Rightness
So - today I did several non-routine things, and I thought I might top off an unusual day by making a post. I know, what. And it has ended up being a post about research - it was going to be about research vs. fiction, but I got caught up in the first half and neglected the second, which is basically metaphorical for my life right now - and for once it is not about how the Hittites are awesome, but I would ask that you assume that, throughout all of this, "and also the Hittites are pretty awesome" may be tacked on to most sentences.
Anyway, I've been thinking about writing today. Which is to say, I have not been writing, lately. Or, I have not been writing fiction. I've been writing a dissertation, which I would say is a lot harder, but I've been working on a story that's at least two novels long for the last two and a half years (Christ Jesus) so - it's different harder. Research is like - it's like, you think, Oh my God, I have figured it out, I HAVE FIGURED IT OUT, IT ALL MAKES SENSE EVERYTHING MAKES SENSE, I AM BASICALLY GOD RIGHT NOW. And then you have to take a step back, and be like - okay. What is everything? And then you have to find the all the little bits of everything that exist - all of them! all! - and that takes you a week, and then it turns out that not all of them actually do make sense. And you're like - what if I'm wrong? What if it's not what I thought it was, what if it's not what I want it to be?
And then you realize that you do really, really want it to be that, and then you have a brief existential crisis over your scholarly ethics and the realities of unconsciously or not-so-unconsciously privileging certain pieces of data over others, and then you get over yourself and realize that if you have to shift, complicate, dilute, or expand your I Figured This Out, it's not actually the end of the world. And then you have to work like a dog to turn all of this into 1% of your dissertation, and you look up after two more weeks and think, If it all takes this long, I am screwed.
But you slog on, because the moments when you're a freaking god are, let's not kid around, seriously awesome. I think the Platonic ideal of a dissertation, at least from the writer's perspective, would involve all of those small, diluted, careful, with-appropriate-caveats but I'm right I really think I'm right moments coalescing like the little Death Star lasers into the one GIANT DEATH STAR LASER OF RIGHTNESS, with which to demolish your committee and anyone else of your choice in the field. (Set on stun, I guess. Though some grad students would definitely be way happier if they had a real operational Death Star, I can tell you that.)
Anyway. Being right, is my point. Being right is like an addictive drug for me, I get such a high off of it, and one of the benefits of writing on a topic the field hasn't given much attention to (for reasons passing understanding) is that I get to be right a lot, just because no one's bothered to look very hard, or to look at the same things at the same time. And it's hard work, but it's incredibly rewarding that way, because that high is something else. And my grad school experience is really shaped around that right now - there's the slogging part of research, and there's trying to put it all into understandable or even elegant academic English, and there's my TA job, and there's my copyediting job, and there's funding applications, and those all have their positive and negative moments (except funding applications), but when it comes down to it - you guys. You guys, I am so right.
And also the Hittites are pretty awesome.
This entry was originally posted at http://frostfire.dreamwidth.org/150032.html. Please comment there using OpenID.
Anyway, I've been thinking about writing today. Which is to say, I have not been writing, lately. Or, I have not been writing fiction. I've been writing a dissertation, which I would say is a lot harder, but I've been working on a story that's at least two novels long for the last two and a half years (Christ Jesus) so - it's different harder. Research is like - it's like, you think, Oh my God, I have figured it out, I HAVE FIGURED IT OUT, IT ALL MAKES SENSE EVERYTHING MAKES SENSE, I AM BASICALLY GOD RIGHT NOW. And then you have to take a step back, and be like - okay. What is everything? And then you have to find the all the little bits of everything that exist - all of them! all! - and that takes you a week, and then it turns out that not all of them actually do make sense. And you're like - what if I'm wrong? What if it's not what I thought it was, what if it's not what I want it to be?
And then you realize that you do really, really want it to be that, and then you have a brief existential crisis over your scholarly ethics and the realities of unconsciously or not-so-unconsciously privileging certain pieces of data over others, and then you get over yourself and realize that if you have to shift, complicate, dilute, or expand your I Figured This Out, it's not actually the end of the world. And then you have to work like a dog to turn all of this into 1% of your dissertation, and you look up after two more weeks and think, If it all takes this long, I am screwed.
But you slog on, because the moments when you're a freaking god are, let's not kid around, seriously awesome. I think the Platonic ideal of a dissertation, at least from the writer's perspective, would involve all of those small, diluted, careful, with-appropriate-caveats but I'm right I really think I'm right moments coalescing like the little Death Star lasers into the one GIANT DEATH STAR LASER OF RIGHTNESS, with which to demolish your committee and anyone else of your choice in the field. (Set on stun, I guess. Though some grad students would definitely be way happier if they had a real operational Death Star, I can tell you that.)
Anyway. Being right, is my point. Being right is like an addictive drug for me, I get such a high off of it, and one of the benefits of writing on a topic the field hasn't given much attention to (for reasons passing understanding) is that I get to be right a lot, just because no one's bothered to look very hard, or to look at the same things at the same time. And it's hard work, but it's incredibly rewarding that way, because that high is something else. And my grad school experience is really shaped around that right now - there's the slogging part of research, and there's trying to put it all into understandable or even elegant academic English, and there's my TA job, and there's my copyediting job, and there's funding applications, and those all have their positive and negative moments (except funding applications), but when it comes down to it - you guys. You guys, I am so right.
And also the Hittites are pretty awesome.
This entry was originally posted at http://frostfire.dreamwidth.org/150032.html. Please comment there using OpenID.