English, of course.

We math and science students used to have royal fun scoffing at the Eng Lit

crowd. “They’re going to give you a degree JUST FOR READING NOVELS? Hooo

hooo hooo!”

I still think it’s a joke. Even more of a joke now than it was back in the

1960s, in fact: the folk we were mocking at least had to master

Anglo-Saxon, now an elective everywhere, I think. Hwaet!

Kingsley Amis asked whether the condition of English Literature had

improved, or not, since the first university courses in the subject were

established in the 1890s.

The question was, of course, rhetorical.