerald, Chekhov, Tolstoy. Real guy guys. That’s a very good observation. Henry Miller. Uh. Philip Roth.

In the edited version, he was portrayed as coming across as macho, by volunteering "Real guy-guys", unprompted. In fact, Keeler introduced the term. Gilmour agreed, and said it's a good observation.

Yes, either way, he's still teaching "guys' guys". But the edited version makes him sound like a macho asshole. In actuality, Keeler prompted this, and fed him the line. The tone of the conversation is quite different.

Beatrice wrote:I almost make it a point to not try to find out anything about the authors I read and love, and that goes for all forms of art, not just literature. What matters to me is what they put out there not who or what they are. I know it sounds trite, but it's absolutely true in my case.
The art and literature that I enjoy the most are generally self-referential. I detest the idea that art "should" be about promoting an agenda.

Coarsely promoted agendas, especially ones you're clear on from the outset, can take a lot of the spontaneity and surprise out of fiction.

There's also a complementary treat to be savored: the denigration of masterpieces by dead white males. When I was teaching music history, I was amazed that several times I actually had to say that just because Haydn was a dead white European male, it doesn't mean that he didn't write some pretty amazing music.