Disorientation Audiobook by Elaine Hsieh Chou

Ingrid Yang's Dissertation Struggle

• 🧠 Ingrid Yang, a 29-year-old PhD student, is in her eighth and final year, burdened by mounting debt and the imminent expiration of her student loan deferral and funding.
• 🎯 She is tasked with writing a 250-page original dissertation on the late canonical poet Xiao-Wen Chou to secure a prestigious post-doc fellowship.
• ⚠️ Despite extensive effort, she has only produced 50 pages of scrambled notes and developed an addiction to antacids, feeling her health and personal life are suffering.

The Challenge of Xiao-Wen Chou

• 📚 Ingrid's research focuses on Xiao-Wen Chou, a highly acclaimed and widely read Chinese American poet, often dubbed the "Chinese Robert Frost."
• 💡 Chou's work is ubiquitous in American education and culture, making it difficult for Ingrid to find an original angle for her research.
• 🔍 Every potential idea Ingrid considers for her dissertation, such as the eternal inner conflict or the impossibility of cultural translation, has already been explored by other scholars.

Desperation and Exhaustion

• 📉 Ingrid has resorted to desperate measures, including searching for ways to contract illnesses like mono to avoid her dissertation and considering plagiarism.
• 📖 She has dedicated immense time to research, memorizing poems, sifting through innumerable archive boxes, and attending pricey international conferences.
• 📌 Her deep-seated struggle is compounded by the fact that she never wanted to research Chou in the first place, suggesting a fundamental misalignment with her academic path.