Confessions of a Reluctant Imposter: Part 1

“Non, je ne regrette rien”, sang Edith Piaf, and who am I to contradict the great chanteuse? Furthermore, I believe in Nietzsche’s “eternal return”. If I had to relive my life, I would remake all the same stupid mistakes in precisely the same order. This doesn’t mean that rummaging through the rubble of one’s memory is not fun or even mildly pedagogical. Not that my past is especially unique or noteworthy. In fact, it is precisely its ordinariness that makes it worth sharing, as readers may find it somewhat familiar. I once asked a psychologist I was seeing if she heard the same old stories from all her patients, "Just about," she replied. Consider this a confession in my name and on your behalf. 

I will only talk about work. I am not skilled enough as a writer to discuss the more gruesome aspects of my personal life with sufficient literary decorum. I am no Philip Roth. In any case, my professional experiences are cringe-worthy enough to satisfy stickybeaks looking for a schadenfreude hit. 

When I look back at my various past jobs, two things stand out: first, I sucked at all of them, and second, the people who hired or supervised me either didn’t notice or didn’t care. Before I get into it, please be assured that this is not an exercise in cutesy false modesty. I am not humble, and if you think I am too hard on myself, you should hear what I say about my colleagues and peers. 

It all started in Rome when I was still an undergraduate student. I was visiting a trendy commercial gallery with a friend who was also an art history major, and we started conversing with the attractive French owner, as one does. At one point, she asked me what I did for a living, and I replied without hesitation: “I am an art critic”. To his credit, my companion waited until we got out before bursting into laughter. I was then too young and insecure to indulge in self-deprecation, so I replied that having already published two reviews in a student magazine, I deserved the title. 

That insignificant, minor incident was an epiphany. In an instant, I saw with absolute clarity that the first and most important qualification needed to be an intellectual is to call oneself one. This gives budding intellectuals an enormous early career advantage over bootmakers and sushi chefs as long as they can also satisfy a second essential prerequisite:  convince one’s peers to accept the qualification we bestow on ourselves. Luckily, nothing could be easier; all one has to do is accept other people's self-validation. The exchange of gifts strengthens tribal societies; the exchange of recognition cements intellectual communities. 

Having learned the fundamentals of the profession, I was ready to embark on my new career. My first real job was as a part-time writer-producer of cultural programs for the Italian government radio (similar to Radio National in Australia). This entailed writing scripts, working with actors and sound technicians to turn scripts into programs, interviewing people and editing interviews. I landed the job the usual way: an old pal who went to the same elite private school as me introduced me to the “right” people. 

It is hard to describe how bad I was at that job, which is unsurprising, considering I had no training, and my only qualification was that I knew a bit about art and I was functionally literate. And, of course, I had published two reviews in a student magazine. Yet my supervisors appeared satisfied with my performance or said nothing to disabuse me of this notion. They didn't even complain when I completed only nine of the thirteen scripts I was commissioned and paid to write and produce. I kept my failure a secret as long as I could, but I can still recall the faces of the audio technician, production assistant, and actors when, on the 9th day of recording, I told them that I had run out of material. 

It was around the same time that I decided to move to Australia. Soon after my arrival, I got my second work opportunity: washing pots in a large restaurant. I remembered it fondly. It was an honest, well-paid job where I was well-treated, and that didn’t trouble me with remorse or misgivings. But this interlude of serenity and clear conscience was not destined to last. After about a year, I was asked to edit a small art magazine. By then, I had already started publishing reviews in the same periodical, which was very appreciated by the previous editor because, as I would soon learn, extracting content from local writers was a Sisyphean struggle. Once again, a handful of reviews were enough to qualify me for a new job I knew nothing about. I told myself it was a learn-in-the-job situation, and I did put an effort into it  - at least by my standards, I am lazy.  Ultimately, I learned the only professional skill I have ever acquired: persuade people to give me money by telling them I am an art critic (or curator or artistic director).  

Incredibly, after a few years, I was headhunted again, this time to teach art students at a university art school. I taught two subjects: modern art history, which students could learn without my help by reading the same book I used to prepare the lectures and art theory. Unfortunately, it was when “French” or “Continental”  theory mesmerised art departments throughout Australia.  It goes without saying that neither teachers nor students understood it or, for that matter, read it. Having studied philosophy in Italy, I was, in principle, marginally better prepared - at least I knew the meaning of “a priori”, “empiricism”, “phenomenon”, and “aporia”. In reality, however, I was out of my depth. It would have taken me many months of reading and research to prepare even a basic set of lectures on just one maître à penser, and I was expected to teach all of them. It was insane!  Of course, when students see you fighting for your survival behind the lectern, some feel pity. And when different brains come together, some spark gets ignited despite everything, so maybe a little was achieved in a crooked, roundabout way. But the same could be said of most experiences. Spending time in jail can be very educational, too.

After I left that job - I didn’t reapply for it when my term contract had to be readvertised - I felt so dirty that I enrolled in a PhD program just to earn a doctorate that would have retrospectively validated a career already over. I atoned by writing a complex thesis on a complicated topic. It was a sacrificial dissertation, a potlatch that expended intellectual resources for no practical gain (if one excludes the three-year-long scholarship that came with it). After my scholarship ran out, I found myself without a secure income for the first time in many years. To make matters worse, no head-hunter came looking for me. I was over 40 years old and surrounded by newer, shinier, younger heads. The writing was on the wall; it was time to put my only professional expertise to work. It was time to ask people to give me money.

To be continued.