Noth himself was a stringer hired from Boston College (or maybe it was Northeastern) to bang some literature into our heads. He moved like a bird, always darting his head this way and that. I had, luckily I thought, plenty of ammo for a lit class. As a shouting member of the old lit and crit club back in HS, I'd penned any number of papers that I thought might fit some of Noth's assignments. Why not recycle? I, too, was desperately trying to become a better musician.
So it came to pass that I laid a paper on Noth called "Hamlet and His Problems, a Critique of Eliot's Objective Correlative in the Play By Shakespeare." It might be tricky (and futile) to try to explain this arcane title. Oh, hell...here goes. Eliot (that's the B. S. from T. S.) had written, in 1919, an essay critical of Shakespeare's Hamlet. What a crock of shit! Among the scattershot, half baked ideas in this godforsaken piece was this insane bit about the 'objective correlative.' I guess it got a little under my skin because I realize I use the expression pretty much the way Eliot describes it. Not having the essays handy (either mine or T. S.'s), I'll have to go it from memory. 'The only way of expressing emotion in the form of art is by employing an objective correlative.' In other words, (if you) want to make the blood boil? Concoct a sun-soaked plain. Feeling grey, let's bring on the rain. The object (one's character) is correlated to the setting. I may have this completely wrong at this late date, but that's the way I recall it. So, even as a whipper snapper, my bullshit detector was up full blast. Doesn't that rule out a certain sort of irony? Suppose your mother dies on a sunlit day. Isn't that just the irony that makes reality the minefield that it is? My essay went after Eliot in high dudgeon and purple prose. It made, I rather thought, a valid point. That Eliot was missing the point of Hamlet, that "Hamlet" (the play) was more of a psychological swamp than Eliot was perhaps capable, with his banker's brain, of really understanding fully. I thought Noth, who spoke often of Eliot and Shakespeare, would appreciate this. I was both right and wrong.
Once again I got the cubbyhole summons. "Urgent, please schedule a meeting with the Dean of Students at your earliest convenience."
Knocking again (too soon) on the big oak door, I was greeted by a red-faced Streator.
"Hello, Calbraith. Thanks for stopping by. It seems like only last week..."
I saw Noth in the high backed chair with my essay, which now sported a great deal of red pen. I thought, 'you didn't need to scribble all over it, now did you!?' But I said:
"Yes. Who would have thought that I could cause so much trouble."
I confess, when I saw the essay on the table before Sam Noth, I actually thought I was in for some long overdue praise and respect. After all, the other students in general distrusted me slightly because I got up and spoke and, well, I'll explain in a bit one other good reason. These men might actually appreciate a good solid intellectual argument. It was Sam who popped the bubble:
"Where did you get this?"
"What do you mean?"
"I mean, where did you copy this paper from?"
"I... copied it from my own archives."
"Ah ha."
Streator looked a bit ashen.
"Cal, plagiarism is a serious charge."
"Oh! You mean you think I actually STOLE this paper?"
I was on my feet. This was a serious charge, and a major slap in the face.
"I suggest you sit back down. Calm down. I'm sure..."
I was not so quick to sit. The idea of walking out on these two baboons flitted through my mind.
"I suggest," I began, quietly but menacingly, "that you tell me, Professor Samuel Noth, why you think I couldn't have written this essay."
Streator nodded.
"Tell him what you told me, Sam."
"OK, I've looked this over very carefully...this...is a very well crafted argument. I have never seen anything like this. I showed it to some colleagues and they'd never seen anything like this. Half of them, me included can't write like this. This is...completely professional, publishable work."
"Does that mean you'll help me publish it?"
"Cal..."
I catch Streator trying his damndest not to smile. Apparently Noth's argument against the possiblity that I was the author played a little weaker on second hearing. It might have been the 'publishable' part that caught him off guard.
"You can't publish it because you're not a scholar, you're a music student!"
"Sam..."
"If that's all you've got, then...well, I've got Eminescu's chorus at 3..."
Streator looked at the desk, then up at his still twitching and purple English Lit instructor.
"Sam, there's a simple way to solve this dilemma. Give Cal some paper and let's see if he can write."
"Oh, Henry. That's insane. Write about what?"
"I can't believe I'm saying this, but I agree with Professor Noth. It's insane. I have class in half an hour."
"I'll get you out of class, Cal. I'm the Dean."
"What do you want me to write about?"
"You're the Professor, Sam. Give the young man a topic."
"Er. OK....write about...oh, I don't know, tell me what you think about the "Wasteland."
"Sam..."
"No, that's fine. Perfect. I have an opinion about the "Wasteland." I know the damned thing by heart, I don't need the text. I'll be back with an essay...in 20 minutes, 'cause I'm not missing Zoltan's chorus."
So it was that, armed with pen and paper, I was shown into a cubicle off the Dean's office. It was a closet. It was full of supplies. I could swear that there was Alphin's old vacuum cleaner. I didn't have time to look around much.
"Eliot leads off with 'April is the cruelest month...' The "Wasteland"is the cruelest poem and it both 'breeds lilacs out of dead air,' and 'mixes memory and desire.' Sexual imagery and a feeling of suffocation are juxtaposed with imagistic fantasies and flights of the most sublime order in Eliot's masterpiece."
And on I bullshitted for about fifteen minutes. I came to a suitably ringing conclusion and left Sam Nosh with five minutes to make a decision about my writing skill. He didn't take the whole five minutes. He read my thesis and skimmed down, pen in hand. Streator watched hi face as it reddened.
"Well, Sam? Are we going to throw him out of school or are we going to let him go to his class?"
"This kid's a writer of the first magnitude. Let him go to class. And Cal..."
"Yes, sir?"
"You have my most sincere apologies."
"You could make it up to me by getting my stuff in print, sir."
I closed the door on the laughter of two fools.
