We were free, though we didn’t know it: that’s what Livia saw.
Our irreverence. We weren’t subject to the rules. We didn’t do as other people did. We didn’t know how to.
Our obliviousness. We couldn’t play along – we didn’t know how. We couldn’t follow the rules – we were incapable of it.
Our wildness. We were natural anarchists. We couldn’t obey authority. We didn’t acknowledge the rules. We barely knew that there were rules.
Our barbarity. We didn’t speak the language of the academy. We weren’t fluent in academese.
And yet we wanted to study. We had our idea of study. To be alone with books. To read, to jot down notes. Intellectual projects: we even had those. With which we were engaged. Primitively, no doubt. Stupidly! Without know what we were doing.
We were busy! Even industrious! What did we think we were doing?
But our role in the academy wasn’t just going to be about pursuing our supposed projects. Livia had something else in mind for us. Livia had her own project.
We had a role in her drama. We had our place in Livia’s fantasies. For good or for ill.
We were antinomians as she was not, Livia said. She lacked our anarchy. She didn’t have our irreverence. Our energy! Our animal spirits! That were natural to us. That belonged to people of our class.
We weren’t to be muzzled. Bridled! We weren’t to be disciplined.
And yet we had PhDs. In philosophy. How was that possible? What an enigma. We’d learnt something, after all. We’d actually sat still for long enough. We’d been able to stay at our laptops. We’d been able to read a few books.
But who were we, really? Who were we going to become?
Livia had her plans. Which was to set us loose in the academy, as you’d set loose rats into a building you wanted to be condemned.
We were Livia’s rats. Livia’s vermin. Livia’s plague. We were Livia’s partisans, deep behind enemy lines.
Our stupidity was something we couldn’t understand. Couldn’t appreciate. We had no idea of it, our idiocy – our true idiocy. We were nearly entirely unwitting.
Only Livia could savour it. Only Livia knew it, our idiocy, in its true dimensions. Only Livia understood it. could do something with it. Could turn it to her ends. To the fulfilment of her plan.
Anarchy in the academy! Idiocy in the academy! Tomfoolery in the academy! Jokes and jesters in the academy. Unleashed! At play! Abroad!
And we wouldn’t understand our role, not really. It would never be clear to us, our significance. Our uniqueness.
Only Livia could enjoy us. Only Livia would savour us.
And Livia could set us free in front of the students. There we were, lecturing. With our immense personal problems. With our vast inadequacy and sense of impostor’s syndrome.
Livia, who’d played the game for so long, and so well. Livia, who’d risen up the ranks. Who’d climbed the academic ladder. Livia, who’d succeeded. Who’d Ascended. Who’d Risen. Who’d crested, pretty much.
Livia, a a professor of many years, and one of the most respected professors. Livia, a university player, and one of the best of the university players.
Who could open a Philosophy department, at the hear of it all. Granted, it hasn’t called a philosophy department yet, but it would be. And staff it with idiots. Imbeciles. The entirely underserving.
Livia, orchestrating it all. Livia enjoying it all. Her wind-up toy philosophy department, that she’d set in motion.
We couldn’t help but escape. We’d already escaped. We were already outside. We were already in relation to the Outside.
In our writings, in our studies – no, it wasn’t there. But in the way we drank!. In the way we were! In the way we lived in the everyday – it was there. It was precious. It was important.
Which we never understood. Of course not! Just like animals would never understand what they were.
She could delight in us, Livia. In our banter. In the way we were together. She could delight in herself. In her own good taste. In the way she’d brought us together. Curated us. It was idiot’s assemble. It was her Z team. Handpicked! Handplucked! For her nefarious purposes. That we’d never understand.
Work in Progress 