The very last people I would consult regarding a question of loyalty
Is this newsletter an act of loyalty or disloyalty to the English department? I’m not sure. I would like to think that I can serve the interests of the profession of literary studies by providing a picture of the working environment in my department. Therefore: I’m a loyalist. I’m trying to make a positive contribution to the department and the profession.
I can understand why my colleagues might view what I am doing as a kind of disloyalty. The problems I discuss in this newsletter are internal to my department. Talking about the problems in public could injure the reputation of the department and create more problems. A true loyalist would deny the existence of the problems, react dismissively when presented with evidence of the problems, and disparage anyone who talked about the problems. To paraphrase Marcus Aurelius: allow no one, not even yourself, to hear you speaking ill of the English department.
I make a different calculation: the problems in my department are obvious. My department is widely known, both inside and outside of the college, to be an unpleasant place to work. Several of my colleagues have already published strange, vague, conflicting accounts of the department’s problems in PMLA, The Chronicle of Higher Education, on social media, and in newsletters on this very platform. A literature professor who denied the existence of the problems might appear untrustworthy. And, after all, untrustworthiness could also injure the reputation of the department.
What about personal loyalty? My colleagues may be dismayed to see that I am publishing an account of the business we transacted together. By writing this newsletter, do I risk destroying my future working relationship with them?
What relationship?
These days, when I go to school, it’s like the chapter in We Have Always Lived in the Castle where Merricat goes to the village for supplies. (Chapter one: “Fridays and Tuesdays were terrible days, because I had to go into the village.”) My colleagues have trouble meeting my gaze. They give the impression that they don’t want to talk to me. Most of them stopped talking to me in 2019. The exceptions are Professor Edmund, who is my close friend; Professor James, who drank coffee with me as recently as September 2021; and Professor Geoffrey, who in October 2020 engaged me in a long phone conversation, at the end of which we wished each other well and professed our mutual interest in continuing to try to understand each other, and I told him that he was a gentle soul.
Apart from these private conversations, my colleagues have seen me only in department meetings and at a few public events. Most of them sent brief encouraging emails when my promotion to full professor was approved by the faculty cabinet. Professor Joy exchanged some friendly texts with me at the start of the pandemic in 2020, and she made an effort to include me in a public event that she hosted with a mutual friend.
That’s it. That’s the extent of my relationship with my colleagues.
With most of these people, I aspire to a relationship of basic professional courtesy. We don’t have that yet. We’re not starting from zero, but we’re close to zero. It seems to me that a prerequisite to improving our working relationship would be a clear view of what we have accomplished so far. That’s one of my ambitions in this newsletter.
Most professional relationships are superficial friendships. The people you see at the office, the people you see at conferences every year or every three years, are friendly, for the most part. They share with you the following things: greetings, smiles, small talk. They might know one fact about you, one personal detail, one joke, and they might make use of that fact every time they talk to you. On rare occasions you might sit next to them at dinner and have a real conversation. Your friendship with them goes that far. Beyond that, they don’t know you.
They are tied to you by threads that disintegrate with a gentle pull.
To call these friendships superficial is not to say that they are unimportant. On the contrary, superficial friends can be wonderful. They can make you feel comfortable and happy at work. They can support you by giving advice, introducing you to other people in the profession, recommending you for fellowships and posts. I have always been fascinated by this thin fabric of exchanges and polite formulas. I admire people who are good at maintaining it. I would not advocate destroying it, except in extreme situations.
A professional relationship can be built out of almost nothing. A handshake. A cup of coffee. Small talk.
But you can’t do it with nothing. If you take away the superficial things, what remains? Only a deeper view of the character of your colleagues, with whom you now have basically no relationship.
Today I have a better idea of what kind of people my colleagues are. The thing is, I never wanted to know what was inside of them. I was happy in my superficial friendships with them.