Deep Thinkers

The Graduate advisor for the department put together a potluck so we could all get together and hear what some of our fellow students were doing with their Masters theses.

One student read from his completed translation of Beowulf, and discussed the difficulties and challenges of translating a text from Old English.

Another discussed her research of John Muir and his writings, her attempt to reposition him in the transcendentalist movement, and her argument that he was more Emerson's ideal Man than Thoreau was.

Another was doing research on African-American writers in San Francisco from the years right before the Civil War to immediately following.

And as I sat in that room, listening to their thoughts, I could not help but wonder at what incredible colleagues I am sharing my graduate years with. What wonderful minds.

I have not decided yet if I am going to do a thesis. It is not required. But after listening to these others, I kind of want to. It seems . . . so very exciting to be working on a project of one's own. At the same time, I am filled with the gravest doubts that I could do the work. But listening to them made me want to try.