Monday, February 26, 2007

Discussing The Professor and the Madman

Our in-person discussion will take place on Sunday, March 4, but please add your own commentary in the comments section of this post.

Here are a few broad questions to get you started (but feel free to talk about whatever you want about the book):

  1. Overall reaction to the book, the writing, the history involved?
  2. What other works does this book make you think of?
  3. Most of these book club discussions have spent time exploring the differences between popular and scholarly history. Where does this book fit and what impact does that have on the way you read and evaluate it?
  4. What field(s) of history does this work touch on?
  5. What is the significance of this work?
  6. Would you read other works by Simon Winchester?
  7. Favorite part of the book?
  8. Most irritating part of the book?
  9. Compare this book to other history texts you've read in terms of quality, readability and historical argument.
Please, feel free to add your own comments, answers, and questions below. Thanks!

2 comments:

KatieScarlett62 said...

Hello everyone! Since I asked for the questions to be posted, I figured I'd at least answer a few of them. :-)

Overall, I didn't quite like the book. It was very easy to read - only took me just over a week. However, I felt cheated on the history side. I felt that Winchester did summary research, but didn't really delve into the depth of the characters. I also felt that he would go on tangents and sometimes lose my interest. He mentions briefly in the Acknowledgement section that his first notion to write this piece was met with lukewarm approval; actually, only 4 people supported his decision to move forward with the project (p.232). That might have been his first clue that there may not be enough material to form an entire book. Sure, it is a captivating story on the surface, but I felt that there were many facts overlooked or just plain missing which left the story rather thin and ultimately unfulfilling.

As for the second question (and may I add, what a leading question that one is!), this book definitely reminded me of "Devil in the White City." Winchester tried to compose two parallel yet intertwined life stories as they related to one historical event. I do not think he was as successful as Erik Larson. When I finished "Devil," I felt as though I had gained a deeper knowledge of the occurrences around the world's fair and had a great desire to read and learn more about the fabulous White City. When I completed "Professor," I had no such desire for further readings on Oxford or the dictionary. I cannot say that I will never read another work by Winchester. However, he will definitely not be a "must-read" historian such as McPherson or McCullough. (On a side note, did anyone else notice that Winchester misspelled McPherson's name on page 241?)

Although this is obviously a historical piece, Winchester dabbled in both English/linguistics and in the medical fields of study. I must say that he lost me towards the end as he discussed the various psychological disorders that may have plagued Dr. Minor and each nuance of the diseases. I also could have done without entire parts of Chapters 4 and 5 (more about that below).

Favorite Part of the Book: I liked the discussion of the urgency to create the dictionary as a source of British pride and to bring them "greater prestige both at home and abroad (87)." As I mentioned above, I felt that Chapters 4 and 5 both dragged on, but the general background as to how and why this massive undertaking began was quite interesting. I also thought it was unique to begin each chapter with a partial/full catchword entry that was central to that chapter's theme.

Most Irritating Part of the Book: Let's go back to Chapter 4. I honestly think that Winchester found the word "sesquipedalian" in the OED and decided to build an entire chapter around this word so that he could use it in a sentence (86). While reading this work, I sometimes found myself questioning Winchester's other word choices. Chapter 4 is the most glaring of this issue, but there were other times when I thought he was just throwing other uncommonly used words into his text just because he could. I also did not like all the speculating regarding the psychological reasoning for Dr. Minor's grotesque act of "masturbation." (Though I did find the initial catchword entry amusing, I was supremely unprepared for what lay ahead in that chapter (189).) I did not like that Winchester suggested that perhaps it had something to do with Merrett's widow. He even admits that this reason "stretches credulity (194)." He gave perfectly acceptable examples of what may have prompted the Doctor to commit such a heinous act that I did not feel the need to sensationalize the story even further by suggesting something that even he didn't seem to support.

Again, overall, this work left me feeling like I missed out on what could have been a very good work of history. I looked up Winchester on Amazon.com and discovered that he published "The Meaning of Everything: The Story of the Oxford English Dictionary" in 1994 - four years prior to the publication of "Professor." This entire piece could probably have been a chapter or two of the first and primary work. I couldn't help but hearing my own professors advising us on our senior theses: Yes, it's a good story, but is there enough there to write an entire 40 page thesis? Someone should have told him: Yes, it's a good story, but is there enough there to write an entire 221 page book?

Two more small thoughts and then I'm done:
1) If Winchester was so proud of owning an original plate used for the OED printing (Author's Note 227-230), why not used that for the inside covers of the hardcover? Yes, I see the "Murder" entry, but wouldn't his own plate have been more meaningful to him?

2) Why dedicate the work to "G.M." and not George Merrett? It's like he wanted people to a) either figure it out for themselves or b) suffer through the whole piece to discover the owner of the mysterious initials at the end (226).


I hope you all have a good time on Sunday discussing this work. I am glad that the blog is up and running and look forward to any one else's posts, ideas, and comments on the book!
~ Kate B. Class of 2004

Elizabeth McD said...

I have to admit, I haven't sat down yet and thought out answers to ALL the questions yet as Kate has so masterfully done (go Kate!) but I did have some responses based on her thoughts.

I agree with the idea that he digresses a lot. I believe I wrote Dr. McC when I first started the book expressing my apprehension regarding Winchester's habit for showing off his own vocabulary. My impression of this stemmed from his six page debate on the word "protagonist." (p28-32) I was very concerned this book would become merely a debate on wordplay. I am grateful it wasn't.

Kate also brings up a good point in comparing "The Devil in the White City" (and she echoed my thoughts...very leading question!). "Devil" did provide a much more in-depth historical background. However I had as many issues with that "background" (I still feel Larson assumed too much on too many points) as Kate seems to have with this skimming of history. Those who know me well know that I adore random facts. This book, while perhaps not having a solid enough background for a classroom book, was loaded with "random facts." My personal favorite was learning that the entire letter F was accidentally sent to Florence.

As fare as my other thoughts go, I'm sure I'll have plenty more to add after sunday!