I came to Georgetown hoping to fill all the gaps in my literary knowledge. Of course, “all” is a very big word. Owing to the exigencies of time, that monster, and my personal learning issues (this essay, although it doesn’t directly deal with my own situation, may shed some light), I was able to read and get to know very little of what I had intended. Of all the canonical characters, objects, notions, tropes, themes and memes out there available for pondering and study – the madeleines and Moors and moors; the whales, princes, and orphans; the adulteresses, heiresses, and governesses – my encounters ended up including, through a mix of intentionality and happenstance, Shakespeare and Woolf, Melville, Keats, and Wharton.