However, we need not take life too pessimistically. Life has a habit of sending us places, and with some effort, we all manage to connect one way or another. Or maybe passion has a way of transforming itself under the influence of new connections.

        Five years ago I left the Netherlands, following two passions of mine: love and literature. One has endured. I was neither a student nor a teacher of literature before I came to the United States, and I honestly cannot tell whether my passion for literature in an academic setting was a new development, or an old passion transformed. Nevertheless, I have learned a lot about myself and about human nature.

        The notion that the study of literature makes for a happier life is misconceived, but that does not make ignorance bliss. Literature does enrich us, and studying it in an academic setting brings us into contact with those who have also chosen to follow this passion. We compare ourselves with our colleagues, our students, our professors; we learn difference and congruence: we connect.

        And we connect with more than just our immediate environment. Reading is talking to someone who sometimes talks back. I have had great conversations with Ishmael, and I fancy that sometimes he laughs at my jokes. In no other discipline can we ever feel so close to others--writers, characters, critics--while weaving ourselves into the tapestry of reading and writing.

        Margaret's suggestion is tragic yet necessary. No man is an island, but often our connections make us aware of our own mortality. To read and write, to study and discuss, is to involve ourselves in the community of mankind. We are blessed in our profession. Almost by definition we have to connect our prose to our passion. A passion for literature, whether innate or acquired, is a blessing. Perhaps it is a mixed blessing, but it is a means of connecting. If only our prose were as polished as our passion is strong...