The Poetess recently gave voice to the existential horror of attending an informal gathering of English professors: "I’m not smart enough."
Well, yes you are, and that’s really no big deal. English professors are just like the rest of us. Nobody comes to a party to be outsmarted. They just want you to listen to them, get their jokes, seek explanations for what you don’t understand, and squeeze their asses when no one else is looking (Professor Dodd will use colourful pants to indicate her receptivity. But do not try this with the Saucy Aussie. I saw her first!).
Your best strategy is to figure out what everybody thinks of everybody else, which you can use for leverage when you ascend to the top of a multinational crime syndicate. This exercise is all about self-effacement. You are not here to show off your resplendent panoply of grace and charm. And if you have enough grace and charm to impress the English professors then I hate you already.
So don’t name-drop, like I did with Princess Glitter Bunny ("Oh of course I know what you’re talking about. Unlike the other undergrads, I’ve read Derrida! Har har har!") That’s just wankerish. Rather, just ask questions. Find an old man, with a bow tie and bushy eyebrows, who is already drunk. He is the best place to start. He is a font of experience, good humor, and as a bonus, he is actually kind of awesome. Ask about what he’s written, what he likes to read — Milton, apparently — where he’s travelled, etc. Let him do the work. He’s just itching to unload some jovial backstabbey nugget about one of his peers. Just wait. I promise it will be funny. You should also probably try to make yourself as drunk as he is.
Do not sit next to Rhymes With Flan. You did not dress well enough for that, and this fact will gnaw at you every second you are there. She is tall, slender, blonde, stylish, and her diction is flawless. If she were your age, she’d be a wholesome sorority frenemy. You, by contrast, mumble and stutter (which is partly why you’re listening and not talking); your sartorial contribution is a wrinkled green docent shirt your ex gave you seven years ago. You wore it today because you really don’t have a windbreaker, but next to Rhymes With Flan, you look like you’re homeless.
Eventually, something underminerey like this will happen:
The Hour Badly Spent: Do you mind if I smoke?
Rhymes With Flan: Oh. Please, don’t. Ew [shudders].
The Hour Badly Spent: Oh, okay.
Rhymes With Flan: Yech.
If you closed your eyes, drifted away for a second, and paid attention not to what you actually heard but rather
what you thought you heard, you’ll realize that the terminal "yech" was not directed at your cancer stick. It was directed at
you.
You’ll see the Perverted Shakespeare Professor. In class, he’s so upbeat, almost cheerleaderey; this evening, long after class, he might seem somehow jaded and weary. We suspect the production of ‘Tis Pitty Shee’s A Whore must have been stressful, what with all the preparations being made during those weeks after spring break where everybody goes through a ceaseless gauntlet of exams and term papers and projects. That is why the cast only met for their first full rehearsal a day before curtain time.
I don’t know shit about Jacobean drama. Or any type of drama, for that matter. But I’ll talk about it anyway. The performance — Saturday night, wish you were there! — was fun and celebratory, and slightly campy; just like the Professor conducts his classes, except with slightly more incest. My favorite actor was the Roman soldier: his uniform was a polo shirt with some pinned-on medals.
You might hear about studentfucking. Kind of interesting, but it’s really to be expected, and it’s only juicy if you actually know either of the parties involved, which you don’t, because you don’t know anybody, which is why you’re drinking with English professors on Thursday night and the following Friday afternoon. So put the hearsay out of your mind, because (A) you don’t want to get anyone fired, and (B) you’re not an earnest do-goodey cockblocker. Also: don’t shout out "studentfucker!" in the middle of a lecture (Sorry about that! It was noisy! How was I supposed to know the dean would hear me?).
You might also hear of dumb stuff the students have said — about ethnic minorities and such. It won’t be so bad. All the real wingnuts either go into engineering or polisci. Don’t worry about who, exactly, said what; there’s a good chance you’ll find out soon enough who this person is, based on your ability to stereotype better than she can (a gender neutral pronoun would be really nice right about now!). She will get a column in the Collegian. She will bring guns to class. She will run for student government. She will meet a soldier who will love her for her "values," and they will marry young and have lots of little douchebags, who will attend K-State.
You, however, will not find love. You will find rum, which is just a different kind of love.
Speaking of which, in time, the Most Annoying English-Major Couple will make an appearance. They really are cute together. They will sit next to each other, of course; bemusedly chatting about their plans for the future. They will lightly stroke each others’ arms, but not excessively; they will smile at each others’ literary puns, but not excessively; and one of them will drink. Excessively. And that is the real secret to shmoozing with people who have more intelligence, class, and wit than you.
