The Ends of English: Divergent Perceptions of Literary Study at the Edge of the Present

When The New Yorker published Nathan Heller's article "The End of the English Major" in early 2023, the response from the intellectual community was robust. Most responses were critical, but few commentators acknowledged Heller's main contribution to the conversation about the "end" or "death" of the humanities: original interviews. This essay attempts to remedy that oversight by close reading the interviews to see what can be gleaned from them beyond their place in Heller's narrative. Ultimately, I argue that the interviews reveal a temporal divergence between students and professors that determines how each group understands the purpose of English departments, the humanities, and the university. The central question this essay raises is whether the divergence can be navigated to prevent the end of English as a university department and disciplinary formation.