English

Is it true you once said that English as a subject at university, um, literature, I mean, was a soft option - that it was just doing what you enjoy doing anyway, that is, reading books, um ... Interviewee: No, I didn't. In fact, I was arguing, and on occasion still have to argue, the opposite. This goes back to the very beginning of English as an academic subject. There was a demand for it, but the universities themselves didn't take it seriously as an academic discipline, so, to cut a long story short, they would only accept its place in the curriculum if it was made more difficult. What I said was that too many people do think of it as a soft option. If you want to find out just how rigorous a course it can be, ask any of my students. If you were to try to read the books on the list for one semester as a leisure activity you wouldn't get through them, let alone reading them with the proper attention, and then having to come up with a suitable and well thought out critical response. And, and, it's not just about the set books, there's the whole cultural context to take into account.