Yet again . . .

I had an "I really, really feel like quitting" week last week, and tonight, my ideas for my prospectus (and its theoretical basis) came together quite nicely--at least in my head. I hope sleeping on it makes it even better.

Hope you two are having good endings to good semesters.

One step closer to Italy

I found out today that my paper proposal for RSA 2010 was accepted to the panel "Maternity and Renaissance Romance Narratives." Now I have to whittle down my 342 word abstract to 150 words and submit it directly to RSA. Evidently, RSA reviews our panel and gives a thumbs up or thumbs down on the entire thing. I'll likely hear back over the summer.

I Heart Cognitive Theory

I’ve been reading the introduction to Mary Thomas Crane’s Shakespeare’s Brain, and I love, love, love cognitive theory. It’s the first theory that feels right, or makes sense, or works in concert with the ways that I think, or however you want to say it. She does the complicated work of justifying the use of cognitive science as a means for describing/interpreting literature, situates it among all the big hitters--Foucault, Althusser, Derrida, Lacan, and others--and proposes specific ways to apply cognitive theory to literature. Here’s a shout out to Dr. Rubba for exposing me to linguistic analysis of literature in general, and cognitive theory in particular. (And for telling me that I should go get a PhD.)

I had a little bit of confirmation that I'm doing the right thing by working on a PhD: I stayed up reading literary theory until 1am BECAUSE I WANTED TO! I was so enthralled, I couldn't put it down.

What crazy things have you done that show you have that crazy-making, magical, mystical, brainiac relationship with your PhD subject?