What I Learned from Jim Mcleod Page 4-5: the Great New As Many of You May Know, There Real Contribution to the World
October 2011 | Vol. X No. 2 One Civilized Reader Is Worth a Thousand Boneheads Jian Leng, the editor of The Figure in the Carpet, decided to ture not just Jim’s calm and discretion, but also, in his tenure as reprint this piece I wrote for the campaign to raise money for the the director of African and Afro-American Studies, his toughness Table of Contents Jim McLeod Scholarship. I recall that when I ran into Jim shortly and his shrewd ability to assess accurately difficult situations after this was published in 2009 he told me, with a wry grin, I and to evaluate keenly the nature of the resources he had at hand was the best PR agent a person could have. I laughed too, but, as and how to use them. Jim had a bit of the Christian saint in him Page 1-2: What I Learned a writer, my hope was that the sharp honesty of my short mem- but he had also more than a bit of the quickness of Joseph among oir of Jim was the guarantee of its truth about a man I deeply the Egyptians. Jim was a fine balance of the pragmatist and the from Jim McLeod by Gerald admired. My intention was to work against all possibilities of PR moralist. My story about Jim is the tale of how an older, wiser Early puffery. Jim deserved something far more than being merely flat- and more capable man took a young apprentice under his wing tered or praised, which means that to the degree and showed him how to survive and even prosper in the formida- that a person can comprehend his colleague, Jim deserved to be bly competitive professional world of the academy and its uneasy Page 3: First Center for the illuminated as one might wish to shed light on a mystery.
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