eurydicebound

Scene: Pulling into the final 7 minutes of my last midterm. I've been taking tests since 4:30 PM, and it's now almost 9:00. The classroom is growing emptier by the second as people come up and turn in their blue books. I'm in the home stretch, working on a closing paragraph, which I've decided I should have. The lady sitting next to me is scribbling furiously as well. My hand hurts.

The topic is Janice Radway's essay on.. well, the difference between critical thinking and literary theory and then reading just for pleasure, and why she's conflicted about the two things. We had to summarize her arguments and compare and contrast to earlier essays we've read in the semester, picking two authors to work with. I chose Plato and Aristotle, not the least of which was because Plato was an easy target for this one.

So 3+ pages in, I'm working on the last paragraph. I had earlier described her as a critical colossus with one foot on the popular culture shore, and one foot in academia. I thought it was a clever turn of phrase. I write the following:

"In essence, Radway is straddled not between highbrow and middlebrow, but between Plato and Aristotle. No wonder she finds the position uncomfortable."

I reviewed it, searching for a sentence to find to finish it off, only to have what I'd written slowly sink in. No eraser to speak of and no time to write something else, so off it went. Uncomfortable indeed. Let's hope my teacher has either a cleaner mind than mine or a great sense of humor. :)