Mark,

So it's as I feared, and Adams is a hard case. To quote you, "there's no silver lining he can't find a storm cloud in," especially hanging over Washington. Or even over pastoral Mount Vernon, where Mrs. Lee and some of her admirers and hangers-on go on a picnic-pilgrimage. Rather than being refreshed or purified by their pilgrimage to the home of the father of our country, though, the party carries the poisonous atmosphere of the Capitol with them.

Not that the cynicism can't be fun. I have to admit I enjoyed the cheap shots Adams takes at General Washington and by extension at the American impulse to turn the founding fathers into national deities. "We are all patriotic about Washington and like to hide his faults," the aptly named Victoria Dare tells Lord Dunbeg, the impecunious Irish aristocrat she's set her cap for. "The truth is that even when George Washington was a small boy, his temper was so violent that no one could do anything with him. He once cut down all his father's fruit-trees in a fit of passion, and then, just because they wanted to flog him, he threatened to brain his father with the hatchet." That certainly freshens up the old story about the cherry tree, doesn't it?

Oddly enough, I liked Ratcliffe more in the Mt. Vernon scene. His amoral pragmatism makes him immune to the kind of hagiography that takes place (still) at sites like Mt. Vernon. As a boy, he says, he was made to learn Washington's "Farewell Address" by heart. "In those days General Washington was a sort of American Jehovah," he tells Mr. Gore. "But the West is a poor school for Reverence."

But you asked about the minor characters, like Victoria Dare and Madeleine's sister, Sybil. Most of them are types, which is a defensible choice on Adams' part, given the kind of book he wanted to write. Some of them, like Mr. Gore, aren't vivid enough for me to care much about them as more than vehicles for amusing or caustic observations. I did warm to Sybil, in part because she's so guileless, so much a creature of feeling, unlike her sister, who's shut down most of her emotions. (Now I'm thinking of Austen again, and the sisters in "Sense and Sensibility.") Sybil is very...un-Washington. So is Baron Jacobi, the old European bon vivant, who endeared himself to me by attacking Ratcliffe with his cane in the street.

What about the city itself as a character? I realized that the Washington of "Democracy" is missing a lot of the physical elements that make today's Washington so distinctive. Work on the Lincoln Memorial, for instance, didn't begin until 1914, 34 years after the novel was published. The Washington of "Democracy" sounds muddy and half-built and not very civilized--which is probably how Adams would describe the democratic experiment itself. The old joke about Washington being built on a swamp makes it a fit place for swamp creatures like Ratcliffe. How did you react to the city that Adams describes? Does it feel like a place you know?

Mark,

Adams does get off some great zingers, doesn't he? I went in expecting cynicism; I wasn't looking for humor. The two blur together all too easily, though, in Democracy. When Mr. Gore, the Massachusetts historian-turned-statesman, asks our heroine Madeleine Lightfoot Lee, the skeptical but curious New York widow, whether she's satisfied with what she's learned of politics, her reply is the most cynical of jokes: "I have got so far as to lose the distinction between right and wrong. Isn't that the first step in politics?" [99]

You asked whether Democracy could have worked with a male lead. My instinct is no, or at least that it would have been a very different sort of book. When he cast a woman as his lead, Adams freed himself up to write a romance. I wasn't expecting that either.

But Democracy is a romance--I'm tempted to say a Gothic one--about seduction, in which the threat to the heroine's virtue is not sex but power. Neither Senator Ratcliffe, the charismatic, amoral pragmatist who wants to sweep everything and everyone before him, nor Carrington, the kind and good but worn-out scion of old Virginia, are real contenders for Mrs. Lee's heart. Adams makes it clear, in a passage that another novelist would make a whole book out of, that Madeleine has buried her affections with her dead family: "'To lose a husband and a baby,' she said, ' and keep one's courage and reason, one must become very hard or very soft. I am now pure steel.'" [7]

At first I thought it was heartless of Adams to make such short work of tragedy. Then I realized that Mrs. Lee's decision to shut down her emotional life makes her more vulnerable to another kind of seduction. In writing about her political adventure in Washington, Adams pulls out all the staples of 19th-century romance: the heroine's arrival on a scene full of allure and possibility; the men who vie for her hand, for better and worse reasons; the charged conversations in parlors and at dinner tables; the barbs and misunderstandings and intrigues. There's a fancy ball (which also happens to be a staple of Washington life, although it's been a long time since I got to wear my dancing shoes), There's a romantic crisis that can only be averted by the delivery of a letter containing a critically important secret, the sharing of which probably dooms the writer's prospects of happiness.

The further along in the story I got, the more I felt I was reading a kind of bizarro-world Jane Austen matrimonial, or one of Ann Radcliffe's gothics. (I doubt Adams intended the Radcliffe/Ratcliffe echo but I heard it regardless, and Senator Ratcliffe is grotesque in his pursuit of power.) And there's a scene of remorse in which our heroine berates herself for her foolishness as thoroughly as any Bennett sister could. "'Oh, what a vile thing life is!' she cried, throwing up her arms with a gesture of helpless rage and despair. 'Oh, how I wish I were dead! how I wish the universe were annihilated!' And she flung herself down by Sybil's side in a frenzy of rage and despair." [166]

What's eating at Madeleine, though, isn't that she gave in to the wrong man but that she succumbed to the "thirst for power." [166] That's her transgression. Adams makes it out to be Washington's mortal sin as well, the canker at the heart of democracy.

And here we are back to cynicism, because if Democracy is a romance, it's one that sees very little good in the world it describes. It bothers me that Adams never gives democracy a chance. This is probably my sentimental side talking, the part of me that drives past Washington's monuments and sees them as the embodiment of ideals that are worth hanging onto. I'm not in politics but I'd like to think that there's some good to be accomplished in political life, in spite of the Hill travesties and gridlock we read about every day in the Post.

So, Mark, I need a cynicism check here. Is Henry Adams right when he has Mr. Gore say to Mrs. Lee, "If you want to know what the world is really doing to any good purpose, pass a winter at Samarcand, at Timbuctoo, but not at Washington. Be a bank-clerk, or a journeyman printer, but not a Congressman. Here you will find nothing but wasted effort and clumsy intrigue." [100] What do you think?

Still, this town is a political town. Even I can't deny that. I live almost in the shadow of the Capitol, after all. Out of local as well as creative interest, I want to get a better idea of the fiction the machinations and maneuverings of politics have inspired. A while back, my friend and fellow Washington-area resident Mark Athitakis and I were talking about the Washington novels--that's "Washington novel" in the political sense--that we hadn't read and wished we had. Henry Adams's 1880 novel Democracy quickly found its way to the top of the list.

Beginning this week, Mark and I are going to host a discussion of Democracy on our blogs. I hope you'll weigh in with comments and thoughts on both blogs. We're working with the Library of America's omnibus edition edition, which also includes the novel Esther as well as the nonfiction works Mont Saint Michel and Chartres and The Education of Henry Adams. But you can easily find a free copy of Democracy online to download. Join us!

Out of curiosity, I went back and looked at my MLA coverage from years past. Here's a sampling. One difference between then and now: I wouldn't say "Twittering" in 2012; I'd say "tweeting." (N.B. Some of the links may be subscription-only; apologies.) Tell me in the comments what themes you've seen emerge and re-emerge--and which ones have faded away.

MLA 2005, "The Talk of the MLA: Technology, Teaching, and Politics"

After several years of soul-searching and hand-wringing about the crises in the humanities and in scholarly publishing, the scholars who gathered here at the Modern Language Association's 121st annual convention last month displayed signs of a practical desire to do something about those crises other than complain. The question of political engagement inside and outside the classroom was very much on public display, as were professional "best practices," an urgent need to rethink the mechanisms of tenure and promotion, and the possibilities offered by the digital age.

MLA 2007: "Humanities Publishing at the MLA: Digital and Posthuman"

"How many of you want your first book to be electronic?" asked W.J.T. Mitchell, longtime editor of the journal Critical Inquiry, after a panel on "Professionalization in a Digital Age" at the Modern Language Association's annual convention in Chicago.

Mr. Mitchell, a professor of English and art history at the University of Chicago, directed the question at an audience largely made up of graduate students. Nobody put up a hand. While that group has good reason to be drawn to digital publishing, it also has reason to be wary, at least until tenure committees treat e-scholarship as seriously as they do print monographs and journal articles.

MLA 2008, "Pedagogy Is Not a Dirty Word"

It's not all economic doom and gloom at the MLA meeting here. For one thing, it's San Francisco, a far more temperate place to be in late December than Chicago, the site of last year's convention.

And the renewed emphasis on pedagogy, spearheaded by this year's president, Gerald Graff of the University of Illinois at Chicago, has gone over well with attendees, who seem relieved to hear that it's not intellectually unserious to talk about teaching. (It's also nice to hear the lovelier word "teaching" make a comeback.)

MLA 2009, "The MLA Convention in Translation"

So what was the big story at this year's Modern Language Association convention, held this week in Philadelphia? Was it translation, the theme chosen by the MLA's president, Catherine Porter? Was it the digital humanities, the pull of which drew overflow crowds to too-small conference rooms and helped create a snappy back-channel conversation on Twitter (hashtag #mla09)? Was it the hardships of contingent faculty members like Brian Croxall (@briancroxall on Twitter), a visiting assistant professor of English at Clemson University. Mr. Croxall's paper on the plight of non-tenure-track professors became a sleeper hit of the conference, although (and in part because) its author couldn't afford to be in Philadelphia to deliver it in person.

The answer to the big-story question depends on which narrative arc you choose to follow and who else is reading--or blogging or Twittering--along with you.

MLA 2011, "Hard Times Sharpen the MLA's Lens on Labor and the Humanities"

Jobs are scarce. Budgets are down. Language programs are threatened. None of that was news at the Modern Language Association's annual meeting, held here Thursday through Sunday.

The association declared "The Academy in Hard Times" this year's theme. Many sessions took up the topic in one way or another, calling for collective action to convince administrators and legislators of the humanities' value.

"Call the fire department!" Everything Timmy said these days had an
exclamation point at the end of it. Six was the age of enthusiasms.

The kids were already unbuckled, scrambling out of their seats and open- ing the doors, oblivious as usual to whatever dangers might be headed their way. "Watch for cars!" Roberta called, even though there weren't any. Half of parenthood involved repeating things you'd said before and would say again, whether or not anyone was listening to you.

Eventually there's going to be a podcast of the reading and the discussion afterward, which got pretty lively. For instance: I did my mini-rant about why I'm not crazy about the term "woman writer." ("Man writer," anybody?) And we made the case that D.C.'s a much better place to write fiction that it gets credit for being. I'll post a link to the podcast when it's up.

Every conference has its own style. The MLA is not the AHA is not the APA is not the [insert association acronym here]. No matter whose meeting it is, though, conference-going is a grueling experience. Germs are abundant; sleep, good food, and power outlets are not. Sessions start too early and go too late. Here, learned the hard way, are my survival tips for conference-goers. Add yours in the comments.

1. Stay hydrated. You'll stay healthier and feel more energetic if you're not parched. Easy to forget, and you'll regret it if you do.

2. Go easy on the caffeine. You'll be tempted to keep the coffee train rolling from dawn til dusk. Refrain. You'll sleep better, and the caffeine you do consume will be more effective. Go easy on the alcohol, too, and save yourself an embarrassing scene at the cash bar.

3. Wash your hands. A lot. Nobody wants to come home with (or transmit) a case of conference crud. Hand sanitizer's a good idea too.

4. Always be charging (your devices, that is, not your credit card). Take advantage of power outlets when you find them, and plug in whenever you can.

5. Pace yourself. Sometimes it's better to take a break and skip a session than to run nonstop from panel to panel from sunrise to sundown. Know your limits and respect them. You'll get more out of the sessions you do attend.

6. Check in with the backchannel. Even if you're not active on Twitter, figure out what the conference hashtag is--many conferences list theirs now in the program--and cast an eye on it from time to time. You may hear about a knockout panel you'd have missed otherwise, or catch the unfolding of a good conference-driven conversation. And if you are on Twitter, write your handle on your conference badge.

7. Take a sweater/jacket/thermal underwear or some other warm garment of your choice. Those conference rooms get cold--bone-chilling, blood-freezing, Peary-to-the-Pole cold. This applies to conferences held anywhere, at any time of year.

8. Do at least one thing that's unique to the locale. Some of the soul-draining effect of conferences derives from the unpleasant sensation that you could be anywhere, or nowhere. A windowless conference room in Chicago looks a lot like one in Seattle. Take a walk through the historic district near your hotel; find a greasy spoon and order the breakfast special. My personal best: At a conference in Utah, I got there a few hours early and went caving. You don't have to be too strenuous, though. Even reading the local paper, if you can get it--and you can sometimes if you ask the front desk--will help you get a sense of place.

9. Find your big idea, one that will change what you do and how you approach it. One good idea, one that really inspires you, can make all those sleepless nights and airless rooms worth it.

It's no secret that I'm not a very good member of my book club. I tend to read the book late if I read it at all. I go for the company (smart, friendly) and the wine (why not?). The latest book I didn't read is A Reliable Wife by Robert Goolrick, which got raves from those who actually had read it.

The book club loved many things about it but especially loved the plot, which sounds like a corker. One friend, who's also a novelist, said, "It's the kind of plot that must have been a lot harder to write than it is to read." That led to a pretty interesting conversation about whether so-called literary writers decided somewhere along the line that plot was beneath them and that anybody with an MFA ought to focus on more sophisticated artistic concerns. Why write a murder mystery when you can forge in the smithy of your soul the uncreated conscience of your race?

Here's my theory: It's not the desire to be James Joyce or Virginia Woolf that drives a lot of writers away from plot. It's fear. Plot's the scaffolding of a story. (Hence the picture above.) And it's hard to build right. Plot derailed my first novel--I'll try this, and this, and hey what about throwing that twist in too?--and I've spent a lot of time thinking about it as I work on my second.

I don't worry that not enough will happen in this one. I worry that too much will, or could--that I'll come up with a storyline that looks like an alluvial delta, with events and subplots that fan out in all directions and take the characters and the reader nowhere.

As I said on Twitter, How did anyone write novels before the Internet told us how to do it? Many advice-dispensers stand ready to show the uncertain how plotting's done. Learn the "Six Vital Signs of a Healthy Plot." ("Want + Obstacles = Tension"). Take "4 Steps for Organizing Plot Ideas Into a Novel."

If this kind of advice works for you, I'm not going to tell you not to take it. I'm not crazy about formulas, maybe because they seem bloodless and recipe-like: Combine a three-strand conflict, throw in an obstacle or two, and voila! Your plot's ready to serve. But, as I said, if that works for you, great. And maybe you're writing a character-driven or mood-driven book and you don't really care about plot at all. I can live with that too. The best writing advice I can give you is not to take writing advice too much to heart.

At book club, Kate, the novelist I mentioned earlier, said something about plot that I did think was useful. When she encounters trouble with a plot, she said, it often turns out she doesn't really know her characters yet. If you don't know someone, how can you figure out what they'll do? That's the most useful plot-related advice I've come across lately.

This is also the week I get back to fiction-writing, although the results of that won't be public for a while. No, I'm not participating in NaNoWriMo, but if you are I wish you the best of writing luck and discipline. Tell me how it's going in the comments. Does the time pressure really help you crank it out? I can believe it does. I already have too much deadline pressure in my day job, though.

And it's not just fiction writers who get to have all the NaNoWriMo fun. Academics, you too can draft your book in one month!

The other day, though, I picked up a paperback--it happened to be Evelyn Waugh's Scoop--and realized how happy I was that it wouldn't let me do anything but read it. No email, no Internet access, no soft keys, no ringtones, no screens. I could pick up a pencil and annotate it if I wanted to. (I didn't really want to. I just wanted to read it.) It was a relief to interact with a device, if one can call a codex a device, that only does one thing but does it very well.

So here's a shout-out to tools and devices designed to do just one thing: hammers, toasters, can openers, typewriters, cheap paperbacks. I appreciate you, I do. Thanks for keeping it simple in a complicated world.

They're a lot of fun, truly, and the kids love them. Why wouldn't they? The books (apps? book apps?) are whimsical and delightful in many ways, although I have my doubts that Morris really works all that well as a story if you stop and think about it--which you probably won't, because you'll be too busy making the books speak famous lines from themselves. It was the best of times, it was the worst of times...

But what the Dickens is time spent playing around with Morris Lessmore and his fantastic flying books? Should it count as reading time or screen time or something that isn't quite either? This is what's got me preoccupied as a parent. Does spending half an hour with interactive Alice equal half an hour watching "Phineas & Ferb" or playing Lego Batman? It doesn't feel the same to a grownup, anyway, as half an hour spent reading the original, page-bound Alice or Lloyd Alexander's The High King or a comic book.

My instinct, so far, has been to treat iPad time as more or less equivalent to screen time and to limit it in a way I rarely limit time my offspring spend with traditional printed matter. It's possible I need a third category that falls somewhere in between. I could also decide that all these modes count as engagement with storytelling and just not worry about what touchscreen time might be doing to my kids' tender brains. I haven't made that leap of narrative and neurological faith yet. Should I? Why or why not?