Eric Song is an associate professor of English literature here at Swarthmore. After being informed of his status as a highly sought-after faculty feature, Song’s reply was humble: “I should warn you that my life isn’t very interesting.” Contrary to this admission, an interview with Song revealed valuable truths about English literature and the current political climate, the evolution of Swarthmore’s English department, and insights on his hot-and-cold relationship with Milton.
Sharvari Tatachar: How did you decide on English literature? And early modern English literature?
Eric Song: I always liked English class, but maybe it coalesced late in high school when I started kind of enjoying what we would call close reading, although my teachers didn’t call it that. I found that there was something kind of fun about the game of interpretation. This was centered on poetry, and in my recollection of it, there was meaning to be deciphered. Writing these little papers all of a sudden became pretty interesting. In college, I was just a total doofus. I wasn’t a very good English major, and I had no idea what I wanted to study. My senior thesis was optional when I was an undergrad at Pomona College, and just under the influence of courses that I happened to have taken, I wrote on a contemporary Irish playwright Martin McDonough who was then not very famous — he had written like four plays. Now, he is fairly famous because he’s written movie screenplays and stuff. Then, I applied to grad school to study Milton in early modern literature. I didn’t get in because my writing sample had nothing to do with my proposed area of study. So then I had to go to an M.A. program and do some more Milton.
ST: Why do you believe it is important to study English literature?
ES: The best, most responsible answer I could give is I do think it’s important to have an intellectual space where you can think about the way that different forms of cultural imagination, expressions of kind of desires, anxieties of all sorts, intersect with historical realities. I do think that for whatever its many grave, serious, horrific deficiencies, the discipline of English literature does [accommodate] and has accommodated that kind of work. It does seem valuable to me to continue that work, even if you run into the constant frustration of: “I think I’ve reached, or we, or others have reached valuable insights.” But what does that mean? How do you disseminate those insights? What happens to them? There are frustrations about how desires and anxieties translate into political realities. We think we have insights about those, but if no one’s listening, that’s frustrating. The work seems to me to be valuable in and of itself.
ST: Is there a class you teach here which demonstrates that transition between intellectual space and political realities?
ES: Strangely, I think the course that I developed when I first got to Swarthmore [does]. It is my first year seminar, Narcissus and the History of Reflection — that’s not a very good name for the course, it should be something else. He’s supposed to be a weirdo in the story. He’s supposed to be very strange. What happens to him? The figure of Narcissus gets transformed in different ways, and then in modernity, turns into the condition of narcissism. How did this weird figure become a condition that has a very particular place, still, in our lives? It’s at once universal, more or less. I mean, the idea that we’re all narcissists is a very common-sense idea. And [it’s] pathological, like you know, “That person is a raging narcissist.” It still remains quasi-diagnosable as a disorder. That’s a fun class that I enjoy teaching a lot.
ST: How has the English department evolved during your time at Swarthmore?
ES: The biggest change is probably in the relationship between the department as a whole and creative writing. It’s partly because creative writing is so popular among students and there’s so much demand for it, but I think there’s a different relationship [now]. I mean, I don’t think it was like a relationship that was bad and has turned good or anything like that. It’s just a different relationship and we’ll see how it goes. I think it’ll be really interesting. Creative writing is a core area of excitement among students and faculty.
ST: What are the most memorable moments from classes you’ve taught?
ES: Back when I first started teaching at Swarthmore, I used to teach, on and off with [English Professor Nora Johnson] — the general Shakespeare course. I did something that I had experienced as an undergrad that was really fun. I had a semester-long performance component where different student groups really practiced, rehearsed, and performed [various] scenes. They’d perform with full costumes and everything. It was fun when I was an undergrad[, too]. That’s when I learned I have no acting skills and acting is a mysterious craft that I know nothing about.
ST: Who is your favorite theorist and/or author and why?
ES: For an author, I’m supposed to say Milton because I am a Miltonist. I’ve even served in official capacities. There’s such a thing called the Milton Society of America. Isn’t that crazy? I’m not going to say Milton, because as I grow older — I still teach Milton — I find him equal parts interesting and annoying. [As for my] favorite theorist I’ve drifted away, but the impact lingers. There are very few who would say this, but I have been in the past, and probably still am to some degree, very interested in theories of Julia Kristeva and abjection. [It’s] kind of making a comeback. Some students have talked to me about how abjection is useful for their thinking in different ways. I, jokingly, sometimes refer to myself as the last Kristevan. I don’t even know if I am a Kristevan, I’m certainly not the last.
ST: What are some of your personal hobbies?
ES: I’m boring. I’ve somehow turned into a man with very few hobbies. It’s terrible. I wish I could tell you something interesting. My hobbies are: I eat, I drink wine.
ST: I’ve also been told to ask about your personal style, because everyone thinks that you have a great sense of style. Is there any inspiration behind that?
ES: Number one, if you’re interested in clothes there will come a time when you’re like, “I can’t afford any of the outfits that I would like to wear.” I mean it’s just a class ambition or something like that. Maybe that was important at a certain time in my life, but now — not because I’m wealthier or anything — the more pressing issue is getting used to being middle-aged and confronting the fact of becoming old in the not too distant future. My most pressing style concern is to maintain dignity. You want to wear things that you like wearing, but not look ridiculous. I think that’s a particular balance. The easiest way to do it, of course, is for an older dude to just wear suits or something. I’m not really in a [suit-wearing] industry. My ultimate aspiration, though, is to own a lot of casual suits. But, casual-suiting is difficult to find in the way that you want, not like frumpy, ugly suiting, but casual-suiting. When you can find it, it’s shockingly expensive. It’s another case where the right kind of casual look is a class affectation and ungodly expensive.
ST: Anything else you’d like to add?
ES: Two things. Number one, I think Swarthmore students, and I don’t mean this in a frivolous way, should have more fun. This culture of misery is not helping. I know that I can’t fix it by saying, “Have fun.” That’s like Miss Havisham saying to Pip, “Play, play!” And number two, I want students to join me in collectively fantasizing about what transformations could take place if we all rose up together and demanded that Swarthmore be a place with good food.
