Seems like a fair amount of space has been delegated here to discussion of the romance novel. For those of you who are in that purgatory between Brit Lit and the lowly romance novel, I suggest a new addiction--Brit mystery novels. Invariably, they involve a chief inspector who is either a peer, a poet or both. His team consists of smart, driven and somewhat diverse investigators who invariably have a dysfunctional relationship with each other, their jobs, or even their neighbors.
If the chief inspector is a woman, she appears hard as nails on the outside but has a mushy vulnerable inside that depends on alcohol, coffee and cigarettes to get her through the day. Her team is comprised of all men who are hostile to her because she was promoted above them and is a woman.
Of course, both the male and female chief inspectors always get their man, woman, dog or child. If the story is about the male chief inspector and his team, it almost always is related to politics and often has a brush with Interpol or at least MI5 and even members of Parliament. If the protagonist is the female chief inspector, the story will contain a serial killer who invariably goes after our heroine. We always worry that her team won't take her back, but, in the end she is saved and the killer is caught or killed.
Since these are British mystery novels, most of the time, smutty sex is implied and not described in detail. Of course, we know it is going on and with whom, but the really juicy parts are left to our imagination in true Brit fashion. For the more intellectual reader, the dysfunctional relationships of the teams take up as much or more space than the plot. Sometimes the messiness is with each other, but in the male chief inspector's case, almost always involves someone of his class whom he met while fox hunting on a weekend getaway to a fellow peer's country estate. Of course, it is his sensitive side that his perspective love interest visualizes through his poetry. Their relationship is difficult primarily because of their jobs keep them apart and each has an innate inability to make or keep social commitments.
Our female chief inspector usually does not have a love interest. She makes no bones over the fact that she is married to her job. She is usually from a middle class background who has struggled to get where she is now. Her experiences with love are always disasterous and in modern mysteries, her love interests are either dead or have had it with her over-the-top work ethic. She is also unable to make or keep social commitments.
Best of all, if you don't want to take the time to read them yet you want to appear knowlegable, they are almost always represented on either Masterpiece Theatre or Mystery! shown ad nauseum on PBS. Of course, you have to make a Sunday night commitment for about eight weeks or if you have cable you can check them out later in the week on a multitude of PBS channels. If you are computer savvy, you can find them on youtube and hulu.com.
These novels are best read with the Oxford English Dictionary handy. For that reason, they are good reading to prep for the GREs. Also, if read in a public place like a park, the quad, or even a quiet bar, they are intellectual babe/guy magnets. You actually look like you are intelligent and know something. Soon, you'll be dressed impeccably with a studied slight inattention to detail and you'll have a quote from the classics or your own poetry ready for every occasion. Or, you may be a secret alcoholic and a chain smoker whose personal life as well as bedroom, apartment or dorm room bears a striking resemblance to something on the edge of condemnation from the British version of the Board of Health.
English geeks like us are beset with the same but different desires and insecurities that the rest of the world faces. We want to succeed in life, love and at least one other fetish that we share with no one. We are obsessed with some aspect of English, often an obscure one, therefore making jobs in the real world elusive. Most of all, like everyone else we want to look cool, especially to the object of our affections.
My advice? Hit Barnes &Noble and buy several Brit mysteries, something from the classics and an Oxford English Dictionary, preferably a bit beat up since you want to demonstrate that you are worth your salt intellectually. Get the wardrobe right. Clothing that is somewhere between age appropriate and Dickensian will do. Find your spot so that the light hits you properly and you are at least within peripheral eyesight of the inividual you want to notice you. Open your books randomly and begin to read the mystery. Cross referencing with the dictionary, Bartlett's Quotations and Homer or Shakespeare is good. If you are noticed by a non-intellectual type, become a bit pedagogical in your conversation. True, it will scare the person away, but these people always talk. Rest assured, your stellar reputation will soon make it around campus and you will attract the right sorts of people that you want to be a part of your circle.
You are on your way to becoming a part of an elite group all by reading British mysteries. Adam Dagliesh and Harriet Vane are your friends. you don't have to be embarassed such as you would if you were caught with say...a romance novel. Perhaps you won't be reading smutty sex, but by reading Brit mysteries, you will go far in establishing a proper reputation and perhaps catch a bit of romance as well.
Oh, and this is just an aside...they really are excellent beach reading.
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