In many years of dealing with many graduate students, I have consistently reiterated my belief that history is far too important for us to content ourselves with writing only for a bunch of professorial pointy-heads. Now at last I have proof positive that I practice what I preach. Instead of wasting his time on “Goodnight Moon” or “The Cat in the Hat,” Ryotaro Miyata has opted for my latest tome. Ryotaro’s dad, Ichiro, told me that his son was a little bit frightened by my jacket photo, but otherwise undeterred by my sometimes turgid prose. Apparently, he has a quibble or two with my take on Faulkner, but was nonetheless overheard recommending the book to several of his friends around the sandbox.
I’m sure that as soon as the folks at Oxford University Press get wind of this, there’ll be a rush to get my opus translated into Japanese and placed in the “kiddie lit” sections of all major bookstores over that way. Ryotaro disdains such puffery, of course, but after completing my book, he has been contemplating something a little lighter and asking about some guy named Gibbon.
