ABSTRACT
In university teaching and in related professions, many pay homage to the notion that wisdom increases with age, not least their own. Lacking illusions about my own wisdom, I retired from teaching eighteen months before I had to, partly because I found it increasingly hard to break down the barriers of difference between my students and me. Distaste for male scruffiness set off by earrings was hard to conceal, and the sight of young women in running suits and punk hairdos made it wearying to lecture or to induce discussion of my subject. My diction puzzled the undergraduates, and theirs aroused my incredulity. Although it sounds pious, I thought it unfair to occupy a senior position when the profession was glutted with good young people who could not find a job. If it hadn’t been for children of my own to see through university, I would have retired even earlier. Practicality apart, the conscious decision to retire early means not being turned out for bureaucratic reason; the initiative is on the self: a healthier place for it, surely.
