Second day of presentations. All have been wonderfully commendable, I think, but there are few which just leave me, frankly, flummoxed and intimadated. Such as Douglas and his intense tracing of a communist conspiracy through the signs of the Zodiac in Transparent Things, and James the Rat's Index for Transparent Things(interesting that one of the least discussed works by N. should be discussed so much for this class), and Parker of the Outback's screenplay bit for Pale Fire. And perhaps it is just the anxiety of influence speaking, but I cannot help it: I mean, making Gradus "a sick basterdization of a Humphrey Bogart character". How in the name of N. can Kari top this!

Or how can anybody top Adam Benson, dominated as he is by Dame Nabson?