i think what depressed me most reading dag solstad is finding that i agree with him, when he says that the staffroom in a high school ought naturally (theoretically) to be a place of lively intellectual discussion and civilised interaction, but never is, yet no one seems to find this amazing. how ignominous it is that when you have, gathered in one room, people who have university degrees, and who are, in their way, experts in their respective fields, and who know, collectively, about art, literature, philosophy, biology, politics, the physical sciences, linguistics, history... and all of those things we call civilisation, the conversation is not naturally intellectual and intelligent, but mere complaints about the marking, and the administration, and the poor pay, and the students. and i'd thought it was just the staffrooms i've been in.