Nice language usage. The setting, of course, is intriguing given where I found the book. The chancellor of a smallish, out-of-the-way, unimpressive midwestern university creates a scandal - he was drunk and fled from the police on his way home from a massage parlor and rolled his vehicle in the course of the chase. He is persuaded to resign and the fun begins. I realize that I don't actually know how this sort of thing is generally handled. I would have thought that if our president resigned that the Board of Regents (almost certainly under pressure from the governor) would have the responsibility of choosing his successor. Here, everyone else wants in on the process - including faculty and students. And we have people actually campaigning for the job. Seems unlikely.
All that notwithstanding, there were a few passages that simply delighted me, so rather than analyze the story any further, I will share them ...
"The fundamental assumption of all this folderol is that it makes a difference who is chancellor of the University of Ohio at Fort Elbow. Think of it. We are now two weeks into our great crisis. Classes meet, students are filled with misinformation as before, payrolls are met, one cannot find a parking space, the ineffable student paper appears daily. If this episode proves anything it is the total unimportance of the chancellor."
"Peter Kessel and Manuel Cerrado were a study in denim when they met in the office of the assistant to the chancellor. Peter's outfit had cost the better part of three hundred dollars, the fabric artificially aged as fake antiques are distressed by dealers. Cerrado's work shirt and trousers were from K-Mart at best and had faded honestly after many washings."
And my personal favorite "a parody of higher education."
No comments:
Post a Comment