academic accuracy and academic freedom (not a flame)

[Peter Giordano]

Let's try this:

An author, let's call him John Smith, writes a biography of James Joyce and
makes two claims
about the book: 1) it is the first book to use Joyce's letters to his
daughter as a source, and 2)
it is the first book to find the relationship between Joyce's daughter and
Molly Bloom (I am not
supposing that there is one)

Now, somebody else comes along and says  "No - Both those statements are
wrong" and this
person (call him Tom Jones) presents what he considers to be reasonable
evidence to illustrate
his point - Evidence which everybody on the planet (via interlibrary loan)
has access to

The first claim is a matter of fact - Either you are first or not - If John
Smith persists in making
the claim after being presented with evidence to the contrary then John
Smith's entire opus is
in question

The second claim may or may not be a fact - But one would expect John Smith
to check the
evidence presented before denying that the evidence is wrong

If John Smith were to engage in the normal academic discourse (Albeit hot
and heavy) then
it would be possible to eventually come to some conclusions about where the
correct answer
might be - However, if John Smith immediately goes into "flame" mode: four
letter words,
threats of violence, attempts at censorship, etc.  then it becomes
reasonable to assume
that perhaps the questions raised are valid

Let's tie this to Pynchon scholarship - There is a lot of stuff written
about TRP but there
is very little (relatively speaking) written about his personal life except
that he keeps it
very private - The few references can be traced to a couple of magazine
articles and
perhaps one book - I would submit that it is critical to establish the
veracity of those
few sources - For example, how accurate is that NEW YORK MAGAZINE article?
I would also suggest that those who are attempting to sell their personal
information
about any given author (as in "I knew him personally and he has bad table
manners")
should be doublely checked out because profit often informs content - Look
at the various
memoirs coming out now about the OJ trial - Each author, in order to get
attention, must
unveil some juicer and more scandalous sound bite and each sound bite is worth
a few thousand dollars

It's been suggested that if I give up my inquiry then I won't  be
threatened any more - Think
about that in an academic context - It does not sound very logical - In
fact, it stinks

I am trying to keep this out side of the realm of flaming - I have no
interest in flaming - So
I request that if you want to send me a message telling me I'm full of BS
or curse at
me or ridicule me please send it privately (that is unless I have already
requested that
you not send me personal mail) - If you'd like to discuss my thesis in the
spirit in which
I intend it I am glad for any reasonable criticism and I'm quite willing to
admit error if
I see it - This is not meant to continue a flame war I think it is valuable
to consider how
we establish the veracity of those who make claims about authors - I find
it bizarre that
my employment can be questioned here - What happened to academic freedom?
Isn't
it reasonable for somebody in research to test sources?  If you want to
discuss my
job please email me privately and I'll gladly do so

Thanks


Peter Giordano
Williams College
Williamstown, MA