So maybe we’ve abandoned much of the old idea of what “scholarship” is as mere nostalgia and (in literature) exercises in authorial or poetic appreciation rather than textual analysis. But I could use some nostalgia right now. I think of Henry Liddell, who did what now we are supposed to scrupulously avoid believing we could do–every night he thought himself into another world, a culture removed from himself by immense spaces in time and geography. But as a result, he created the dictionary that every undergraduate, graduate, and PhD in Greek uses to-day.

Ultimately, I’m afraid that if all we can do is think our limitations, our work, and our legacy, will reflect that.

By June, I know why I’m going to need the summer to end.

It would be nice if winter were home, and summer a daytrip.

“But I don’t want to go among mad people,” Alice remarked.

“Oh, you can’t help that,” said the Cat: “we’re all mad here. I’m mad. You’re mad.”

“How do you know I’m mad?” said Alice.

“You must be,” said the Cat, “or you wouldn’t have come here.”

Alice didn’t think that proved it at all: however, she went on: “And how do you know you’re mad?”

The question of Alice’s madness is intentionally left open. And this last sentence serves as a much better conclusion than the Cat’s assertion, “I’m mad. You’re mad.” The madman doesn’t know that he’s mad, so in fact, the Cat’s statement, if it is true, cannot be trustworthy. The real problem is not accepting one’s own madness, but the question of how we can even know.