February 9, 2011

Prolonged, amazing morning dream. Some terrible apocalyptic end -time had come upon us. Many of us had terrible deforming diseases. Many of us were so despairing that if one of the wandering the wandering brigands maimed us or chopped off a leg, we didn’t care, just as content to die cursing in our chairs. But for all that it was more funny-gruesome than really gruesome. I think we were in London, wherever there was a large sunken green park surrounded by what once was a pleasant neighborhood.
Or maybe it was still a pleasant neighborhood and only our side of it was ghastly. This is one of my exhibits for the utter discreteness of the conscious and the unconscious. I would never have thought of this “myself.”

Discussion of “Prometheus Unbound” in class yesterday ranks as one of the top classroom experiences of my career. The students were miles ahead of me, having figured things out to a depth I am still swimming toward. The expression on my face at the beginning of the semester was not a smile; it is now.

Talked to GE in the hall about last semester’s arbitrary grade-changing atrocity. It’s the first time I’ve spoken of it at any length, and I felt like a very small revolutionary in a very small version of that square in Cairo.