Its C. Author holds no official position, claims no affiliation, and signs no open letters. The Authors are one of the most distinguished families of The Margins—a township renowned for its diaspora, and for producing more heartbreaks than fortunes. Its wishes to honor the family trade and is currently working on a major heartbreak.

The Professor is a book of unsolicited advice addressed to a New Professor joining the Cadbury English Department at The University. Framed as a parody of Machiavelli’s Prince, it guides the New Professor through the rites, ranks, and rivalries of academic life—from the adjunct pool to The Hierarchy (Figg and the pope), from the fading reign of Old Professors (Moses, Meyer, Casagrande) to the rising empire of the New (The Twins and the addressee himself), from Mortimer Moonshine, “the apple of The Bureaucrat’s eye and the sore in everybody else’s”, to Quincy the mule—the last trace of sanity in an institution at war with sense.

Speckled Jim Press is an independent, non-commercial publisher devoted to serious nonsense and unserious truths. It operates under the auspices of Carrier Pigeon Publishers—expert couriers since 1564.

We are currently accepting submissions for our new project, The Chronicles of Lower Education—an exhaustive account of the institutions, slogans, and figures that turned learning into a lifestyle brand. We do not, however, intend to review the submissions or to publish them.

Nulla fides vipris nigris — No faith in black adders.