Very briefly (this is more for me than for you, this forced description writing): my dissertation was supposed to be about narrative structures of women’s speculative fiction (not narratology, mind you, though I briefly flirted with the possibility). I had something specific in mind to say about speculative fiction, and I even might have extended that something beyond the realm of women and speculation, but then I found out (not so very long ago, a month ago as of mid-July) that the dissertation I wanted to write had already been written. Very well. And turned into a postdoc. And then a book. In the brief academic span of four years.
So.
First I was okay (oh, adventure, a new topic for to seek!). Then I cried and pounded on some walls and watched tv (that was my one good idea, whatever will I do???). Then I got some perspective and launched myself into a new idea that I had also been thinking about for some time (this seems good, but I’m too afraid to talk to my advisor about it, for she will most surely crush my tender hopes).
In brief, then: I’ve taken the thing about women’s speculative fiction that most interests me (time-travel) and am thinking about it in a not-specifically-feminist context which may or may not limit itself to literature written in the past decade.
Okay, so I’m doing none of the above. What I’m working on now has to do with 21st century literature, and I’d talk about it here, but I’m afraid of outing myself. NOT because I’m so good or whatever that you’d read it and immediately unmask me. No, I could write the entire diss. on this blog, and if you didn’t know me in real life, you wouldn’t know me here. BUT. If you did know me, and you read the combo of life facts and work facts, you’d out me in a second. And since I do a lot of bitching about work, including the people with whom and for whom I work…mmm, not so good. If you work in 21st C. lit as well, and you feel like having a buddy, I’m totally up for that. Email me: mme(dot)perpetua(at)gmail(dot)com
After I make sure there’s no way we could possibly be real-life acquaintances, we can totes be internet friends.
Have you read Woman on the Edge of Time? Hmm…speculative fiction=pretty awesome. My one qualm is the emphasis on time-travel. That happens to be the one area of the genre I don’t like.
The only time-travel novel that I left feeling like there wasn’t major problems that rendered the novel to a point of unbearable was Slaughterhouse-five. Any recommendations to change my mind?
Somebody just sent their book to press on my dissertation topic. If I weren’t dicking around for so long I suppose that could have been me, but I realized that 1) she had missed huge portions of relevant material on the topic, like gaping wound things; and 2) who cares, I fucking hate academia anyway.
Not that this probably makes you feel any better. But, with literature it is always possible to tweak a topic enough to make it original, IMO. (my PhD is in English).
Good luck! There IS light at the end of the tunnel.
Thanks for the cheering-on. That’s what my advisor wanted me to do–tweak the thing into original territory. But as I’m not one to take good advice, I scrapped my original plan and cooked up something new. Who knows what will come of it, but the goal right now is just to finish. Or to start, rather.
Academia=Geographic Center of Assholery. That I ended up here kinda makes me question my character.