For a Ph.D. in American/English literature a candidate is not expected to write literature; he is expected to criticize it.
Can you imagine a man being awarded an M.D. for writing a criticism of some great physician without ever himself having learned to remove an appendix or to diagnose Herpes zoster? And for that dissertation then be hired to teach therapy to medical students?
There is, of course, a reason for this nonsense. The rewards to a competent novelist are so much greater than the salaries of professors of English at even our top schools that once he/she learns this racket, teaching holds no charms.
There are exceptions - successful storytellers who like to teach so well that they keep their jobs and write only during summers, vacations, evenings, weekends, sabbaticals. I know a few - emphasis on "few." But most selling wordsmiths are lazy, contrary, and so opposed to any fixed regime that they will do anything - even meet a deadline - rather than accept a job.
Most professors of English can't write publishable novels ... and many of them can't write nonfiction prose very well - certainly not with the style and distinction and grace - and content - of Professor of Biology Thomas H. Huxley. Or Professor of Astronomy
Sir Fred Hoyle. Or Professor of Physics John R. Pierce. Most Professors of English get published, when they do, by university presses or in professional quarterlies. But fight it out for cash against Playboy and Travis Magee? They can't and they don't!
But if you are careful not to rub their noses in this embarrassing fact and pay respectful attention to their opinions even about (ugh!) "creative writing," they will help you slide through to a painless baccalaureate.
You still have time for many electives and will need them for your required hours - units - courses; here are some fun - filled ones that will teach you almost nothing:
The Fortunes of Faust
Mysticism
The Search for a New Life Style
The American Dilemma - Are "all men equal"?
Enology - hi story, biology, and chemistry of winemaking and wine appreciation. This one will teach you something but it's too good to miss.
Western Occultism: Magic, Myth, and Heresy.
There is an entire college organized for fun and games ("aesthetic enrichment"). It offers courses for credit but you'll be able to afford noncredit activity as well in your lazyman's course - and anything can be turned into credit by some sincere selling to your adviser and/or Academic Committee. I have already listed nine of its courses but must add:
Popular Culture - plus clubs or "guilds" for gardening, photography, film media, printing, pottery, silk-screening, orchestra, jazz, etc.
Related are Theater Arts. These courses give credit, including:
Films of Fantasy and Imagination - fantasy, horror, SF, etc. (!)
Seminar on Films
Filmmaking
History and Aesthetics of Silent Cinema
History and Aesthetics of Cinema since Sound
Introduction to World Cinema
Sitting and looking at movies can surely be justified for an English major. Movies and television use writers - as little as possible, it's true. But somewhat; the linkage is there.
Enjoy yourself while it lasts. These dinosaurs are on their way to extinction.
The 2 - year "warm body" campus is even more lavish than UCSC. It is a good trade school for some things - e.g., dental assistant. But it offers a smorgasbord of fun - Symbolism of the Tarot, Intermediate Contract Bridge, Folk Guitar, Quilting, Horseshoeing, Chinese Cooking, Hearst Castle Tours, Modern Jazz, Taoism, Hatha Yoga Asanas, Aikido, Polarity Therapy, Mime, Raku, Bicycling, Belly Dancing, Shiatsu Massage, Armenian Cuisine, Revelation and Prophecy, Cake Art, Life Insurance Sales Techniques, Sexuality and Spirituality, Home Bread Baking, Ecuadorian Backstrap Weaving, The Tao of Physics, and lots, lots more! One of the newest courses is "The Anthropology of Science Fiction" and I'm still trying to figure that out.
I have no objection to any of this.. . but why should this kindergarten be paid for by taxes? "Bread and Circuses."
I first started noticing the decline of education through mail from readers. I have saved mail from readers for forty years. Shortly after World War Two I noticed that letters from the youngest were not written but hand - printed. By the middle fifties deterioration in handwriting and in spelling became very noticeable. By today a letter from a youngster in grammar school or in high school is usually difficult to read and sometimes illegible - penmanship atrocious (pencilmanship - nine out often are in soft pencil, with well - smudged pages), spelling unique, grammar an arcane art.
Most youngsters have not been taught how to fold 81/2" x 11" paper for the two standard sizes of envelopes intended for that standard sheet.
Then such defects began to show up among college students. Apparently "Bonehead English" (taught everywhere today, so I hear) is not sufficient to repair the failure of grammar and high school teachers who themselves in most cases were not adequately taught.
I saw sharply this progressive deterioration because part of my mail comes from abroad, especially Canada, the United Kingdom, the Scandinavian countries, and Japan. A - letter from any part of the Commonwealth is invariably neat, legible, grammatical, correct in spelling, and polite. The same applies to letters from Scandinavian countries. (Teenagers of Copenhagen usually speak and write English better than most teenagers of Santa Cruz.) Letters from Japan are invariably neat - but the syntax is sometimes odd. I have one young correspondent in Tokyo who has been writing steadily these past four years. The handwriting in the first letter was almost stylebook perfect but I could hardly understand the phrasing; now, four years later, the handwriting looks the same but command of grammar, syntax, and rhetoric is excellent, with only an occasional odd choice in wording giving an exotic flavor.
Our public schools no longer give good value. We remain strong in science and engineering but even students in those subjects are handicapped by failures of our primary and secondary schools and by cutback in funding of research both public and private. Our great decline in education is alone enough to destroy this country ... but I offer no solutions because the only solutions I think would work are so drastic as to be incredible.
Span of Time - Decline in Patriotism and in the Quality of our Armed Forces
The high school I attended (1919 - 24) was an early experiment in the junior and senior high school method. The last year of grammar school was joined with the freshman class as ':junior high" while the sophomores, Juniors, and seniors were senior high.
There was a company of junior ROTC in junior high and two companies in senior high. Military training gave no credit and was not compulsory; it was neither pushed nor discouraged. A boy took it or not, as suited him and his parents. Some of the sub freshman (ca. 13 years old) were barely big enough to tote a Springfield rifle.
Kansas City had a regiment of Federalized National
Guard, with one authorized drill per week, 3 hours each Wednesday evening. For this a private was paid 69, a PFC got a dollar, and a corporal got big money - $1.18.
The required & paid weekly drill was not all, as about half of the regiment showed up on Sundays at the "Military Country Club" - acres of raw wood lot until the regiment turned it into rifle range, club house, stables, etc. No pay for Sundays. Two weeks encampment per year, with pay. For most of the regiment, this was their only vacation, two weeks then being standard.
That regiment ran about 96% authorized strength. About 1921 Congress authorized the CMTC, Citizens Military Training Corps. It proved very popular. A month of summer training in camp at an Army post, continued through 4 years, could (if a candidate's grades were satisfactory) result in certification for commission in the reserve. Civilians submitted to military discipline in CMTC but were not subject to court martial. Offenders could be sent home or turned over to civilian police, depending on the offense.. There were few offenses.