i moved to western massachusetts in 1998 when i was something very sad called abd. as in all but dissertation. i had finished all my coursework and everything else for my degree but not my thesis. my idea is that i would live in undistracted bucolic bliss in order to finish the darn thing. it took me years but i did finish. to the extent that finishing the darn thing meant having to work in libraries, i did most of my work at the web dubois library at am hertz. it is the tallest university library in the world, almost 30 stories. western massachusetts is more of a 19th century barn and a couple of cows kind of place. but the campus library is this big tall brick tower. you can see it from everywhere. and here s the weird thing. the whole time i was squeezing blood from that stone, the whole time i was writing my des sertation, there was this temporary looking chain link
degree but not my thesis. my idea is that i would live in undistracted bucolic bliss in order to finish the darn thing. it took me years but i did finish. to the extent that finishing the darn thing meant having to work in libraries, i did most of my work at the web dubois library u mass amherst. it is the tallest university library in the world, almost 30 stories. western massachusetts is not a skyscrapery kind of place. western massachusetts is more of a 19th century barn and a couple of cows kind of place. but the campus library is this big tall brick tower. you can see it from everywhere. and here s the weird thing. the whole time i was squeezing blood from that stone, the whole time i was writing my des sertation, there was this temporary looking chain link fence that went around the building. these are pictures of the fence from back in the day that the meant you couldn t just walk up to the building except through one tiny alley of space. it s a giant building visible from every