it's all about paper

I thought I had a paper due Thursday...but it was actually due today! Not good. Fortunately my professor is very merciful. So now I'm trying to crank out this paper on Papal Reform in the 11th Century. Nothing too bad, but I hadn't planned on writing it this way right now.

Moral of the story: Be very careful which date you highlight on the syllabus and * always * double (or triple) check the date before you write it anywhere else or attempt to remember it.

In other news, the second lecture in the Center for Ethics and Culture Series was tonight. It was given by Prof. Peter Holland of our Film/TV/Theater Department.

I have to confess while it was great to hear the other side of the story, it wasn't as thrilling as Pearce's. He tried to tear down some of Pearce's arguments, but I don't think he did a very good job. His attack on the Spiritual Will & Testament of John Shakespeare seemed particularly shaky. I think it was mostly a failure on his part to properly articulate its origins and the way in which it came into the eye of the public. I don't think his concerns were entirely ignorable (e.g. the document was dug up by a wheelwright known for his forgeries of Shakespearian Stuff in the 1700s) But when Profs O'Connor and Solomon challenged him on the logic of his objections (e.g. how was it that only the wheelwright found this text (see the post from last week) and was smart enough to recognize and use it during at time when Catholicism still wasn't popular. Meanwhile scholars had no clue what it was until fairly recently), but he just retreated into the poor defense of "well that's what we scholars are all about - controversy and disagreement. If those things didn't exist, if we knew all the answers, we wouldn't be here now, would we?"

The closing line from his lecture was (near quote): ""A Catholic Shakespeare is much less brilliant and interesting."

Seriously