What I did at Kalamazoo

At In the Middle, Eileen posts an introduction to the BABEL sessions at Kalamazoo this last May, and links to the full texts of the Roundtable on which I spoke with Tom Prendergast: "Are We Serious Enough Yet? The Place of Ethics in Medieval Scholarship."

Our remarks were brief, as instructed (as you can see), and celebrated the fun we have writing together. At the moment, we are each working on separate projects, but in a few weeks' time we are getting together to do some very serious work on our book (you reading this, Tom?). We wrote these remarks, it should be noted, after sitting in the sun in Rittenhouse Square in Philadelphia for an hour or so until it was decently time for lunch. Milo and Larry wandered around the square and punctuated our deliberations most pleasantly.

But I particularly like the photograph Eileen chose to accompany our contribution, "The Ethics of Trans-Pacific Collaboration", because it reminds me of what fun it is to collaborate. Especially when Chapter Five of the current project is being so recalcitrant. Although perhaps today saw a bit of a breakthrough? Today is also the day Miss Sophie showed me how to do "lunges" (I once saw a woman in Russell Square in London doing lunges, accompanied by her trainer: Oh! that could be me!). Anyway, you can practically see me and Tom in the front of this picture.

Would that all scholarly work were as much fun!