Work in the Dark, Share in the Light
or, how I took a chance and submitted my work to the Henry James Society Conference
I can’t believe it’s been sixteen years since I first presented my work to other James scholars. Of which, I realized that day in July 2008, I was now one.
At the end of 2007, I shared an idea with my dissertation director, one that involved a favorite James novel of mine and a character in a Joyce Carol Oates story who reads it. He told me to write it up, and while I was thrilled about working on it, I wondered if there was a way to share it with the world.
Surely there was someone besides Robert, who was paid as my guide through the final work of my PhD studies, who would be interested in the final product. I had used studies from the community of James scholars many times, but never felt as if I belonged with them. They had extensive publications and presentations, along with volumes upon volumes of work about The Master. Who was I to think I could offer my work up to them?
As I read both The Awkward Age and "My Warszawa: 1980” closely, I continued to feel like I wasn’t the only one interested in why Judith was reading James. Why did Oates put this specific story in this woman’s hands? As the end of the year approached, my grandmother, who I’ve always been close to, neared her end as well.
I sat beside her bed the week before Christmas and asked her if she thought I should submit the final study to a conference or journal for James studies. She didn’t have long, and we both knew it, and I wanted her to make this decision for me, as I relied on her for so much advice in the past.
A war bride from the Midlands of England who, like so many children in her cathedral city in the 1940s, finished her school career after the eighth grade, she always liked to listen to tales of my academic pursuits, even while she insisted that she didn’t understand most of what I was talking about. We shared a love for historical romances and often read the same book at the same time to discuss it, and she liked to hear what sort of randy behavior might have gone on between the lines in James’ stories.
But she was tired and ready to move on, ready to see those she had loved and lost, and waved her hand at me dismissively as I worried out loud about whether or not my writing and studies were good enough to send out into the world.
“Stop whining and put it in the mail. What can they say? Yes, or no. That’s all. What are you doing all this writing for anyway? To keep it in a drawer in the dark?”
Her no-nonsense response (not out of the ordinary) sent me looking at the Henry James Society website and their calls for papers. I wish my grandma had lived to see the acceptance email I received months later, after my study was complete and submitted, and I made plans to present it at the Society’s conference in Newport, Rhode Island that summer.
More on the conference, where I met my favorite James scholar, the author of the book that led me to James as the focus of my PhD studies, later. For now, I like leaving this story where it is, with my grandma’s admonition to just do it. Just send it out, share it with whoever will read. Because our work belongs in the light, out of the drawer and the dark.
“We work in the dark - we do what we can - we give what we have. Our doubt is our passion, and our passion is our task. The rest is the madness of art.” Henry James, “The Middle Years”
A middle aged author declining in popularity. An up and coming literary agent with an eye for genius. A partnership that would forge a prodigious legacy in American literature. Read An Eye for Genius today.
I don’t drink coffee anymore but I adore matcha. You can buy me one or just click over and take a look at some random photos and snag a free black cat lined notebook page PDF to print or use with any PDF annotation app.
