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Jo Guldi, History, Leaving Behind the Yellow Submarine

Boston Review

Originally Posted: November 22, 2016

The final scene of the 1968 animated Beatles movie, Yellow Submarine, shows the character of Jeremy Hillary Boob, Ph.D., pirouetting through the cosmos, borne by a constantly expanding flower. He is the nerd-hero; he has triumphed over the closed-minded, music-hating threat of the Blue Meanies, proving that even the cruelest of adversaries can be transformed by the power of beauty, love, and a classical education. Yet when we first meet him, Jeremy is pitiable, a “Nowhere Man”: a bulbously shaped, furry, pink-tailed creature who alone remains in the void when a Vacuum Monster sucks the world into his snout and then devours himself. He babbles in Latin about his articles, his essay for The New Statesman, his educational pedigree, and his yet-unfinished novel. Everything he has written is “for nobody,” the Beatles observe.

Jeremy is a satirical representation of Jeremy DuQuesnay Adams (1934–2016), medieval historian at Yale and Southern Methodist University, a professor fondly remembered for his resonant voice, wide smile, wild suspenders, and entertaining ties. At Yale his books won prizes, but in those days a single no vote could void a tenure case, and Jeremy was the victim of jealousy or resentment or skepticism of some kind. In his later life, exiled in Dallas, Jeremy found generating books cumbersome. In the classroom, however, he still stood out for the quality of his engagement with students: a mind vividly alive, capable of tacking between ancient philosophy, art history, theology, debates about charter schools, and contemporary theories of child development. READ MORE