How we cite our quotes: Possession: A Romance. London: Vintage Books, 1991.
Quote #4
Blackadder, schooled by his grandfather, saw immediately that all these poems were by Randolph Henry Ash, examples of his ventriloquism, of his unwieldy range. He himself had two choices: to state his knowledge, or to allow the seminar to proceed, with Leavis enticing unfortunate undergraduates into making wrong identifications, and then proceeding to demonstrate his own analytic brilliance in distinguishing fake from authenticity, Victorian alienation from the voice of true feeling. (3.15)
Possession isn't satisfied with portraying the real-world historical figure F. R. Leavis as a man who crushed young undergraduate dreams: it also suggests that his teaching style was self-indulgent and contrived. Don't hold back, A. S. Byatt: tell us how you really feel.
Quote #5
'And you? Why do you work on Ash?'
'My mother liked him. She read English. I grew up on his idea of Sir Walter Ralegh, and his Agincourt poem and Offa on the Dyke. And then Ragnarök.' He hesitated. 'They were what stayed alive, when I'd been taught and examined everything else.'
Maud smiled then. 'Exactly. That's it. What could survive our education.' (4.146-48)
One of the first things that draws Maud Bailey and Roland Mitchell together is their shared sense that university education can threaten our appreciation for literary works. What about you, Shmoopers? Have you ever watched a novel, short story, or poem grow dull and lifeless through too much classroom attention and examination? Or—even worse?—too much of the latest trendy theory?
Quote #6
She told Professor Bengtsson that she wished to write her doctoral dissertation on Ask to Embla. He was very doubtful about this. It was uncertain ground, a kind of morass, like Shakespeare's sonnets. What Contribution to Knowledge did she hope to make, could she be sure of making? (7.4)
As we learn, Beatrice Nest's graduate education was just as disappointing as James Blackadder's undergraduate education. Rather than pursuing the topic that she really wanted to research, she was steered into "safer"—and more traditionally "feminine"—territory.