Kate McDowell on Storytelling

The tenure track was a very long track, like the extended-play dance remix of a very long song, and now the time has come to sounds its final notes.  In talking about tenure I join a chorus; in addition to the Chronicle forums about Balancing Work and Life and The Tenure Track , lately some people are talking back about the tenure process on the internet.  The first I saw of it was " The Awesomest 7-Year Postdoc ," which asserts that you can work  for about 50 hours a week and still have a family life, if you organize everything and keep to a schedule. Organizing everything is basically what I did to get tenure, but I did it my own way and with a lot of reflection up front, in the middle, and in this present coda.  What I've learned more than anything else is that, depending on your productivity style, academic field, and goals, there are so many great ways to do this work.   There are myriad smart, creative, and effective ways to get tenure. After tenure, the work

When I first started my master's program, I was so thrilled that there were any critical studies of children's literature at all that I could hardly stand it.  Now I've been in the field, more or less, since 1997, and there's been huge growth in the scholarship of children's literature, some of it wonderfully inventive, some of it peculiarly intriguing, and of course some not so hot.  It's a delight to be working with a grad student who is contributing some very hot new stuff to the field. And as for me and my reading, well, it seemed appropriate this last few weeks of summer to get back to basics and read a handful of good books for kids and teens. Throne of Glass by Sarah J. Maas YA fantasy fans have yet another tough assassin heroine to admire and envy, and this time she has a genuine ball-gown-fancying girly streak.  Though it takes her awhile to get back into fighting or gown form after a year in the death camp of Endovier.  Background info is filled i