Mark D. White

Writer, editor, teacher

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about

I’m a professor in the Department of Philosophy at the College of Staten Island/CUNY, where I teach courses in philosophy, economics, and law, and the author/editor/co-editor of several books.

  • A big phew, halfway through… (A personal midsummer’s update) [UPDATED]

  • Ta-Nehisi Coates and Leinil Francis Yu’s Captain America #1: A great start that hits all the right notes, some of them new.

    Cap coates 1 coverMarvel Comics nicely timed the release of the latest Captain America #1—by Ta-Nehisi Coates, Leinil Francis Yu, Gerry Alanguilan, Sunny Gho, and Joe Caramagna—for July 4th, and this is appropriate for so many reasons. The most obvious is that this is a new start for the Sentinel of Liberty, but it also fits the state he's in, struggling to reclaim the trust he lost during the entire Secret Empire episode when a version of Cap, altered by a sentient Cosmic Cube to believe himself to be a lifelong undercover Hydra agent, helped the fascist organization take over America with him as its figurehead. At the end of the story (which I discussed here), the Cube created a new version of Cap from her memories, who quickly defeated Hydra-Cap, went on a motorcycle tour of America (in Mark Waid's short run with Chris Samnee and Leonardo Romero), and now stars in his new run, where he has to come face-to-face with "his" recent past in a number of ways.

    This book is everything I want for a launch of a new Cap title: a solid focus on his virtues and his patriotism in the context of fantastic superheroics, with plenty of room for his supporting cast. Coates provides Cap's ongoing internal narrative throughout the book while also doing a fine job of capturing the other characters' voices and motivations (chiefly Sharon Carter and Bucky Barnes). The art is simply breathtaking, with Yu turning in the work of his career, lightly but deftly fleshed out by Alanguilan, and endowed with a subdued palette by Gho, with a wealth of greens and browns to contrast with Cap's red, white, and blue. Caramagna, as always, letters in a way in keep the exposition, dialogue, and art clear, tying the entire effort together. (And we can't forgot the glorious by Alex Ross, shown above! Click to enlarge, and just gaze at it for a while.)

    (more…)

  • Captain America #700 reminds us who Steve Rogers is…

    700 coverThe final issue of Captain America by the now-classic team of Mark Waid, Chris Samnee, Matthew Wilson, and Joe Caramagna was, appropriately enough, the bonus-sized issue #700, and true to its anniversary status, it serves as a reaffirmation of who Steve Rogers is. In wrapping up their near-future storyline, the team puts Cap in an impossible situation, forces him to make a tough decision, and gives us one of the best Cap scenes in recent memory, all before setting him up for his next round of adventures from Waid and an all-star roster of artists (before a new #1 this summer from Ta-Nehisi Coates and Leinil Yu).

     

    SPOILERS BELOW!!!

    (more…)

  • Checking in, one quarter of the way through 2018… (A personal update)

  • My 2017 in review, and looking ahead to 2018…

    2017-2018I've been putting off writing this post for a while — not because I'm disappointed with what I did this year, but because I don't yet know what I will do next year (aside from finishing one major project begun this year), and that has me feeling very uneasy. But more on that to come… let's see what I managed to accomplish this past year (aside from my day job).

    BOOKS

    I started and finished three books this year: two of them sole-authored and one edited, one of them out now and the others coming in 2018 and 2019. (I also had one edited book come out this year that was finished last year: The Insanity Defense: Multidisciplinary Views on Its History, Trends, and Controversies.)

    Decline1. The Decline of the Individual: Reconciling Autonomy with Community, which was written in the spring and then went through a ridiculously rushed production process over the summer, was published by Palgrave in September. (It was scheduled for August publication, if you can believe that. I still can't.) I wrote about this book and the writing process behind it here, and my friend Dante brilliantly described the production process here. (I also constructed the index that there "just wasn't time for": you can find it here.)

    2. Doctor Strange and Philosophy: The Other Forbidden Book of Knowledge, an entry in the Blackwell Philosophy and Pop Culture Series that I worked on over the summer, will be out from Wiley-Blackwell in May 2018. My first volume in the series since 2013's Superman and Philosophy, this project was a joy to put together with a couple dozen brilliant contributors and trusty series editor Bill Irwin. (The cover has not yet been posted as I write this, but trust me, it's gorgeous. UPDATE: You can see it here.)

    3. A sole-authored book on a superhero and ethics (in the vein of The Virtues of Captain America), which I wrote mostly during the summer and completed in the fall, is under review for classroom adoption potential and is planned to be published by Wiley-Blackwell in 2019. (Will this particular superhero still be around by then? I sure hope so!) I wrote about this book, the process behind it, and the reason for being so coy about its subject, here.

    Currently, I'm in the midst of production for Doctor Strange and Philosophy and editing The Oxford Handbook of Ethics and Economics, for which I already have a handful of finalized chapters and which I hope to finish by the middle of next year. Other than that, aside from a few things I've discussed casually with editors at various presses, I have no firm plans for the books in the future, and that is a strange feeling. (But more on that later.)

    ARTICLES AND CHAPTERS

    As I've said for the last several years, I'm shifting my work away from short pieces and toward books, and this year reflects that. Although a decent number of articles and chapters written last year (or earlier) came out this year, I only wrote two book chapters this year (and have just two to write next year).

    Published this year but written earlier (although the first two were revised this year) are:

    Accepted this year and forthcoming — the first written last year, the second this year — are:

    • “Nudging – Ethical and Political Dimensions of Choice Architectures,” forthcoming in Handbook of Behavioural Change and Public Policy, edited by Holger Strassheim and Silke Beck (Edward Elgar).
    • "The Otherworldly Burden of Being the Sorcerer Supreme," forthcoming in Doctor Strange and Philosophy.

    Finally, in progress are chapters for two edited books, one on Spider-Man and his villains and another on ethics and economics, and next spring I will write my chapter and the introduction for the handbook. (After that… who knows?)

    ONLINE WORK

    I included this category even though there is very little to account for, other than a few posts at Psychology Today and The Comics Professor. I always hope to blog more — and still do — but rarely find I have anything to say. (That may soon be changing, though… see more below.)

    PRESENTATIONS/LECTURES

    Not much to report here either: I only gave two presentations in 2017, both at the Central Division meetings of the American Philosophical Association in March. I have no travel planned for next year; I think I'm skipping next week's ASSA meetings for the first time since I began going to 1996, and I already turned down one conference invitation for 2018.

    LOOKING FORWARD

    I really can't improve on what I wrote last year: "Little has changed since I invoked Tolstoy five years ago at The Good Men Project. I'm still not sure what I'm doing, what I 'should' be doing, or what I want to be doing."

    When I told one of my best friends recently that I have nothing planned to do after the handbook is finished next year, he told me, "do what you really want to do." But he knows full well that that's my problem: I still haven't figured out what I want to do. (Pacing around my apartment isn't one of them, but here I am!) I keep a list of things I could do — various topics I could write on, as well as book projects I've discussed with editors at different presses — but none of them excites me at the moment. And then there's that novel I've been telling myself I'd write when I get done with other things, but that's such a huge shift in focus… I'm not sure I'm ready for that yet. (But maybe soon.)

    There may be a light in the distance. however. In my last update, I wrote this (originally from my "comeback" post at The Comics Professor, a comeback that lasted all of two posts so far), partly in response to my declining interest in the current state of superhero comics and also looking towards my future activities:

    I've been thinking a lot lately about diving back into the past comics I love, whether Captain America, Batman, the Fantastic Four, or others, and blogging in a more systematic way about them, taking each issue or storyline and writing about what I love about it, whether there's something of philosophical interest there or not. Maybe I'll just geek out about how cool the art is, or how a moment made me laugh or cry. Maybe I'll even do a podcast about them, something like The Fantasticast or the Nerdsync podcast—not that I can do that any better than Stephen and Andrew or Scott do, but I'd do it my own way, whatever they may be. Just an idea I've been knocking around, something to get excited about.

    Cap coverSince the time I wrote that, I received two very gratifying and humbling messages, one from a college professor and the other from an instructor in the United States Army, both of whom have used my Captain America book in their classes. This news affected me deeply — especially the one from the army — and confirmed my thoughts about focusing more on comics in general and Captain America in particular, including developing some online content to reinforce and supplement the book, as well as extending the approach to other heroes (such as I did with the book I wrote this summer). So this is likely what I'll be doing next year (aside from the handbook), though it still feels too amorphous at this point to seem "real."

    ~ ~~ ~~~ ~~ ~

    In general, I realize I don't need to plan the entire next year and have projects nailed down, and that ideas will come to me eventually, but this is the first time in years that I don't have several projects stacked up going into the new year. And I think that's why I look back on 2017 and worry that my 2018 won't be as productive. (There's also the question of why my productivity matters so much to me, but let's ignore that elephant in the room.) Instead of being pleased with what I accomplished this past year, I'm afraid that it's my last "good" year, that I'm "done." And when work is all there is… well, you can fill in the rest. (This also answers that question above.)

    Finally, to address my best-laid plans about keeping a routine as laid out in last year's wrap-up post… well, I didn't, at least not in the sense of keeping to a certain schedule or routine. I did, however, work on my two books most every day while writing each of them, so regularity, more than routine, seems to be key for me. I also kept a book journal for the summer book (but not the spring one, for some reason), and this helped reinforce my progress and keep me on track. (No Steinbeck-style ennui this time, amazingly.) I suspect this may be why I need to be working on a "big project," something I can work on every day — it seems that's how I work best and am most satisfied with what I do.

    We'll see what happens… and in the meantime, I wish you a fulfilling 2018, whatever that may mean for you!

  • At last, another book: A mid-November update

    Batman tired113,248 words. (Imagine that sung by the cast of Rent.)

    Whew.

    Yesterday evening I emailed the manuscript for my latest superhero-and-philosophy book to my editor, who will then send it to instructor-reviewers to assess its potential for course adoption. As with my Captain America and Civil War books, this book was written for general readers, but the publisher wants to test the waters for class use as well, so we'll see what happens with that.

    As readers of these updates and my Twitter account know, I've been coy about the subject of the book. The book isn't planned to be released until 2019, and there are other people who do this kind of thing (and do it very well), so I'm wary of inviting them to beat me to the punch. I can tell you, however, that the book has an approach similar to The Virtues of Captain America, exploring the moral code of a popular superhero while making a broader point about our ethical decision-making. While Cap can come off as "too" good, the hero I deal with in this book does not, which lets me delve more into issues of moral conflict and consistency. In that sense, the book serves as a nice companion piece to the Cap book—so much so that the publisher actually suggested we title this one The Vices of…, but I thought that was going a little far!

    The last time I gave an update, I had completed my work on the book for the summer, at which point I felt I was almost done and had 92,000 words written. As the fall semester began, I worked here and there throughout September, adding 10,000 words, and did a quick pass-through in early October, adding about 2000 more. At the end of October, I split the two huge files (Part I and Part II) into four chapters each, and the chapters into sections, and then began the fine editing: filling gaps in content that I kindly left for myself, reinforcing the broader point of the book as often as I could, and trying to cite as many comics as possible (433 at latest count). In the end, I had 113,248 words, definitely the longest book I've ever written and nearly twice as long as each of my Palgrave books (including The Decline of the Individual, which I wrote earlier this year and was published since my last update).

    Again, I say whew.

    — — — — —

    While this book was my main activity the last several months (outside of teaching and chairing), I did also manage to write a few posts for Psychology Today:

    Cap 695Finally, after a year and a half away, I returned to comics blogging at The Comics Professor, commenting on the return of the classic Steve Rogers in Mark Waid and Chris Samnee's Captain America (with a word or two about Secret Empire and "Hydra-Cap") and the surprising move of superstar comics writer Brian Michael Bendis from Marvel to DC. I hope to blog on comics more frequently from now on, as well as begin some other related projects, as I wrote at the end of the Captain America post:

    I've been thinking a lot lately about diving back into the past comics I love, whether Captain America, Batman, the Fantastic Four, or others, and blogging in a more systematic way about them, taking each issue or storyline and writing about what I love about it, whether there's something of philosophical interest there or not. Maybe I'll just geek out about how cool the art is, or how a moment made me laugh or cry. Maybe I'll even do a podcast about them, something like The Fantasticast or the Nerdsync podcast—not that I can do that any better than Stephen and Andrew or Scott do, but I'd do it my own way, whatever they may be. Just an idea I've been knocking around, something to get excited about.

    In other words, my next major comics project will likely not start out as a book, although a book may eventually come out of it. We'll see.

    — — — — —

    The near future brings some academic work: writing a chapter for a book on ethics and the "making of an economist," due by the end of the year, and then my major work for the rest of the academic year, continuing to edit and write for The Oxford Handbook of Ethics and Economics, my most ambitious editing project to date. (In the meantime, I'll be overseeing production of Doctor Strange and Philosophy, which is planned to come out in spring 2018.)

    I hope to check in again before the new year. I hope you enjoy the upcoming holidays, and stay warm and safe.

  • So who had “Brian Michael Bendis moves to DC Comics” in the pool? Anybody?

    BendisSome random thoughts on the jawdropping news — at least for readers of superhero comics — that superstar Marvel Comics writer Brian Michael Bendis has signed an exclusive contract with DC Comics…

    Wow. I mean WOW. This is huge.

    I count myself as a huge Bendis fan. Daredevil was the first Marvel book I read, and as I followed Ed Brubaker and Michael Lark's run I also went back to read all the Miller and Smith, and then all the Bendis, and loved it. Then came his Avengers in the run-up to Secret Invasion, which is my favorite Bendis event, especially the carefully laid groundwork leading into it and the support stories in the Avengers books that ran alongside the main series. Dark Avengers and Siege were fantastic, especially with his multilayered Norman Osborn, but his Avengers titles began to get tired for me soon after The Heroic Age began. I soon gleaned on to his X-Men books (which I almost never read) and Guardians of the Galaxy. After the Marvel Universe died (but didn't really OK never mind hey look Miles is here everybody yay), his Iron Man work was brilliant, especially in the recent developments with Riri Williams and Victor Von Doom, and of course I love Jessica Jones (in all her Bendis incarnations) and Miles Morales, his two best creations. (Didn't like Civil War II, but oh well.)

    In short, he represented a lot of Marvel was to me for the last 10-12 years, and I will miss his voice there (even if it has become less pervasive in the last couple years as his big franchises wound down).

    Two obvious questions going forward are:

    What happens to his Marvel books? I assume he'll stay on Iron Man until #600 (when Tony Stark will presumably return), after which the book will go to a heavy hitter like Jason Aaron (my first choice). The inevitable Ironheart book will hopefully go in a new, emerging writer, as should happen also with the Miles Morales book. Jessica Jones is too connected with Bendis (and Michael Gaydos), though, so I don't see anyone taking that over, unless she's wrapped into a joint book with Luke Cage. Defenders could go on with someone else, but it never received Legacy renumbering, so I expect it will be cancelled (especially now that the show is a memory) or re-oriented more towards the rotating line-up of the classic book (at which point it will be renumbered). I would also nominate Mr. Aaron for that. (Or anything. That fella's great.)

    What will he do at DC? The best guess is Batman, whether one or both of the existing books (in which I would expect Tom King to jump to Marvel full-time) or a newly created book. Bendis has often expressed his desire to write the character (which was his sole DC credit to this point), and it makes sense given his focus on street-level heroes at Marvel, but personally I don't see Bendis' voice fitting the Dark Knight. (But I imagine this was the lure that got him to jump ship.)

    The best fit in my opinion would be a restored Legion of Super-Heroes book: huge team (like the Avengers or X-Men), an entire world for him to play in and develop (like X-Men and Guardians of the Galaxy), and so much dialogue to write. (I love his style of dialogue, which would work much better with Legion or Titans than Batman.)

    My fantasy pick? Restore Green Arrow to his old, ornery glory and give him to Bendis. Call it Old Man Ollie if you want. (I really want my Ollie back, and I think Bendis would be great. The return of three-alarm chili!)

    In general, I do have reservations. I don't think it's particularly novel to say that Bendis is an intrinsically "Marvel" writer, much like writer and penciller Jack Kirby was before he jumped ship to do New Gods and more at DC, and more recently when penciller John Romita Jr. moved to DC to draw Superman. Frankly, I wonder how the patented Bendis voice will fit at DC. (But then again, Kirby didn't do too bad!) Given my poor opinion of the state of DC at the moment, I'm inclined to welcome any shake-up. But I also wonder if the addition of such an "outside" voice, as talented and inventive as he is, would get DC even further off-track at a time when they need to find their center (as promised by Geoff John's Rebirth one-shot). I would prefer that they engage Mr. Johns to devote himself to focusing the line (rather than messing with what should never be touched), and find a corner of the DCU for Bendis to play in where he can indulge himself fully (as they did with Kirby). Again, I think the Legion would be perfect for this, or maybe a new or reimagined parallel Earth. (Earth-B, of course.)

    What do you think?

  • A return to form: Waid and Samnee’s Captain America #695 (and a bit of catching up)

    Cap 695A year and a half ago, Steve Rogers spoke those two words that changed the Marvel Universe and launched a secret empire… but more on that later. Suffice it to say our hero was not the same, until he was.

    Today, with the release of Captain America #695—renumbered a la "Marvel Legacy" to include most of the previous issues of Captain America with the notable exception of the run of Steve Rogers: Captain America that featured the Hydra version—Mark Waid, Chris Samnee, Matt Wilson, and Joe Caramagna return the Sentinel of Liberty to his past glories.

    The issue reads more like a re-introduction of the character and a reminder of what he stands for than the start of a new arc, and serves well as a standalone issue meant to re-assure loyal readers that this is the Steve Rogers we know and love. The story has its own sense of legacy as well, as Steve Rogers, fresh from his defeat of the false Cap, visits the site of a decade-old battle from the days soon after he was defrosted. Few remembered him then, but he is now well-known—and at least in this town he is celebrated, despite the recent experience with his doppelgänger. (One assumes the rest of the first arc will show him encountering a bit more caution and hostility from his fellow Americans, as should be the case.)

    The fervor that we see surrounding Captain America in this town, and Steve's discomfort with it, reminds me of the "Cap-mania" from the beginning of Waid's "Heroes Return" run, and this is just one of the meaningful character touches in this issue. If you miss Cap saying typical Cap things, this issue will not disappoint, especially the sentiment expressed on the final two pages, always one of my favorite aspects of Captain America. It isn't just Waid's words that restore our faith in this Cap, but also Samnee and Wilson's depiction of him in his simple, classic, three-colored costume, along with Samnee's characteristic clean lines and Wilson's bold color choices. Back are the cavalier boots and the wings on his head, so his fellow Avengers can once again call him "Winghead." (Sometimes it's the little things that make comics great, after all.) No need for a combat helmet or chinstrap for this Cap, who recognizes the symbolism of simplicity and the confidence it inspires in those he's saving—as well as those he's inspiring to help others.

    I look forward to seeing where Waid, Samnee, Wilson, and Caramagna go in exploring more of Captain America's trip through his country to help restore his name and legacy, but I appreciate that they took this first issue to simply celebrate who Captain America is and will always be.

    —– —– —–

    So… about the last year and a half…

    I'm hesitant to talk about "Hydra-Cap" and Secret Empire, especially because it's over, and there's little reason to dredge up the past. (See also: Civil War II.) But I do have some thoughts, and I guess it's only appropriate given that my last post was on the occasion of the first issue of that story.

    In that post, I defended what I thought Nick Spencer was trying to do. As the story progressed, I admired how he spun out the story little by little, even after the second issue abruptly revealed the secret behind Cap's transformation. Even after the storyline blew up into A Marvel Event, I appreciated how he seemed to go all in, pushing the premise as far as it could go, even having Hydra Cap lift Mjolnir, suggesting that he night be worthy in some sense even if he had evil ends. (Let me give a shout out to my friend Armond Boudreaux, who wrote a number of excellent posts about this storyline over at A Clash of Heroes.)

    The Secret Empire series started exceptionally well, with an amazingly multilayered roll-out and perfect pacing in the first half, but then collapsed in the second half as the creators seemed to be pressured to come up with an ending that put all the pieces back in the box and restored Captain America to his former glory. (We all remember the assurances from Marvel Comics that everything would be fine and it would all be over soon, not exactly a sign of confidence.)

    The final issue of the main series (Secret Empire #10) was when the creators dropped the ball. As I wrote about the first issue, I hoped that Spencer and the rest of his term were setting up "an epic redemption story":

    And when Steve recovers from the brainwashing, false memories, hypnosis, or Cosmic Cube shenanigans, even though he shouldn't hold himself responsible, he will. He tortures himself much more than anyone else could when he is forced to compromise his principles, even if he could not control it, because he feels he should have been able to control it.

    I'm not upset by this comic because I see it as Steve Rogers' greatest test ever, a test I'm confident he'll pass, but not without going through hell first. And that could be a truly amazing story.

    Secret empire 10But that isn't what happened. As we now know, Steve didn't battle back as I'd hoped, the essence of who he is overcoming Kobik's reprogramming to reassert his true character by sheer force of will. Instead, a new Steve Rogers formed out of Kobik's memories emerged to defeat Hydra-Cap, who is the Cap we see in the new comic. This familiar Cap didn't struggle to come back, unless we consider the version we saw in Kobik's dream-like memories, but that Cap was never corrupted in the first place. He bears no personal responsibility at all for what happened, although he will still have to work to get his good name back after it was usurped by the imposter.

    In the end, there was no redemption story at all, and that is the greatest disappointment of all.

    (To be fair, the Secret Empire: Omega issue that served as the story's aftermath was excellent, especially when Hydra Cap explained that he didn't force anything on the America people—instead, they handed him all the power he wanted, which made the real Steve Rogers question what the American people really want from their government and from him. Perfect, and perhaps Spencer's most spot-on political statement in the entire story.)

    I like to think that, had Spencer kept the story within the pages of the two Captain America comics, it would have had a more satisfying resolution. Perhaps it got away from him when it was blown into an event and had to change to fit that model and get ready for Generations and Marvel Legacy. We'll probably never know, and… that's fine. As I said above, it's behind us. If nothing else, at its best the storyline was a fascinating reflection of the political situation we find ourselves in. Was the damage to a beloved character worth it? I don't think so, but I also think people will forget about it soon enough, and we'll think of it like we think of Teen Tony Stark, the Invisible Woman's 90s costume, or One More Day. (Unfortunately, we're still living with the last one.)

    —– —– —–

    Silver surfer 14Finally, while I've got you here—and it has been a while—let me say a few words about what I've been up to since I last posted.

    The quick answer is I've been working on other things, some of them related to superheroes. This includes writing a chapter for Wonder Woman and Philosophy, available now, edited by Jacob Held; editing Doctor Strange and Philosophy (out in early 2018) and writing a chapter for it; and writing an entire book on a superhero and philosophy, which I'm currently doing final editing for (and is planned for release in 2019). All of this, plus my non-superhero writing and my day job, has kept me busy. (If it helps, I haven't blogged much on anything for a long time, other than my monthly-ish posts at Psychology Today.)

    The longer answer has to do with my state of mind about current comics, which isn't entirely positive. I may have more to say about this in a later post, but I'm largely disenchanted with new comics, with rare exceptions such as Dan Slott, Mike Allred, and Laura Allred's recently-concluded run of Silver Surfer, which is one of the most satisfying and emotional reading experiences I've had in a long time. (The last issue, shown to the right, was so magnificent that I'm still thinking about it, and probably will for a long time.) But most of the comics I buy these days—usually about 50 a month—I'm just not enjoying, despite the craft and devotion being put into them. There is fantastic work being done, but the quarter of my monthly pull that blows me away doesn't make up for the three quarters that don't.

    I've been thinking a lot lately about diving back into the past comics I love, whether Captain America, Batman, the Fantastic Four, or others, and blogging in a more systematic way about them, taking each issue or storyline and writing about what I love about it, whether there's something of philosophical interest there or not. Maybe I'll just geek out about how cool the art is, or how a moment made me laugh or cry. Maybe I'll even do a podcast about them, something like The Fantasticast or the Nerdsync podcast—not that I can do that any better than Stephen and Andrew or Scott do, but I'd do it my own way, whatever they may be. Just an idea I've been knocking around, something to get excited about.

    And don't we all need that?

  • Reflecting on a summer quickly coming to its end… (A personal update) [UPDATED]

    (SunsetUpdates in red.)

    Tomorrow is my first day back at school for the fall semester, which makes today the last day of summer for me. It would seem like a fine time for an update, right?

    In terms of my three tasks for the summer…

    1) Drafting my sole-authored superhero-and-philosophy book was my primary goal, and I had arbitrarily chosen last Wednesday as the "completion" date (in case I needed to go into the office on Friday, and graciously allowing myself a day before that as well). That worked out nicely to 12 weeks, 6 days a week, so 72 days total. As of the end of Wednesday I had about 92,000 words written, exceeding my target of 90K words, and I still have more to write. Given that my usual concern is having enough to say, I'm pleased with meeting my target, and a bit bewildered at being in the strange position of exceeding it. It's not the normal case of writing more than I need and then having to trim it down—if anything, I need to flesh out some material as well as add one more significant section. I hope to get this additional work done in September before confronting other writing responsibilities for the fall. All in all, I'm fine with my work on this book this summer, although it was a bit more up and down than I would have liked, and I wanted to be done done. (While I just started writing this summer, this book has been in the works for years.)

    2) Work on Doctor Strange and Philosophy is also nearly finished—doing final editing on the last few chapters. ('Nuff said!) UPDATE: I submitted the manuscript on September 1, four days ahead of deadline, thanks to the timeliness and cooperation of my contributors.

    3) Production of The Decline of the Individual is finished as far as I'm concerned. The release date was changed from August 25 (as confirmed by the project manager on August 10) to September 15 (according a change made to the website on August 11). (When I replied to the project manager about this, the email bounced back "address unknown." Same for the production editor.) But wait…. last week the date on the website became October 15, which happens to be close to the date my editor gave me when the whole thing started. As before… ¯\_(ツ)_/¯. For my part, I'm constructing a proper index for the book which I will post here; I was hoping to have it done by now, but it still needs a little work. UPDATE: I finished the index on September 4—you can find it here.

    –o-O-o–

    Looking back, I wish I had done the summer differently—it became so intense that I'm looking forward to the semester for relaxation! Part of my problem was not spreading out the work as well as I could have; while I worked on the authored book most every day, I didn't always keep up with other work, which then built up at precisely the wrong time (as it inevitably will). However, besides the Oxford handbook I'm editing, I don't have a commitment for any other books going forward, so things are open for next summer to consider projects I've batted around with different editors, as well as some ideas of my own.

    Finally, I did have one new post at Psychology Today last week that did fairly well: "Why Adultery Is Harmful Even Before It's Discovered," elaborating on what is by far my most "successful" tweet:

    //platform.twitter.com/widgets.js

    –o-O-o–

    Looking ahead, this semester I need to finish up the summer tasks three, and then begin a few new things. In addition to the chapter and introduction for my handbook, I'll be contributing a chapter to an edited scholarly collection on Spider-Man (focusing on Civil War), and another chapter on ethics and economics to a very intriguing new project. And most important, I will be returning to the classroom for the first time in two years. It's a long story, but it comes down to teaching too many courses for many years before I became department chair, and now having to balance that out by a certain date while being chair, which already carries reduced teaching expectations as it is.

    However you're spending it, I wish you a happy and successful fall, and I'll see you next time I have something to say. In the meantime, here's Sam… just pretend it's yesterday, OK?

     

  • Two months down, one month to go… (Another personal midsummer’s update)

    Beach 2Is it the end of July already?

    As I did at the end of June, I'll give a brief update on things happening here…

    1) The superhero-and-philosophy book I'm writing is going well. I'm in a better position than I was a month ago: I've experienced fewer down days, and as a result I'm well over two-thirds of the way toward my target word count. (I now imagine the book may be a bit longer than planned, a very strange position for me to be in.) I now expect to have it drafted by the time the fall semester starts, and then I'll do a bit of editing and revising early in the fall.

    2) Doctor Strange and Philosophy is also proceeding nicely. Most chapters are finalized and looking great, and we're in the final editing stage, looking good to finish on time.

    3) The Decline of the Individual: I approved the third set of page proofs last Monday, so barring any surprises, we're good to go. (The first set of proofs required around 1000 corrections, because I didn't have a chance to review copyedits; the second round, which served as proper proofs, needed only about seventy.) I've been told to expect publication "in the month of September." ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

    The fall semester at CSI officially begins on Friday, August 25, although for me it effectively begins the following Monday, so I have four more weeks to go. As I wrap up the tasks above, I will turn to a book chapter I agreed to write (a return to Civil War from an interesting new angle) and my introduction and chapter for The Oxford Handbook of Ethics and Economics… and thinking about future plans.

    I hope your summer ends well… see you on the other side!