In which we discuss

ADA PALMER, RENAISSANCE WOMAN · MAPS AND LEGENDS

Also Life-size religious statues · Horror movies · Wayne C. Booth · Therapy dogs · Gnocchi

THE COLLEGE MAGAZINE

Winter 2018 Supplement to The University of Chicago Magazine

CDO-17-1746_The Core Winter2018_Cover_v6.indd 2 1/18/18 1:37 PM Fourth-year forward Madori Spiker takes on a Williams College defender in the NCAA Division III women’s soccer national championship game in December. Spiker had two shots on goal in the game, but the Maroons were unable to score and lost 1–0. Photography by Nicole Watkins, UChicago Athletics Watkins, Nicole by Photography

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CDO-17-1746_The Core Winter2018_TOC_v3.indd 1 1/18/18 1:00 PM From the editor ANSWERS

Sasha Trubetskoy, Class of INSIDE 2019, whose maps are featured on page 16, occasionally answers questions on Quora, a crowdsourced Q&A site.

SHORT For example: Q. If the world federates into one nation, where would the UChicago creatures: Therapy dogs · Student art: Seek and find, capital be? UChicago edition · Top 5: Firsts in women’s athletics · Student life: 2 A. New York. “Most likely there Campus North Residential Commons wins architecture awards ICYMI: would not be a single capital,” · Trubetskoy writes, but New York College Review review On the Dean’s List: What’s new in the College · would serve “as a figurehead for the ‘world government.’”

Q. What is the cheapest and most open-minded city in the MEDIUM United States? A. Louisville, Kentucky. (Runners- up, according to his scatterplot: Office Space: The Regenstein’s Ray Gadke, AM’66, explains his unusual San Antonio, Texas; Indianapolis, office decor · Film: Mattie Szydagis, AB’95, on her short horror films · 8 Indiana; Jacksonville, Florida; From the archives: #Fakenews and free speech—in 1967. An excerpt from Salt Lake City, Utah.) a talk by Wayne C. Booth, AM’47, PhD’50 Athletics: Women’s lacrosse · On his website, sashat.me, becomes a varsity sport he compiles these on the page “answers,” along with other non- Quora short pieces. “Something I learned recently,” Trubetskoy writes, “the longest unit of time LONG in ancient Rome was called the saeculum.” It’s the period of time from the moment something MAPS AND LEGENDS 16 happened—the founding of Rome, How Sasha Trubetskoy, Class of 2019, became an “internet- for example—until everyone alive at the first moment is dead. famous cartographer.” “Legend has it that every civilization is given a certain number of saecula by the gods,” Trubetskoy writes. “The Romans lasted for 24 saecula, the ancient Egyptians held on RENAISSANCE WOMAN 24 for 30.” He tracked down two Historian Ada Palmer researches the history of ideas, writes science Americans whose combined fiction, and has helped elect a new pope (c. 1470) four times. lives span most of US history: Henry Boehm (1776–1875) and Lucy Terrell (1875–1993). “The American Empire is in its third saeculum,” he concludes, “but ET CETERA only the gods know how many we’ve been allotted.” —Carrie Golus, AB’91, AM’93 Recipe: How to make gnocchi in 1570 and in 2018 · Seen and heard: Abigail Shearrow, AB’16, quantum engineer Excerpts: From the 32 · The University does not discriminate on Daily Maroon, October 1, 1902 the basis of race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national or ethnic origin, age, status as an individual with a disability, protected veteran status, genetic information, or other protected classes under Front cover: Ada Palmer, associate professor of history, and Daniele Macuglia, AM’10, PhD’17 the law. For additional information, please Back cover: Copyright 2018, The Chicago Maroon. All rights reserved. Reprinted with permission. see equalopportunity.uchicago.edu.

THE CORE · Supplement to the Winter 2018 issue of the University of Chicago Magazine

EDITOR CONTRIBUTING WRITERS CONTRIBUTING EDITORS 773.702.2163 (phone) Carrie Golus, AB’91, AM’93 Jeanie Chung Amy Braverman Puma 773.702.0495 (fax) Benjamin Recchie, AB’03 Laura A. Demanski [email protected] ART DIRECTOR Maureen Searcy Mary Ruth Yoe mag.uchicago.edu/thecore Guido Mendez

COPY EDITOR DESIGNER The Core is published twice a year as a Rhonda L. Smith Michael Vendiola supplement to the University of Chicago Magazine by the University of Chicago. © 2018 University of Chicago.

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Photography by Anne Ryan 2 / The Core 1/18/18 1:01 PM UChicago creatures PET LOVE Meet Teddy the therapy dog.

“This is Teddy’s first time doing this work at a university,” says his owner and handler Cindy Gross. Teddy, a one-year-old goldendoodle, is by far the youngest and most outgoing of the five dogs at the quarterly Pet Love event, held at the McCormick Tribune Lounge in the Reynolds Club. All the dogs and their handlers work with the Rainbow Animal Assisted Therapy organization—the dogs wear vests indicating as much. Teddy has mostly visited hospitals and rehabilitation centers, where he meets people one on one. But he’s a natural at Pet Love, where students gather around each dog to pet, snuggle, or just watch tricks. He works the crowd, greeting each person in the circle. “Oh my gosh, he’s so soft!” says one student, tickling Teddy under the chin. Another commands, “Sit.” The student’s eyes light up when Teddy offers his paw as well. On a table, Student Health and Counseling Services has laid out pens, Play-Doh, stress balls, coloring sheets, and pamphlets on stress management. They go largely ignored. “People come mostly for the dogs,” says grad student Hannah Wishart, student coordinator of the event. Capacity is limited to 10 students per dog. There’s a line early on, but eventually everyone gets a turn. After spending a few minutes To get Teddy the goldendoodle (a cross with Teddy’s colleague Palin, an between a golden eight-year-old golden retriever, retriever and a poodle) two women stand up and brush to sit for photos, his long yellow hairs off their black owner frequently had to bribe him by holding pants. “It doesn’t matter,” one a French fry just above says. “I’m so happy.” the camera. —Jeanie Chung

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CDO-17-1746_The Core Winter2018_Short_v3.indd 3 1/18/18 1:01 PM Student art SEEK AND FIND: UCHICAGO EDITION

Last summer Jacob Goodman, Class of 2019, created a mural in the College’s admissions office. Among the Chicago iconography Goodman included:

Carl Sagan, AB’54, SB’55, SM’56, PhD’60. “We don't have a lot of famous- face-recognizable alumni,” says Goodman. “It helps to have that to latch onto.”

His textbooks for Soc. “The best class I've taken by far.”

Broomball. “I was in Halperin House in South. We were terrible.”

Latke-Hamantash Debate. “I'm not that observant of a Jewish person, but that's the thing I go to religiously.”

Item #191. You’ve braved the South Pole and flown to the highest heights. Now how low can you sink? Your team’s logo photographed as many meters below sea level as possible. (5 points per 100 meters, maximum of 549 points conceivably available to be awarded by the boundaries of modern science)

Polar bear from Kuvia. “I’ve never done Kuvia. I can’t. I can’t.”

Dean Boyer. “He’s like the mascot-god of UChicago, always watching you from his bicycle.”

CTA “L” map. “I forgot the Pink Line. That’s

something that bugs me.” Michael Vendiola by Photography

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CDO-17-1746_The Core Winter2018_Short_v3.indd 4 1/18/18 1:38 PM Top FIRSTS IN WOMEN’S ATHLETICS

Gertrude Dudley UChicago’s first women’s athletics director, from 1898 to 1935. Her athletics program for women was the first of its kind at a major American university. Marie Ortmayer, PhB 1906, MD 1917 First president of the University’s Women’s Athletic Association. Mary Jean Mulvaney Director of women’s athletics beginning in 1966; under Mulvaney UChicago women entered intercollegiate competition for the first time. Also one of the first women on the National Collegiate Athletic Association Council and, in 1976, to chair a coed athletics department, retiring in 1990. Patricia Kirby Women’s basketball coach in 1974, when her team was the first women’s team in the country to fly to an away game (at MIT). Naomy Grand’Pierre, Class of 2019 The first Olympic swimmer to compete for Haiti. She swam the 50-meter freestyle in the 2016 summer games.

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CDO-17-1746_The Core Winter2018_Short_v3.indd 5 1/18/18 1:01 PM Student life DECORATED DORM

A 90th Nobel Prize—to behavioral economist Richard experiences that enhance campus and academic life Eight hundred Thaler—wasn’t the only reason UChicago was for today’s undergraduates.” undergrads live in Campus North, standing a little taller last October. Translation: the three-story house lounges are built on the site That same month, Campus North Residential pretty cool, the 24-hour study spaces on the top floor where the flashbulb- Commons, designed by Studio Gang Architects, offer panoramic views of the city (for whenever your like Pierce Tower received an American Architecture Prize in the eyes and brain need a rest from Ovid or Durkheim), once stood. educational buildings category. Despite the name, the and you can get warm cookies delivered until 3 a.m. prize’s judges scan the globe. Other 2017 educational In November the dorm continued its overachieving honorees included buildings in China, Ireland, Japan, ways, hauling in three awards from the Design-Build and the Netherlands. Institute of America, including the first-ever Chairman's In awardese, Campus North got the nod Award for Community Impact and Social Responsibility.

Photography by by Steve Hall/Hedrich Blessing Steve by by Photography for (among other qualities) “social spaces and —Sean Carr, AB’90

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Photo courtesy Misha Collins ICYMI COLLEGE REVIEW COLLEGE REVIEW You’re well known for your Where didyou livewhenyou The College Review, aquarterly email Judson team. Mygirlfriendat the AB’97 (sociology), aka MishaCollins, aka There was some Three years, Ibelieve. By my senioryear, I childish pursuits. Castiel onthecultTVshow Supernatural. Vantoch [AB’97 (sociology)]), was ona newsletter from theeditors of theCore day. Igained30poundsinninemonths. different team—Breckenridge, Ibelieve. She was launchedlast spring.The first issue year's Scav (’93, asIrecall) was three Some excerpts: a Best Western hotel that was goingoutof and (b) Ihave afirm a competing team and asked ifshecould borrow academics to bebothered withsuch Woodlawn withfive roommates. Oneof my we hadfive orsixleft over so we stacked way. (a)You’re on was too single-mindedlyfocused onmy was hard-core. Oneoftheitems inthat She said,“Ifound afarm charity scavengerhunt. Didyou were intheCollege? mattress wrestling matches. roommates hadarelative whohad aleadon plan, andIate like afamine was coming every me to fall asleep, rule.” She cuddled no-sheep-in-my-car my car. Isaid,“What for?” included aninterview withDmitriKrushnic, up andwaited for us borrow three lambs do Scav allfour years? for Scav.” Isaid,“No them upinourlivingroom andhadwobbly then took thekeys. Burton-Judson. Iremember having themeal time (wife now), Vicki Vantoch (still Vicki live sheep. Vicki cameover to B-J in Wisconsin that willlet business. After eachpersongotamattress, karmic retribution, The first year was witha Burton- I moved from B-Jto 5401 South

, -association/college-review. crushing disappointment. alumniandfriends.uchicago.edu/alumni and whenVicki’s team won, they gave methe sheep hadeaten theupholstery inmy car. winning potbecausethey felt badthat the Look for thespringissue of theCollege Review interview andother backissues of theCollege in your in-box thisMarch. ReadthefullCollins though: athird team stole thesheepfrom her MiG fighter jetand failing. That was a Review I remember tryingto acquire aRussian ontheAlumniAssociation’s website,

On the Dean’s the On List WHAT’S WHAT’S African Civ COLLEGE African Civilizations Alabama, to visitcivil or Wolof, andwillbe classes, aswell asFrench offered at theUniversity’s chairman oftheRedbud established anew crowdfunding campaign (1897–1970), cofounder This winter quarter the The College has Core curriculum Civil rightscareer and legendaryteacher in and friends. a career inthefield. The Center inParis. Students College students will Glenn Swogger Jr., AB’57, Civilization sequence. The Christian W. Mackauer NEW IN THE THE IN NEW will take three African Civ ship honors first time;previously it was travel to Birmingham, the History ofWestern than 75 alumni,parents, that drew giftsfrom more trek issupported by a program willbeheldin professor ofanthropology, professorship issupported professorship honoring rights organizations and Dakar, Senegal,for the Foundation. JohnD. Kelly, Montgomery, andSelma, During springbreak, 20 Mackauer Professor. trek to Alabama learn how they canlaunch inaugural Christian W. housed withhost families. has beennamedthe by a$3.5milliongiftfrom New professor- in Senegal Christian W. Mackauer Winter 2018 / 7 Winter

1/18/18 1:38 PM

UChicago Photographic Archive Office space SAINTS PRESERVE US! The Regenstein’s Ray Gadke, AM’66, explains his unusual office decor.

Even if you don’t recognize the name Ray On the extremes: Gadke, AM’66, alumni of the past few decades will surely recognize his mustachioed, aloha- His oldest and largest statues are a seven-foot- shirt-clad figure on sight in the Regenstein high German-made pair from the 1850s, depicting Library. Students and faculty who venture to Saints Peter and Augustine. The newest is one of Gadke’s space on the third floor in search of St. Thérèse of Lisieux, commissioned by a Catholic the microforms department are treated to a church that ended up not buying it. puzzling glimpse through the windows of his office: wood and plaster statues of saints and On ethnic identity: other religious figures. “You get to the point where by going into a church On the beginnings: you can kind of tell what the ethnic background is,” Gadke explains. Scandinavian churches would Gadke came to the University in 1965 as a order statues of Christ and the saints with fair graduate student in history. His studies on hair and blue eyes; French and Italian churches immigrant religious communities led him to visit depicted saints with olive skin and brown eyes. Catholic and Lutheran churches in the city. One Irish churches had very plain, understated statues, day in the early 1980s, a Catholic priest of his whereas in Latin America, statues would display acquaintance (he no longer remembers who) great emotion. There, he says, “Mary is shown as whose church was closing called to ask, “Do you the mother of sorrows, with tears streaming down know anyone that would be interested in statues her face. Christ is drenched in blood. … The faces from my church?” Gadke said, “Hey, that’s an are stretched in agony.” idea.” Today his collection numbers roughly 40 statues, with 10 on display in Regenstein. On the future of his collection:

On mass production: “The time is going to come when I retire and I don’t have room for all of these at home, and so they’ll Statue makers would commonly use a generic be distributed,” Gadke says. (He’s already donated torso, then give it attributes that would several to local Catholic churches and schools.) identify it as a particular figure. Gadke has “In my will, I’ve written that whatever I have left one in his office that depicts a generic bishop, will go back to the Archdiocese of Chicago, and but “the hands are removable,” he points they can distribute them as they see fit.” out. Just swap out a hand for one carrying a shamrock, paint the cloak green, and voila— On his corner of the Reg: St. Patrick. “Because it’s out of the way, a lot of Muslim On ecumenicalism: students come and pray in that back corner of the microfilm room,” near his office. “I consider Manufacturers had no problem selling to any this kind of the spiritual part of the library.” church that wanted their wares. “I’ve been in Lutheran churches in Wisconsin where Christ On whether there are many collectors is in the middle and they have Peter and Paul with the same interest: on either side, and those are identical to the statues of Peter and Paul that you’d find in a “No.”

Catholic church.” —Benjamin Recchie, AB’03 Joe Sterbenc by Photography

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CDO-17-1746_The Core Winter2018_Medium_v4.indd 8 1/18/18 1:01 PM “I consider this kind of the spiritual part of the library.” —Ray Gadke, AM’66

During his decades in the Reg, Gadke has supervised dozens of student workers, nicknamed “Ray’s Rangers.” They include Byron Trott, AB’81, MBA’82, who established the Metcalf Internship Program.

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CDO-17-1746_The Core Winter2018_Medium_v4.indd 9 1/18/18 1:01 PM Film SCARY STORIES TO WATCH IN THE DARK Matilda “Mattie” Szydagis, AB’95, followed anthropology into the realm of fear and film.

In addition to acting in movies, Where on the UChicago campus its overall Shining-esque feel, television shows, and theater, Chicago would you set a horror film? I always felt the vibe there was native Matilda “Mattie” Szydagis, tinged with ghosts. AB’95, writes and produces short I was talking with my cousin Elena horror films. The first two of a trilogy Tuskenis [AB’94] and my sister Kathy How did you get interested in in progress—one of which she directed Szydagis Müller [AB’86, PhD’95] who making horror films? and one in which she stars—have is a script consultant, and they joked been featured in recent film festivals, that my third film should be called: I grew up on the hysterical Son of winning awards such as best horror “The U of C: Where Fun Came to Svengooli, watching Svengooli [Rich short, audience choice, and best actor. Die … or Did It!?” The premise would Koz] host Abbott and Costello Meet The Hoosac (2016) is a ghost story be that Fun is found in the second the Mummy [1955] as well as Bela inspired by an 1867 tunnel explosion sub-basement of the Reg, but it’s Lugosi’s Dracula [1931], Nosferatu in Massachusetts. The Ruins (2017) radioactive and out for blood. The last [1922], Frankenstein [1931], Godzilla focuses on a New York City psychiatrist line of the film would be, “Hutchins [1954], It Came from Outer Space struggling with post-traumatic stress was right. Fun can kill you!” [1953]—a variety of classic horror disorder who turns to nature for I was lucky enough to live in the and science fiction films. In grammar healing but finds horror instead. Shoreland all four years, and I never school, I was an avid reader of the —Maureen Searcy had a doubt that place was haunted. Dark Forces and Twilight: Where With its dilapidated, closed-off main Darkness Begins series, and as I got Interview has been edited and adapted. ballroom echoing of past trysts and older, John Saul and Stephen King.

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CDO-17-1746_The Core Winter2018_Medium_v4.indd 10 1/18/18 1:01 PM CDO-17-1746_The Core Winter2018_Medium_v4.indd 11 The Hoosac,whichismore ofanold- everyone watch course The X-Files—and horror films the Darkside was afavorite—and of What isyour favorite horror What subgenre isThe Ruins? shout-outs inourfirst horror short, welcome. Shining There of lot a are Some ofthoseepisodesstill haunt psychological thriller, my favorite me today. The TVshow Tales from from the’70s and’80s. fashioned ghost story. I was anOaide, every year Ihad I would say The Ruinsisa I loved watching The Twilight Zone. movie inthat subgenre? being The Shining[1980].When The Shoreland Hotel, are notmentioned. and becamearesidence where studios start at which openedin1926 $1,270 permonth.If there are ghosts, they luxury rental building hall in1973, isnow a The Shiningasa

You were supposedto carrythedead Wedding of theDead:Ritual,Poetics, and Popular Culture inTransylvania going to comic cons andsci-fi fests. dead. OneofthebooksIread in one whowrote themovie. out headfirst, theirspirit would stay out ofthehousefeet first. Ifcarried When herfilmsscreen there, guys What’s beenyour experience as are shocked to findoutsheisthe and honorto attend the Lady about theirexperiences, andsci-fi ages. They offered aseminar where an anthropology class was The and spiritualityconnected to the and ageneral senseofdread school withaconcentration in where stories, includingDracula; witches, writer JuliaCamara hit thenailon with interesting, intelligent, funny, a woman inthisfield? anthropology related? five women screenwriters spoke friendly, andsupportive women ofall the headwhenshetold usabout to tell you how wonderful itfelt to the most famous beingBaba Jaga; I recently hadthepleasure I was thinkingofgoingto grad Halloween block.Ican’teven begin Filmmakers Fest inBeverly Hills, Eastern European folklore. It’s [University ofCalifornia Press, 1988]. in thehouseandhauntitforever. immersed inavariety of vampire be surrounded by andnetworking How isyour degree in The Ruinsscreened intheir “I was luckyenough to —Mattie Szydagis, AB’95 place was haunted.” never hadadoubt that live intheShoreland all four years, andI

Glitch, andWolf Creek. Iamalso can alsofindheronAmazon’s new and info onSzydagis’s films,visit going to includeThe Handmaid’s Tale don’t tend to useinourdailylives. example ofthis,aswell asItFollows show The Marvelous Mrs.Maisel. Our goalisto make “intelligent Revenants, The Fall, Stranger Things, What abouthorror speaksto you? For upcoming screening dates and hasustapinto ourimaginations. as aprecursor—which thrillsmeto facebook.com/yourteamfilms. You no end.GetOut[2017] isaperfect under dystopian horror. It awakens that partofthebrain we [2014] andTVshows The OA, Les happening—with The X-Files, Ithink, horror,” andthat trend seemsto be Mattie Szydagis, AB’95 Horror titillates andprovokes Winter 2018 Winter 1/18/18 1:01 PM / 11

UChicago Photographic Archive (far left); photo courtesy Mattie Szydagis From the archives #FAKENEWS AND FREE SPEECH— IN 1967

Excerpted from “‘Now Don’t Try to Reason with Me’: Rhetoric Today, Left, Right, and Center,” originally published in the University of Chicago Magazine, November and December, 1967. Wayne C. Booth, AM’47, Booth’s books include PhD’50 (1921–2005), then The Rhetoric of Fiction dean of the College and the (1961), Now Don’t Try to Reason with Me: George M. Pullman Professor Essays and Ironies from of English, gave this talk a Secular Age (1970), and For the Love of to students as part of a It: Amateuring and Its 1966–67 series sponsored Rivals (1999). by Student Government.

When I first began teaching English, low that most men no longer try to turn news into fiction, giving each I saw myself taking up the weapons provide good reasons for what they story its own literary form, with a of reason against a world committed believe. The very notion that such beginning, a middle, and an end, to emotionalism, illogical appeals, forms of proof are desirable, or even regardless of whether the story thus and rhetorical trickery—a world full of obtainable, is under scathing attack. invented matches the original event. vicious advertisers and propagandists “The way to tell a successful lie is to determined to corrupt the young Everyone knows that journalism has include enough truth in it to make minds I was determined to save. been transformed in recent years, it believable—and Time is the most Now, as a professor of rhetoric and especially in the news magazines, successful liar of our time.” dean of a liberal arts college, I may right and left, from reportage into seem still to present myself in the new forms of paralogical rhetoric: Another good instance of this same same melodramatic light: the valiant political argument disguised as kind of transformation of journalism champion of rationality against the dramatic reporting. It would be fun into degraded rhetoric is the forces of darkness. to spend the rest of my hour simply magazine Fact, a collection of shrill Let me at least begin bravely, with describing the new rhetorical devices, exposés, most of them with a touch a defense of reason that implies more and the new twists on old devices, of scandal and few of them providing clarity than I feel about how men that Time magazine exhibits from enough solid evidence or argument. ought to proceed when they set out week to week, all in the name of “A Psychoanalytical Study of to change each other’s minds. The news. Mr. Ralph Ingersoll, former Baseball,” “A Study of Wife-Swapping defense begins with the claim that publisher of the magazine, has in California,” an argument that we are in a time of intellectual crisis, a described the key to the magazine’s Goldwater1 has been declared insane

time when confidence in reason is so success as the discovery of how to by thousands of psychiatrists (yet if of Chicago LIbrary University Archive, UChicago Photographic

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CDO-17-1746_The Core Winter2018_Medium_v4.indd 12 1/18/18 1:01 PM “We can quote Pascal, who said that the heart can be turned on by reasons that reason cannot dig—or words to that effect.”

you look closely at the evidence here remind us that much that we think of rhetoric of a student. It is one mark it turns out to mean far less than the as distinctively human—love, poetry, of an honest man, as it should be the headlines claimed)—why, it’s as hard martyrdom—can present itself in mark of an educated man, that he to read Fact as it is to read Time. forms that seem to violate reason— tries not to use a double standard in or perhaps to transcend it. We can judging his friends and his enemies. What I think I have been revealing here quote Pascal, who said that the heart Self-righteous bullying fanatics are are a few examples of a world in which can be turned on by reasons that self-righteous bullying fanatics, and men show little esteem for logic, little reason cannot dig—or words to that they are as much a threat to the respect for facts, no faith in anyone’s effect. Tertullian is supposed to have central values we defend when they ability to use thought or discourse said that he embraced his religious bully on our side as when they bully to arrive at improved judgments, belief just because it was absurd. The on our enemy’s. commitments, and first principles. young student who is impatient with My point is not to indict either the cautious weighings and probings Our hold on reason is precarious; the left or the right, but to plead and refusals of commitment that go our institutions for giving it a chance for the very fragile twin values of on within every university is plainly are highly fragile. It would not really honest inquiry and honest rhetoric. in one great tradition of mistrust of be surprising if 50 years from now These values are under steady attack, reason that all of us must feel at one no one in America will even know both in theory and in practice, by time or another. what I’m talking about tonight— men of both left and right—some of such a transformation would not be them presumably sincere, some of Plato said that the worst fate that greater than many that history has them no doubt knaves. can befall a man is to become a known. Men in that time would know Wherever men find themselves misologist, a hater of reason; for something that most of you do not too impatient to think together about him it was clear that since man is know—what it feels like never to be their problems, wherever immediate essentially reasonable, when he able to follow a thought where it action based on unity becomes more ceases to reason he ceases to be might lead, openly, publicly. important than men’s determination a man. I happen to believe this Whether we move toward that to achieve genuine unity by unfashionable doctrine. genuine garrison state, that really discovering the truth together, my I also believe that when any total institutionalization of the mind, twin values disappear—often never society loses its capacity to debate will depend in part, in very small but to reappear. They always disappear its ends and means rationally, it very real part, on how many of us here in a major war. They disappear in ceases to be a society and becomes can manage—not in sermons like this, any society whenever enough men instead a mob, or pack, or a herd which are easy superficial substitutes decide that political victory is worth of creatures rather less noble than for the day by day thinking that whatever it costs. most animals. In America in recent counts, but in our life as teachers and I would not want to suggest that years we have seen far too many of students—to reason together about my twin values are the supreme such herds—self-righteous fanatics what we care for most. values for mankind, or that I would who know without listening that the never be willing to risk them for speaker is wrong. There are many of other values. Though it is fairly our universities, so-called, where Karl 1 easy to show historically that most Marx, say, or Miss Aptheker2 would Presidential candidate Barry Goldwater sued Fact magazine over its publication of a 1964 revolutionary efforts work more be booed from the platform, even survey of psychiatrists in which half claimed he harm than good, I can think of if the administration were to allow was mentally unfit to be president. Afterward situations when I would want to them to speak. the American Psychiatric Association issued stop talking and start overthrowing: And on the other hand there have the so-called Goldwater rule, forbidding psychiatrists from commenting on people they Nazi Germany in 1940, say, or been some disturbing instances lately have not examined. Boston in 1775. of left-wing students in first-class Man was traditionally known universities booing a speaker into 2 Bettina Aptheker (b. 1944), political as the rational animal; in that view silence. Whatever defenses may be activist, radical feminist, then member of the Communist Party USA; now a reason was of man’s very essence. offered for such rhetoric—the rhetoric distinguished professor at the University of But it takes no great learning to of shouting a man down—it is not the California, Santa Cruz.

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CDO-17-1746_The Core Winter2018_Medium_v4.indd 13 1/18/18 1:01 PM Athletics STICK IT TO THEM

After 20 years as a club, women’s lacrosse is finally a varsity sport, and team members (left to right) Veronica Myers, Katie Mott, Maya DeJonge, and Clare Brown are celebrating. The lacrosse team is the first addition to UChicago’s varsity sports program since women’s soccer in 1986. The team will play a heavier club schedule this spring to prepare for a full varsity schedule in 2019. Second-years DeJonge and Myers and first-year Brown—who has played for England’s youth national teams—will help form the core of the varsity program. Mott graduates this spring. While all four played in high school, some UChicago players didn’t pick up the game until arriving on campus. Coach Kate Robinson welcomes more of them as she builds for the future. Speed and athleticism are more important to her than experience. “We need people who can take it from one end of the field to the other as fast as possible,” she says. “Great stick work and stick skills are a plus, but they can pick that up later.” Robinson’s approach has worked before. She came to Myers (19) and Brown Whitman College (Walla Walla, (3) are defenders, Mott Washington) in 2014 under (23) is a midfielder, and DeJonge (7) is an similar circumstances: as the attacker (similar to a first coach of its women’s forward). Coach Robinson lacrosse team after it had says her current team has been a club. At Whitman, she been a big help recruiting next year’s players. A fall was named conference coach clinic on campus drew 55 of the year in 2016 and 2017. high school students from —Jeanie Chung across the country.

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Photography by Anne Ryan CDO-17-1746_The Core Winter2018_Long_v6.indd 16

Photography by Jean Lachat 16 / The Core Trubetskoy outside the W 87° 36'05.9"). Sciences (N41° 47'25", Henry HindsLaboratory for Geophysical 1/18/18 1:01 PM MAPS AND LEGENDS

How Sasha Trubetskoy tried to break the internet with maps.

On his website, Sasha Trubetskoy, Class of 2019 (statistics), describes himself as an “internet- famous cartographer.” In his spare time he makes maps and posts them on Reddit. Some end up being seen by millions of people.

As told to Carrie Golus, AB’91, AM’93

’ve always been super into atlases, maps, things like that. Other kids would read Harry Potter; I would read the atlas. In high school I’d go on Wikipedia, which has plenty of lists. I would digest those lists and put them on a map— countries by gross domestic product, something like that. IWhen I was a high school junior in January 2014, we had a snow day. In Northern Virginia it takes about three inches of snow. Miami, they get a dusting and they close school. What about the rest of the country? There was no data, so I posted a survey on Reddit. Maybe a couple hundred people filled it out. I plotted those points on a map and eyeballed it, super unscientifically. Since Reddit was how I got my survey information, I was like, thanks, here’s what the map looks like. (continued on page 20)

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Some of Trubetskoy’s stations have Anglo-Saxon names. These represent areas where Roman remains have been found, but the Latin names have been lost 1/25/18 3:40 PM to history. CDO-17-1746_The Core Winter2018_Long_v6.indd 20 of different ways, which Ithink has helped my at all. Ithink they can beinterpreted inalot urban-rural divide. online made alotofcomments about the This was before Trump—it was 2014.People disproportionate looking, the most shocking? it intotwo halves that would bethe most States GDP. Iwas wondering, how can Isplit Best Infographics 2015. blowing, and put itinabookcalled America’s publisher. They paid me $300,which was mind- publication rights.Irealized this was abook super scary and official sounding, asking for little map. it—wow. The whole thing is dedicated tomy is going tobesome political article. Iclickon to Atlantic.com. I’mthinking, Oh great, this best friend is like, dude. He sends me alink 20 / The Core I’m not trying tobepolitical withmy maps My next bigmap was the one onthe United I gotanemail atone pointthat was Then Iwent tosleep. Iwake up, and my HOW MUCHSNOW DOESITUSUALLY TAKE TO CANCEL SCHOOLS? sort. Ican see why peoplelike that. It’s cute, it’s maps is afictional subway network of some That worked too. Same idea, every Australian stateproposal. me onHuffington Post Canada. was going tobepart ofCanada. That map got succeeded. Not many peopleknow Jamaica if every Canadian province proposal had So Imade amap ofevery Canadian province, will upvote out ofsolidarity. You can game that. sees something that mentions Canada, they working yet, they’re browsing the internet. not justawake but atwork. They are not fully that hitsacritical amount ofpeoplewho are If you postataround 8or9a.m.Eastern time, premier place for interesting maps onReddit. For alotofpeople, it’s apolitical message. appeal. Everyone takes away their own message. A very popular recurring theme inviral I was like, Canada worked, let’s tryAustralia. I learned from Reddit that ifaCanadian I postonasubreddit called Map Porn, the (below), made (opposite, bottom) The snow map The Vancouver film Trubetskoy’s first The Australia map 2017. “Vancouver 2014. Australia has six states. was alsomadein top) was madein map (opposite, map to goviral. notes onhiswebsite. movies,” Trubetskoy never plays itselfin in 2014, was 1/18/18 1:01 PM

All maps courtesy Sasha Trubetskoy FILMED IN VANCOUVER BUT SET IN …

THE 24 STATES OF AUSTRALIA if all statehood proposals had succeeded

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CDO-17-1746_The Core Winter2018_Long_v6.indd 21 1/18/18 1:01 PM CDO-17-1746_The Core Winter2018_Long_v6.indd 22 “In Europe, red is explains onhis of-center orpopulist coalitions, whileblue of leftist orsocialist website. Hemade this mapin2015. typically thecolor parties,” Trubetskoy is typicallyfor right- by official colorofdominantpartyor coalition 22 / The Core VOTING DIVISIONSINEUROPE 1/18/18 1:01 PM

Photos courtesy Simon and Virginia Aronson “I’m not trying to be political with my maps at all. I think they can be interpreted in a lot of different ways, which I think has helped my appeal.” —Sasha Trubetskoy, Class of 2019

UNITED STATES ECONOMIC ACTIVITY, SPLIT IN HALF

The orange areas bright colors, everything’s nice and organized, The first people who came to me were a of this map, made it’s fun to look at. Spanish newspaper. The Roman legacy is huge in 2014, represent Somehow I stumbled upon the idea in Spain. Then some Italian writers, British, the 23 largest metropolitan areas of representing the ancient Roman road recently some Japanese website. Mental Floss, by GDP. network. I tried to make it look like a modern Citylab, the Atlantic, Design Boom. publication that the actual Roman Empire I put up a link for people to download would have, like little leaflets at the train it and print it into a poster. I think around station. The map is in Latin. I don’t know Latin, 800 or so people did. The Paypal link said but I have a knack for picking up little bits and $9 by default. It came to around seven, eight pieces, maybe born out of necessity from my thousand dollars. It’s been mind-blowing. childhood. My parents come from Moscow, and And a lot of people sent more than $9. One at home we only spoke Russian. My grandma guy from Germany sent 50 euros. speaks French. A handful of people tried to trick me. You Latin has six cases, Russian has six cases, can change the currency on Paypal, so they and they’re essentially the same. I had an would send me like, nine yen. The best was intuition, like, how would I say this in Russian? nine Philippine pesos, which literally didn’t Then replace the words with Latin. It turns out register as a single cent. So I had to decline that’s a fantastic way of doing it. that payment. ❁

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CDO-17-1746_The Core Winter2018_Long_v6.indd 24 1/18/18 1:02 PM RENAISSANCE WOMAN Historian Ada Palmer researches the history of ideas, writes science fiction, and has helped elect a new pope (c. 1470) four times.

By Carrie Golus, AB’91, AM’93

t’s only the second day of Ada Palmer’s the worst part, “which is me censoring it,” she history course, Censorship from the points out. Inquisition to the Present. Already the (The book demonstrates how censorship’s class is deep into the vexed topic of battleground is often at the margins, she “icky speech.” explains later: “Few people would defend ITake Suehiro Maruo’s Ultra-Gash Inferno nauseating pornography, yet the book contains (Creation Books, 2001), from the “erotic a protest about the postwar occupation of grotesque” (“ero guro”) genre of Japanese Japan—the kind of political speech that can be comics. The first time she read it, Palmer says, the most important to defend.”) she was so disgusted she threw up. The next Palmer has long flowing hair; she’s day, just remembering the experience, she wearing a long flowing blue cardigan, flared threw up again. jeans with embroidered stripes down the Palmer passes the book—held shut by sides, and chunky boots. The effect is not flimsy, loose rubber bands—around the class. so much professorial as otherworldly, like a “If you want to take the rubber bands off, you guide you might seek out on a difficult and can,” she says, “but I don’t recommend it.” For frightening quest. In contrast, her coteacher anyone brave enough to look, she’s included Stuart McManus, a postdoctoral fellow at the

Illustration by Zé Otavio Zé by Illustration an additional safeguard: a sticky note over Stevanovich Institute on the Formation of

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CDO-17-1746_The Core Winter2018_Long_v6.indd 25 1/18/18 3:23 PM Knowledge, looks banker conservative in a blue-and- f you were told that reading this book could send you white pinstripe shirt, gray slacks, and black wingtips. to Hell, would you keep reading?” The censorship class—30 students, a mix of grads I That’s the first sentence ofReading Lucretius in and undergrads—meets in an enormous classroom at the Renaissance. An award-winning novelist as well as the south end of Special Collections. Today’s assigned a historian, Palmer has managed to make her academic readings include chapters from 1984 (Harcourt Brace, book into a page-turner. 1949), the American Library Association’s “Top 100 Lucretius’ poem De rerum natura (On the Nature Banned/Challenged Books: 2000–2009,” and a blog post of Things), rediscovered in 1417, lays out the ideas of by writer Neil Gaiman that sets the tone: “Why Defend the Greek philosopher Epicurus, set in verse to make Freedom of Icky Speech?” them more appealing. From the perspective of the Palmer’s syllabus requires no papers. Instead, the Catholic Church, it promotes extremely dangerous students will create an exhibit, The History of Censorship, ideas. There’s no divine plan. The gods don’t hear to be held at Special Collections in September. Extra human prayer; they never intervene in our world. credit writing exercises include what she calls “Half and Perhaps most devastating, the soul is mortal and there Half Again”: rewrite a paper from another class, making is no afterlife. exactly the same arguments, in half as many words. Then And yet Lucretius was read. By 1600, 30 print editions cut it down by half again. of De rerum natura had been produced; more than As Ultra-Gash Inferno makes its way around the 30,000 people bought it. How did a book with such outré class (most students do not open it), Palmer places ideas achieve such wide circulation? And what did its Frederic Wertham’s Seduction of the Innocent (Rinehart, readers think? 1954) on the overhead projector. A few students laugh. To find out, Palmer painstakingly analyzed readers’ The book famously blamed violent comic books for comments and other markings in 52 handwritten juvenile delinquency. manuscripts and 172 print copies. She traveled to Can fiction inspire readers to emulate poor examples? libraries in Berlin, London, Milan, Paris, and Vatican City, One student argues that it can. Suicide in artwork can among others. Where she looked at the same book. Over trigger imitation, she says: “That’s a case where I’m very and over and over again. much in favor of censorship.” In the Netflix series13 As various commentators have pointed out over the Reasons Why, for example, the protagonist kills herself in centuries, it’s rather dry reading. “One of the things the final episode. “It’s very visual and very direct.” I rarely confess,” says Palmer, “is that despite having The discussion bounces across centuries—from the devoted years of my life to it, I really don’t like reading Spanish Inquisition to the Parents Music Resource Center, De rerum natura as much as reading what people said whose campaign in the 1980s and ’90s led to parental about it.” advisory labels on albums—and back to Seduction of the Based on the marginalia written during the 1400s Innocent. The book claimed to offer proof that comics and 1500s, Lucretius’s earliest readers cared most about cause violence, but “Wertham manipulated, exaggerated, Greek and Latin vocabulary, the poetry—especially and sometimes completely fabricated his very scientific- lines that were similar to other classical authors—and seeming data,” Palmer says. Its publication inspired book mentions of famous people or places. burnings across the country. Machiavelli’s copy (written in his own hand) was a “I don’t think it makes sense as an argument stark exception: his notes are clustered in the passages against censorship to say art has no effect,” a male on atomism. student points out. You have to have “respect for the Atomism explained how the world could function power of art.” without gods, laying the groundwork for atheism. It also A second male student counters that you can’t claim raised the possibility that nature could operate by its own art causes suicide: such thinking is “post hoc, ergo internal laws, an idea essential to modern science. propter hoc.” Only people who had already suicidal Most early readers breezed right past it. “The fact that thoughts would be affected. Machiavelli was exceptional for his day should surprise “You remind me of people who wanted to censor no one,” Palmer writes. Lucretius,” says Palmer. In her first book,Reading Palmer’s research belongs to a field called reception Lucretius in the Renaissance (Harvard University Press, studies, or, less commonly, transformation studies, a term 2014), she characterizes the ancient Roman poet’s ideas she prefers. “Reception implies that the object received as “proto-atheist.” is unchanged,” Palmer says, “as if the Iliad in 300 BC is But Renaissance censors were less worried about the same as the Iliad in 1200 AD and the Iliad in 1500 Lucretius than Luther, whose ideas might gain wider AD, and the same Iliad we pull off the shelf in Barnes & currency. “They thought atheism would only appeal to Noble. That just isn’t true. We find new pieces, we take people who were at risk of damnation already,” she says. pieces away, we translate, we reinterpret. And the context “It’s very parallel logic.” in which we place and use things changes.”

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Photography by Nathan Keay “If you were told would you keep —Ada Palmer, this book could this bookcould that reading reading?” send you tohell, Reading Lucretius in the Renaissance

contact lenses. complete withred cappella music.She style polyphonica about Viking myths, performs asLoki, projects includeaplay Palmer’s othercreativePalmer’s featuring Renaissance- Winter 2018 / 27 Winter 1/18/18 1:02 PM

Photo courtesy Ada Palmer n the wall of Palmer’s office in Stuart coorganized a Renaissance banquet (see The papal election Hall hangs her great-grandmother’s recipe on page 32). “It’s a form of immersive of 2016, held in O diploma. Ada Louise Wilcox, PhB 1913, recreation, after which you return refreshed to Rockefeller Chapel. studied education and went on to teach home other things that you’re doing.” economics at Northwestern. Palmer is named Her course on the Italian Renaissance, after her. Students who come to her office for example, includes a live-action role- hours, she says, are often gratified to learn playing game: a papal election circa 1490. “how early women attended this university She gives each student a packet about one of when they were excluded from so many.” 50 historical figures, along with each figure’s Palmer began her own career in academia background, political allies, marriage alliances, by quitting high school. At 16 she enrolled coat of arms. The students negotiate, make in Simon’s Rock College of Bard in Great alliances, trade money and titles, and compete Barrington, Massachusetts. Like the Hutchins to elect a pope, whose influence and military College of the 1940s and early 1950s, Simon’s strength determine the outcome of a war. Rock admits precocious 16-year-olds lacking If they had to memorize the material for a high school diplomas. She studied history at quiz, she says, they would struggle. But since Bryn Mawr and Harvard, earning a PhD in it’s for a game, they know it inside out within 2009, then taught at Texas A&M University. a few days. She’s run the game four times, and She’s been at UChicago since 2014. the outcome is different every single time. In addition to the censorship class, which A sampling of the kind of evaluations was new this fall, Palmer teaches Italian she receives: Renaissance, Renaissance Humanism, “Her lectures are like listening to someone Patronage and Culture in Renaissance Italy tell really good stories.” and Her Neighbors, and the Core course “I left the class feeling like I’d had a European Civilization I. This winter she’s religious experience.” teaching History of Skepticism. “She got rounds of applause after the first Palmer is known for teaching through and last days of class.” quirky yet studious play. “I play a lot,” “She’s literally the patron saint of the Italian says Palmer, who’s partial to board games Renaissance, Lorenzo de Medici reborn.”

and historical costumes; last spring she Palmer’s driving passion is to understand Palmer Ada courtesy Photo

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CDO-17-1746_The Core Winter2018_Long_v6.indd 28 1/18/18 1:02 PM how ideas change over time. After early Because of a system of flying cars, “you obsessions with World War I and the can go anywhere in two hours. The whole Enlightenment, she settled on the Italian world is commuting distance. Socially Renaissance, a period when “ideas about speaking, that collapses the world into the science, religion, and the world which had neighborhoods of a city.” With geographic developed in the Middle Ages suddenly met nations no longer important, children choose those of the ancient world,” she writes on her which nongeographic nation (called a “hive”) website. “All at once many beliefs, scientific to join once they come of age. systems, and perceived worlds clashed, mixed, Palmer came up with the idea while living and produced an unprecedented range of at an academic institute in Florence, Italy, new ideas.” together with researchers from all over the Palmer brings the same set of world. Many of them had children, who very preoccupations to her creative work, which quickly “created their own pidgin language she describes as “future historical fiction.” out of the 15 different languages they spoke.” She’s written three books in the Terra Ignota The children had connections to two, three, series: Too Like the Lightning (2016), Seven sometimes four countries. The notion of Surrenders (2017), and The Will to Battle (2017), citizenship to their country where they were all published by Tor Books. born seemed arbitrary: “Citizenship was The fact that she’s published three novels language, culture, connections, not geography.” in two years—while teaching, researching, and Contrary to the dystopian trend in recent working toward tenure—is deceptive, Palmer fantasy and science fiction, Palmer’s world says. She began writing the books in grad seems to be a utopia—but it’s underpinned school; it took years to find a publisher. by censorship. To prevent another Church In a talk at 57th Street Books last spring, War, all public talk of religion is banned. Palmer described the world she’s created. The books themselves begin with a page of The novels are set in the 25th century. In the censor’s permissions, warning the reader same way that people of the Renaissance that the book “discusses religious beliefs were fascinated by ancient Greece and Rome, of real and living persons and therefore is a the people of her imagined 25th century are particularly dangerous text that should be fascinated by the Enlightenment. approached carefully.”

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CDO-17-1746_The Core Winter2018_Long_v6.indd 29 1/18/18 1:02 PM or the October 24 class on continental vs. British ike her Terra Ignota characters, who are not censorship practices, Palmer has brought a copy allowed to discuss religion or gender, Palmer has F of the Catholic Church’s 1948 Index Librorum L kept certain aspects of her life quiet over the years. Prohibitorum (Index of prohibited books). In her previous teaching job, she told just one colleague The index was first published in 1559; the edition that she wrote fiction. Her colleague’s advice: don’t tell she’s displaying on the overhead projector was the last. anyone else, and publish under a pseudonym, or you “Who still uses this in 1948?” someone wants won’t be taken seriously in academia. to know. By the time Palmer was interviewing at UChicago, she “Pious people,” says Palmer. had a book deal. She had not used a pseudonym. So she After the Second Vatican Council, which brought asked Tor not to make an announcement until her job far-reaching reforms to the church in the 1960s, the index search was over. was no longer produced. Nonetheless, “the Vatican still The success of those books brought her to the World maintains a list of ‘discouraged’ films,” Palmer says. “The Science Fiction Convention in Helsinki last August. Avatar movie made it on.” Palmer was a finalist for the John W. Campbell Award for Today’s assigned readings include the pamphlet Best New Writer, while Too Like the Lightning was a finalist Areopagitica (1644), subtitled A Speech of Mr. John for the Hugo Award for Best Novel. Milton for the Liberty of Unlicenc’d Printing, to the When she won the Best New Writer Award, Palmer Parlament of England. wrote in a blog post, she “mounted the stage with difficulty, One student summarizes Milton’s argument: “If leaning heavily on my cane.” She hadn’t intended to, but you’re a good person, a bad book isn’t going to corrupt she gave a speech about invisible disability. you. If you’re a bad person, a good book isn’t going to “I have never discussed my invisible disability in do anything.” public before,” Palmer wrote. But sometimes, like the night “In the context of his most famous work, knowledge before the awards ceremony, “the pain sets in ferociously, of good and evil is inherent in humans,” another student too much to hide.” The cause of her chronic pain, Palmer adds. “The free exchange of ideas—good ideas and explained, is complicated: Crohn’s disease, polycystic ovary bad ideas in books—allows people to come to a greater syndrome, and other factors. understanding of good and evil.” In the same post Palmer, who was diagnosed during Palmer, who is prone to historical digressions, graduate school, explained why she self-censored for explains how itinerant pamphlet sellers—often on more than a decade. “Being public about disability foot—brought printed news and sermons to even the (especially for women) so often results in attacks from smallest hamlets. Her description is so vivid, it’s like the uglier sides of the internet, a dangerous extra stress she has traveled to Reformation England by TARDIS while I’m working hard to manage my symptoms,” she and observed such sellers personally. wrote. She also worried that it might affect her academic Books were sold as “naked pages,” she continues; you future. (Palmer was awarded tenure this past December.) had to take them to a bindery and choose the binding On her “pain days,” she can’t do anything except yourself. “Wealthy people have fancy covers. Poorer lie down. If she feels up to it, she watches Shakespeare people have simple parchment, enough to protect the DVDs. She estimates she lost 80 days to pain last pages,” she says. academic year. In her blog post Palmer lists all the “When you go into a rare books library, you can things she wanted to do, but couldn’t: promotion for her tell at a glance: there’s an aristocrat’s copy, there’s a second novel, a new CD with her folk band Sassafras, the scholar’s copy.” fourth Terra Ignota book, more academic publications, Did people who owned books read the entire thing? a more blogs. woman wants to know. Two years ago, she thought she might have to miss “Great question,” says Palmer. “No. Even as far back class to have surgery. For the first time, she told her as the 1560s, people were already complaining that students why. wealthy people fill their houses with books and never This led to a long class discussion about invisible read them.” disability, mental illness as an invisible disability, how Another woman has a related question: Did you have invisible disability is political. Afterward 12 different to own a book to read it? students came to her office hours to talk more and thank “Around universities there were book rental her for having the conversation. shops,” Palmer explains. “You were encouraged to The students’ “incredibly warm reaction” gave Palmer write notes in the margins because it increased the the strength to have similar conversations with her value for the next reader.” colleagues and department chairs. Since then, she’s told It also left a priceless written record for Palmer and her students about her disability during the first meeting other historians: an insight into what centuries-dead of every class. “It’s been a very powerful experience,” she readers were thinking about as they read. says, “beginning to talk about it openly.”

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Images courtesy Ada Palmer copies ofDererum of atoms. The sketches onthe natura, reproduced marginalia and possible shapes Examples of far leftpagedepict illustrations in in Palmer’s book. in Palmer’s O feel,” says Palmer. to power, the sketchier the same bookact can teacher orthe Board ofEducation. “The closer offensive ifit’s done by a parent rather than a that the same censorship act can feel less going todoit.” felt. “Iwas like”—she shrugs. “Iknew she was with enthusiasm. the Inquisition.) out text and missing pages, courtesy of astronomy treatise that also features blacked- book willbedisplayed next toaRenaissance ripped out intheir entirety. the tiny, uneven remnants ofpages that were over the offending lines. McManus picks at projector, have asloppy mixofwhite and black the sixthgrade.” out, half Sharpied the book,so Icould read itin ratted me out tomy mother. She half whited- Breaking Dawn,” Olivia explains. “But my sister mother. The class laughs uproariously. series, withthe sex scene redacted by her Dawn (Little, Brown, 2008) from the Twilight The discussion circles around the claim One ofthe men inthe class asks how Olivia “I’m glad itcan beput touse,” Olivia says. “It’s such aperfect example,” Palmer says (In the exhibit, Palmer explains later, the The pages, spread open on the overhead “I really loved Twilight and wanted toread censored text toshare. It’s Breaking an undergrad named Olivia has a n November 28,the final class, another profound part ofthis conversation.” ❁ “It challenges how we think about censorship. It’s complex tenderness and love?” she asks the class. Enlightenment” withhis own self-censorship. is the person who most slowed down the is done,” Palmer says. “Inasense Diderot yet. We have tobesilentuntilthe Encyclopedia much yet, don’t criticize the Church toomuch to self-censor: “Don’t criticize the king too intellectuals ofthe Enlightenment, asking them cases I’ve found in the historic record.” was going tohell. It’s one ofthe most touching she says. “He didn’t want her tobesad that he weeping. “His daughter was adevout Catholic,” after the death ofhis daughter. anonymously. His work was not published until published nothing about atheism—not even sophisticated atheist ofhis time.” Yet he pieces,” Palmer says. “The most philosophically “beautiful, subtle, intimate, magnificent case anew Dark Age should ever come. driven topreserve humanity’s achievements in was chief editorofthe Encyclopédie (1751–72), to talk about Diderot abit.” Denis Diderot, the notion ofparental love. “Inthat context Iwanted for your own good.” woman studentagrees. “That they’re doing it “How can we feel about that moment of Diderot also wrote letterstothe other Her voice catches unexpectedly; Palmer is Privately, he was anatheist who wrote Near the end ofthe class, Palmer returns tothe “There’s asense ofcare withaparent,” a Winter 2018 / 31 Winter 1/18/18 1:02 PM CDO-17-1746_The Core Winter2018_EtCetera_v3.indd 32 32 / The Core first translated into Englishin2008. additions asthetomato andthepotato. The bookwas cuisine, before itwas transformed by suchNew World of afork—collects 1,000 recipes from Renaissance Italian cookbook—which includestheearliest known illustration served aschefto two in1570, popes.Published Scappi’s del cucinare by Bartolomeo Scappi(1500–1577), who cuisine aswell aslive performances ofpolyphonicmusic. (see banquetfare), and listened to lectures onRenaissance The guests wore period costumes, feasted onperiodfood AM’10, PhD’17, andhistory associate professor Ada Palmer. for aRenaissance banquet,organized by DanieleMacuglia, and community members gathered at International House Last Junemore than130students, faculty, staff, alumni, How do you gnocchi make without potatoes? COOKING RENAISSANCE Recipe The banquetrecipes were adapted from Opera dell’arte —Carrie Golus,AB’91,AM’93

(crunchy cinnamoncake served withhoney) Sformatino croccante dicanella Porta finale: (apples, pears,grapes, figs,andcheeses) Frutta avolantà Frutta eformaggi: (gnocchi cooked inbutter sauce withfresh sage) Gnocchetti rivoli bianchi Vegetarian: cinnamon, andnutmeg) (chicken thighswith fennel, crushedalmonds,parsley, Coscette finocchiate Seconda portata: (onion soupwithparsley, cheese, andchard) Zuppaccia allapreboggion Prima portata: Bread, olives, cheese, nuts,andfigs Banquet fare 1/18/18 1:01 PM

Photography by Jason Smith “The University is incredibly strong in Renaissance studies,” says Palmer (center), with more than 39 faculty members in various departments and schools. She’s working with Timothy Harrison in the English department to develop a Renaissance studies program that will offer both undergraduate and graduate courses.

Gnocchi recipe, 1570 Gnocchi recipe, 2018

Several ways to make and cook macaroni for a day in Lent. 2 12 oz Directions packages Get a pound of fine flour and a moistened in hot water. potato gnocchi Cook gnocchi pound of grated bread that has Mix everything together and according to been put through a fine sieve, and serve it garnished with pepper 2 tbsp package directions. fresh sage leaves, chopped make up a dough with boiling and cinnamon. Melt butter in a water and olive oil mixed with a If, however, you want to skillet. Add garlic little saffron. On a table make the make macaroni spread out with 1 and sauté until soft clove garlic, minced dough so it is not too firm, but a rolling pin, make the dough and golden brown. well mixed together. When it is a little firmer and let the sheet Stir in the sage and warmed up make the gnocchi— of it sit on a table a short while. 1/4 c salt, then add cooked butter that is, macaroni—on the cheese Cut it with a pastry wheel into gnocchi. Toss gently grater and put them to cook in rectangular strips or some 1/4 c with the Parmesan lightly salted boiling water. When other way, however you like. cheese and the Parmesan cheese, grated they are done, take them out and Cook them in salted water and pepper. Sprinkle with put them into an earthenware or serve them like the ones above. 1/4 tsp additional Parmesan wooden vessel, putting on them Anyone who wants to can also salt to serve. a garlic sauce made with ground cover them with green sauce. walnuts, cloves of garlic, pepper, 1/4 tsp Adapted from and breadcrumb that has been From Opera dell’arte del cucinare fresh-ground black pepper allrecipes.com

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CDO-17-1746_The Core Winter2018_EtCetera_v3.indd 33 1/18/18 1:02 PM Seen and heard CLEAN HOUSE Abigail Shearrow, AB’16 (physics and mathematics), works as a quantum engineer in the lab of David Schuster, assistant professor of physics.

What is that outfit called? recognize them by their height, or you can walk up and awkwardly try to see their face I work in the Pritzker Nanofabrication Facility underneath their mask. It’s weird; it starts to for a physics group that is working toward feel like a normal work space. Someone will be making a quantum computer. I fabricate circuits like, “How was your weekend?” that are really tiny, on the scale of microns. Having a clean environment gives the circuits What’s up with the yellow light? you’re making a better chance of working. If you get dust on them, or fuzz, or little particles The clean room is divided into bays, and in some of dirt, it can contaminate your process. So we bays the lights are yellow. That’s because when wear these suits—we call them bunny suits—to we build our circuits, we start by evaporating keep anything that’s on us inside the suit and metal onto an entire wafer. To make the circuit not in the clean room. itself, we pattern the wafer and remove some of the metal. To do that, we coat the wafer with a Is it a pain to put on? And don’t you get hot? viscous liquid called resist, and then we bake it, and it forms a soft plastic. Then we pattern the There are two stages to getting gowned up. In resist using either lasers or an electron beam. the first stage, you have to put booties over The yellow light makes the resist last longer. your shoes and a hairnet on. You also put on a beard cover, which is like a hairnet for your face. Isn’t it difficult to work with small things when We use them because if you get spit on what you’re wearing gloves? you’re making—if you cough or something—that can ruin it. Yeah, the stuff in the circuits can be smaller Then you move into the next room, and you than the wavelength of light, which is trippy to have this white zip-up jumpsuit that you get think about. You do lose dexterity, but you get into. It’s really fibrous, like normal clothing but used to it. I haven’t dropped anything. I know papery, similar to the gowns you’d get in a people who have, though, and sometimes it’s doctor’s office. You have a hood that goes over surprisingly OK. I know someone who dropped the hairnet. You have a pair of boots that go his circuit facedown on the ground, and he up to your knees, and then you put gloves on cleaned it off, and it still worked. and tuck the ends of your suit into the gloves. Sometimes, depending on what you’re doing, Have you ever had to leave for something you have to wear two pairs of gloves. The while you were still gowned up? temperature and the humidity inside the clean room are monitored in order to keep all the Once I was in the middle of cleaning the processes the same, and it tends to run a little evaporator in our lab, which deposits metal onto cold, so no, you don’t feel hot. wafers. I didn’t have to be fully gowned up, but I did have to wear a hair net, a mask, and gloves. When all your coworkers are wearing the same I had to run out to get someone, and I stepped thing, how do you tell anyone apart? on an elevator that was full of 10 people. They looked at me like, “Oh my God, what is that?” I Some people write their names on the back was like, “This is the science building. This can’t of their suits. Eventually, if you’re in there a be the weirdest thing you’ve seen.”

lot, you get to know everyone, and you can —Edited and adapted by Anne Ford, AM’99 John Zich by Photography

34 / The Core

CDO-17-1746_The Core Winter2018_EtCetera_v3.indd 34 1/18/18 1:02 PM WHAT’S SHE HOLDING?

“An old sample that I helped to fabricate”: niobium on a sapphire wafer, Shearrow explained by email. This one wasn’t used because the circuit design was changed. If the sample had been finished, “it would have been diced into 24 chips. Normally these circuits would be cooled down in the lab’s dilution refrigerators to 20 milliKelvin (past the temperature at which niobium goes superconducting) to be tested. For reference, outer space is about 2.7 Kelvin, so the fridges reach a temperature that is 100 times colder than outer space.” Ordinarily Shearrow would use wafer tweezers, “so as not to contaminate the sample with anything that might be on my gloves. Since this sample won’t be used, it was all right to touch this one.”

Winter 2018 / 35

CDO-17-1746_The Core Winter2018_EtCetera_v3.indd 35 1/18/18 3:29 PM Excerpt THE DAILY MAROON Wednesday, October 1, 1902

EDITORIALS

“Segregation” and University Life

Of all the questions considered in the University since the last Autumn quarter, the proposed separation of the men and women students in the Junior College is without doubt much the most important. If the separate instruction plan is carried out, it will mean that there will be a Junior College for men in a quadrangle on the Midway west of Cobb Hall, and a Junior College for women in a quadrangle on the Midway in the other direction. In general a majority of the men seem to favor the change. But in a jocose manner they say seriously: “If they don’t take the girls away from the University it will be all right.” But most of the young women seem to be opposed. The alumnae are bringing pressure to bear on the trustees in the hope of causing the board to reject the plan. One trustee says they are indulging in hysteria. We believe that the fundamental cause for their fight is the fear that by some hidden scheme they are to be deprived of equal opportunity for higher education, which they are sure of when in the same classes as the men. But we believe there is no doubt that in college life the girls of the U. of C. will make wonderful gains from the creation of a woman’s college in the University. Many a girl in the halls has listened almost with envy to another tell of a year at a woman’s college, and the delights of the college life of college girls together. While the men want the virile life which comes from the comeraderie [sic] of manly men together, and the girls that charm and character from daily life with live, womanly young women, we all want the university life, the feeling of partnership in the whole University of Chicago. The plan of the University administration seems to provide for the realization of all these desires in balance.

Beginning in 1902–03, the University briefly offered separate instruction for men and women during the first two years of undergraduate study. The experiment ended a few years later. The Chicago Maroon, the independent student newspaper since 1892 (known as the Daily Maroon until 1942), is 125 years old this academic year. Browse archival issues online at campub.lib .uchicago.edu.

36 / The Core

CDO-17-1746_The Core Winter2018_EtCetera_v3.indd 36 1/18/18 3:31 PM A selection of small ads from The Daily Maroon, October 1, 1902

Collage by Michael Vendiola

Winter 2018 / 37

CDO-17-1746_The Core Winter2018_EtCetera_v3.indd 37 1/18/18 1:02 PM Ibidem MEMBERS OF THE SOCIETY FOR CREATIVE ANACHRONISM, MIDWAY PLAISANCE (UNDATED PHOTO)

Time drives everything before it, and is able to bring with it good as well as evil, and evil as well as good.

—Niccolò Machiavelli, The Prince (1513)

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