Walcott smears shame our intellectual standards

Poet's decision not to stand for professor of poetry at Oxford is not a victory for feminism, but reveals the petty-minded nature of higher education

FIRST POSTED MAY 13, 2009

This is a shameful day for intellectual life in this country. One of the world's greatest living poets has withdrawn from the election for Oxford professor of poetry because of a nasty, nefarious smear campaign.

It is a shabby affair. The delight that the Nobel laureate Derek Walcott had entered the race to become the Oxford professor of poetry turned to dismay after what Professor Hermione Lee, who supported Walcott in the election race, described as a 'campaign of vilification'. A dossier detailing sexual harassment claims from a student about Walcott when he taught at Harvard in the 1980s was anonymously sent a week ago to staff and graduates eligible to vote in next Saturday’s elections. This week Walcott thought enough is enough and threw in the towel. I don’t blame him. The whole saga is indicative of the petty-minded, down-graded nature of higher education and intellectual life in the UK today.

We have deprived a generation of students from being taught by this remarkable poet

Some have pointed to the C grade given by Walcott to his accuser after she refused his advances – upgraded after an appeal citing the allegations – as proof of his unsuitability as a teacher. Who knows the truth of these assertions? Academic departments know how to cover their backs, and, in an era of grade inflation, to single this instance out is disingenuous.

I will stand up and say now that even if every word of the allegations are true, if the worst thing that is ever said to you as a woman is "Imagine me making love to you. What would I do? ... Would you make love with me if I asked you?" you need to get out more. If anybody thinks this is a fine day for feminism they need to be disabused of that misapprehension sharpish. If women winning is now associated with mean-spirited, conniving, back-stabbing, then we really have lost the plot.

I'm not condoning the inept passes of English literature professors. Possibly Walcott is guilty of bad judgment. Possibly he was trying it on. But if over-stepping the mark is what we are talking about here – despite the lingering whiff of coercion and abuse that consciously accompanies such allegations – then that is really very little to hold in the balance against the greatness of Walcott. Is it for this that we have deprived a generation of UK students from listening to and being taught by this remarkable poet?

Which brings me on to some of the sneering comments in the liberal press about Walcott's response to the allegations. Walcott has argued that his teaching style was "deliberately personal and intense." Cue the nudge-nudge wink-wink sneers. Why is an intense, personal approach to teaching adults a problem? Poetry is an intense and personal business. I want to be taught great literature by somebody who gives a damn and isn't a passionless automaton. The best teaching relationships I had at university were intense and changed me as a person. Isn't that what we want from higher education rather than a sausage-factory of tick-box skills?

Sorry, but I was so shocked and saddened that he had withdrawn. I have a terrible memory for poetry, but there are lines of Walcott etched in my heart.

FIRST POSTED MAY 13, 2009

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Hiya Shirl. You are one of the few professionally commentating people who sounds like your not stuck in femistazi GCHQ personing the decks monitoring our brainwaves and sending out fixed penalty notices for thought-crimes. I have been defending Degsie because it all stinks. Fenton waded in yesterday in the Evening Standard after i had been putting the case over at one of our other sporting gulags, where the war is over and they are letting me take my rightful place as a bore who can do what it says on the tin. Did you see that one of the women involved in this hoo ha from 1982 Harvard, also came out in defence of her *former mentor* saying she was appalled too and best of all: "I am appalled and saddened by the anonymous smear campaign against my former mentor Derek Walcott. Everyone has a right to face his or her accusers. Thats why I sued Boston University. I wanted to discover if Professor Walcott was actually harassing me. At first, I thought he was joking." So, all these right on geneutral advocates playing by Man rules coz they aint escaped their chains in Plato's cave, still gawping at the shadows on the wall cast by the guards their self-policing does not even grasp as the Reality of what's happening - ranting about blokes behaviour based on body language, I mean, come on, this woman didn't even know, was confused, couldn't tell if she was being harrassed or not and decided to sue, to find out. At Harvard, where there's poetential for lots of lovely lolly if any tin pot claim gets past first base. You talk sense Shirl, i mean what's next, the so called liberal feminists having long, long lists and codes of how Men must conduct themselves, whilst all around it's wall to wall page 3, Bunny Girls and young wans takin Katie and Barbie as their role models. Hey Shirl, if yer wanna have a gawp at one of the stars of the show singing his song at the Love Poetry Hate Racism gig in Dublin 2007 (remember that one hey Shirl? ooh the tussles we had) have a gawp at the link. An absolute stunner, roars loader than Liam Gallagher before the fags and ale took 80% of his voice and prior to him becoming a walking retro-cliched rebel manque with nowt to offer the youth of Britian but a model for going plastic working class. I remember the first time I heard Sleepy Rise (stephan) nail this ballad in Naked Lunch, a Poetry night he and two pals from UCD instigated after coming to the gigs i hosted as Poet in Residence of the Art Gallery, and fronted by Virginia Cavanas own, Mike Igoe - and the hairs on the back of the neck, fulfilling the Houseman test of psychic spear amply. The sheer force of it beyond putting into words. Oh theres blood on the splinters Of my mind, coz ive broken down This wall just like its one last time And you never cease to amaze me, after all my mistakes you could Learn so quickly - oh im not so god-damn naive, and im not a well Meaning acolyte for a troubled Day at sea no more, oh no, Thats why ill be walking, walkin Out the door. Well im not as wise as i was As a child, and im not just the back- End of a colour from the light oh but im sure that i could ever Succeed, if i keep working so well For those faces the summer leaves, And without this truth, thered Be no fallacy, and without this dream of mine, there can be no there will be no reality: Sleepy Rise: Love Poetry Hate Racism: Dublin 2007

Posted by Desmond Swords at 6:20pm on May 15, 2009