In Plato's Cave

In this delightful and candid memoir, Alvin Kernan recalls his life as a student, professor, provost, and dean during a distinguished career in some of higher education’s most hallowed halls. With his customary wit and insight, Kernan recounts his experiences at Columbia, Williams, Oxford, Yale, and Princeton in the company of an array of fascinating colleagues. And he describes from an insider’s point of view how colleges and universities in the second half of the twentieth century have been transformed in radical ways.

Against the background of what it was like to work and teach in turbulent decades of change, Kernan details the broader educational battles in which he became embroiled. He discusses the struggle for equality of opportunity for women and minorities; the questioning of administrative and intellectual authority; the appearance of deconstructive types of theory; the technological shift from printed to electronic information; the politicization of the classroom; and much more. His vividly remembered account is not only a unique personal story, it is a thought-provoking history that brims with insight into what has been won and lost in the culture wars.