'We're ideally situated,' said my host from the University of Lethbridge: 'We're three hours' drive from Calgary and an hour from Glacier National Park.' Not everyone would say the location was ideal but that sort of cheerfulness was typical of many academics teaching off the beaten path in the United States and Canada. Invited to do so by Phi Beta Kappa, the American university honour society, I spent most of the fall toting the torch of learning from sea to shining sea.

LRB 10 March 1994 | PDF Download