Letters to Myself: Number One With Sloths

From the University of San Diego Fall 2007 course catalog:

Engl.223: Epic
Antone Minard
Epic is narrative writ large, standing at the junction of myth and literature. This course will examine some of the more important epics of ancient and medieval Europe and Asia (Gilgamesh, Genesis, the Odyssey, the Ramayana, Journey to the West, Njal's Saga, The Song of Roland / Orlando Furioso, The Adventures of Sayf Ben Dhi Yazan). We will also discuss how / whether the concept of the epic is alive in the modern day with a collection of "epic" short stories (ed. Groppi & Moles) and the medium of film.

From an email from the instructor sent to David Moles, redoubtable editor of Twenty Epics, and forwarded to me:

So, I had my students in the Epic class read the book and write a short response as to which was the most successful as an epic. About half the class picked either "Cup and Table" [by the now sleepy Tim Pratt.--J] or "The Book of Ant." [Written by me, if you didn't know. --J] So far the most amusing line has been "In fact, I learned more things about literature and life from The Book of Ant than some of the full-length epics we read." (Which is code for "Long books are boring. Poetry is boring. I have the vocabulary of a tree sloth. I only signed up for this class because it doesn't meet on Fridays.")

I've lost track of many students I've helped who, when looking for an article on their subject, want one that's as short as possible (in fact, many of them are happy with the abstract, which gives me pause).

As Lisa remarked, it's easy to mold young minds when they're so simple. Also, I'm being taught in classrooms now? How'd that happen? Did the skinny guy in black with the farming implement come by and collect my works when I wasn't looking?