"Genius is born--not paid."

I'd just like you to know, bloggity blogworld, that Oscar Wilde is the man. And he speaks the truth. Even though he was imprisoned and sentenced to hard labor for being gay.



You've gotta love students. Not your elementary and high school students. Your deep-thinking, tormented, over-thoughtful, gluttons-for-torture college students. You have to love the way they over-analyze even the most mundane points of a story. Granted, this may just be something that is singular to certain areas of study (anything artsy...film, literature, PHILOSOPHY...God, I hate the philosophy majors. I want to do violent things to them when they question every statement I make. "And what do you mean by 'fan?' As in, fanatic or fanaticism?" Good God, man, aren't they same??). Being (for all intents and purposes) a literature major, it's my job to read in between the lines and find symbolism and meaning where there probably isn't any. Do I think that the aliens in "Alien" were simultaneously symbolic of drag queens and vaginas? No, not really. Do I buy that H.G. Well's portrayal of aliens is a distorted reflection on humanity? Yeah, I can buy that, because the point can be well-proved. But you have to love the kids who question, very deeply mind you, the motivation of what drives a minor character to enter a carriage.

I wish I had made that last sentence up. I quote it to you verbatim. "What is her motivation to enter the carriage?" Gee, I don't know, TRYING TO GET SOMEPLACE??? She wasn't a major character AT ALL so it likely doesn't matter. Keep your hand down, your mouth shut, and your mind someplace useful. Throwing around words like "hubris," "heteroblastic" and "alterity" does not automatically make you smart. Nor does bringing the all-present "consumerist driven society" into every discussion. Buying stuff is bad. And we're all whores for doing it. We get it. Thank you for your riveting input.

However, I do have to say that I find it highly interesting that women were discouraged from an education in the Victorian era because it was thought that the blood would be sent to the brain to help them start thinking and working things out for themselves. Therefore blood would NOT be present in...other places. So people back then literally thought that either women's baby-makers would get all dusty and useless with an education, or that they'd go about willy-nilly in Tiger Woods-esque sexcapades.

Luckily for women and Oscar Wilde, we've come a long way since then.

But it has absolutely nothing to do with you "deep" thinking vocabulary-spewing students. So take your alterity and go home.