The Joys of Teaching Literature, started in September 2010 and with a Spanish version since July 2021, is a blog for ranting and raving about (teaching and researching) English Literature, Cultural Studies, and Gender Studies, and other aspects of the Anglophone world. I publish a post once a week, usually on Monday. Please, download the yearly volumes from https://ddd.uab.cat/record/116328, or read the volume collecting some of the entries (Passionate Professing: The Context and Practice of English Literature, 2023). The comments option is not available, sorry, but you may contact me through my e-mail address, Sara.Martin@uab.cat. The contents of this blog are protected by a type 4 Creative Common License (Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs (by-nc-nd)).

  • GIVING UP (ON A MASTERPIECE): FORD MADOX FORD’S PARADE’S END

    I don’t feel much compunction when abandoning a book that fails to interest me. So many fish in the sea… why bother to stick to one chosen freely and that can be equally freely abandoned? (quite another matter are the books I must read, for teaching or research… and the many I read as a…

  • AND THE GENERAL STRIKE, AND WAYS OF PROTESTING THROUGH LITERATURE…

    I have a list of themes waiting to be addressed, as the series of protests culminating in today’s general strike demand more attention than what might seem today just trivial Literature matters. How I long to get back to normality, if this can ever happen in this abnormal, subnormal, paranormal culture of ours. Let me…

  • UNHINGED (MORE ON THE PROTEST)

    More of the same yesterday to begin our day: the Facultat uglified by barricades in each corridor (wo)manned by humourless, verbally aggressive students defending the ‘consensus’ reached by the assembly to stop all lecturing. We do whatever we can to defend our right to teach/learn: go on-line, go elsewhere… Our own English Studies students have…

  • OCCUPATIONAL HAZARD: YET ANOTHER STUDENT PROTEST…

    Yesterday you and me found ourselves unable to access our classrooms and teach, which is what we love doing and are (under)paid for. The corridors were blocked by the usual assembly students announcing that the Facultat had been occupied and that it was in everyone’s interest not to do any teaching or learning… to guarantee…

  • WE’RE ALIVE, WE’RE ALIVE!: THE FIRST ENGLISH STUDIES SF CONFERENCE IN SPAIN

    My good friend Pere Gallardo from Rovira i Virgili in Tarragona has just organised the first English Studies SF conference in Spain. 18 of us, SF academic fans and shcolars, met last Friday 16 (see the list at http://www.sciencefictionppab.blogspot.com.es/) and promised to stay in touch to meet again in one year’s time at my home…