Glad to have your comment!

I’m afraid I’m not an HLS student. However, I spent some time there as an employee, and got a sense of the student body. I’d say that being a generalist needn’t be a block to studying there, or probably any other law school. Getting a J.D. is a lot of work (though I don’t know if it’s necessarily any more at HLS than anyplace else), and does require some dedication and focus. But people with broad interests will improve any academic setting they’re in, and not many of the students I met at HLS were single-minded drones.

So, I’d say go for it! Best of luck in your endeavors.

Re: “Thank yo”

Thank you in advance for any time or assistance you can provide me.

However, presumptuousness aside, I am making my attempt. I wanted to commend you on your further defining a sometimes derogatory stereotype. You see, I too am donning a scarlet “D” and am currently formulating a trivial “Apologies for the Dilettantish.” I had done a google search of “appellation and dilettante” hoping to pull up some significant historical dabblers when I came across your blog.

I admit I have an ulterior motive in contacting you. It is a question I hope you can shed some light on. I am but a lowly undergraduate with my eyes set on the hallowed halls of law school. As of late, I have been a bit concerned with my dilettantish stereotype. You–a fellow dabbler–obviously are enrolled in our finest! Would you be kind enough to perhaps share you own experience as a dilettante subverted to the demands of the rigorous curriculum of the juris doctorate?

Thank yo

Before you sick your cronies on me, keep in mind that I’m the biggest fan of your various intellectual endeavors. I think you should continue to plunge (head first) into the shallow end of a thousand obscure disciplines and ideas rather than get bogged down in just one topic. You never bore me. And I bore easily. It’s true.

E., thanks for the story! I can now happily call myself pretentious, instead of with mixed feelings as before.

This person is the one who called me a dilettante. Go to it!

Excellent derivation! Who called you a dilletante? I’ll have words with that unknown assailant.

I recall Brian Eno, who in an appendix in “A Year With Swollen Appendices” comes to peace with the word “pretentious,” a word that “is used negatively, especially in Britain, where it has the sense of ‘rising above one’s station,’ of trying to do something to which you had no right. I am glad to have attempted something which I had no right to attempt…” This in the midst of some text describing the idea of “taking the waters” (attending a spa) as a universal (and placebonic (?)) cure in Victorian times–and comparing such a placebo with electronic music. Smashing guy, that Eno.

I applaud your reappropriation of “dilletanterie” in the same spirit!