Category: Travel

When doing academic reading, you sometimes run into the equivalent of a slow moving recreational vehicle on a winding, mountainous, two-lane road. The thing has such bulk and you cannot hope to push it forward, and yet it would be perilous to circumvent entirely. As such, you get stuck behind it. I carried around Keohane’s Neorealism and its Critics for more than six months, in three countries, before finally deciding that my studies could proceed without actually reading the conclusion in anything but the most cursory of ways. A few bits of thesis reading have been similar, though I am not going to name names.

By now, I have doubtless crafted a groundbreaking and compelling document, in which every footnote jumps off the page with ecstatic energy. As such, I am probably strolling along the coastline now, looking southwards in the evening light.

Alternatively, six days of reading may have left me so utterly lacking in the ability to focus my eyes and perceive depth that I need to walk with arms outstretched in front of me, so as to avoid walking into walls.

Five days without web access has been the longest stretch I have experienced in about two years. It is amazing how utterly useless a computer now seems when it isn’t connected to the internet. First came the abandonment of gaming, in favour of blogging and chatting with friends by instant messenger. Then came the general abandonment of print media for online news sources (though I have hung onto my print subscription to The Economist). Finally, there was the selection of a research area where sources are virtually always available online. My transition to the web-embedded side was complete.

Hopefully, I have managed to keep my sanity. Quite possibly, doing so will involve painting an image resembling Slashdot onto a volleyball with a little painted Skype window in the corner. The other members of the retreat will probably be wondering who I am speaking to.

I wonder how different thesis writing was back in the days of typewriters. On one hand, many operations would be extremely frustrating. You would need to redo an entire page to correct a single error, for instance. On the other hand, people were probably less susceptible to being overwhelmed by the amount of information at hand. Furthermore, there is little danger of your typewriter getting toasted by a malicious script picked up on a dodgy website.

About 72 hours into this trip, I have 21 days left before the thesis actually needs to be handed in at the Examination Schools. Since it will need to be printed by the Friday prior (April 20th), it actually needs to be submitted for printing by the 18th. Hopefully I will come back from Devon on the 7th with something very close to being finished.

With luck, the first full day on this thesis writing retreat is proving useful for the conversion of heaps of notes and myriad random thoughts into well-sequenced textual arguments. I hope my fellow program members are finding equal success and that those lucky enough not to have theses to write are enjoying their liberty.

Until April 7th, I will be in Branscombe, Devon working on my thesis. Rather than spending hours coming up with eight posts, you will just get a photo each day for the duration.

Wish me luck in finishing a good first complete draft: 30,000 words in five chapters.