I hope Prof Marquis understands how revealing of himself he is in his presumptions about Jeffrey Epstein’s putative attraction for academics (Why are so many academics in the Epstein files? It’s not just about money, 20 February). Most academics, I suspect, would have felt queasy about having anything to do with Epstein, and if they had been invited to fly private in his “Lolita Express”, would certainly not have accepted. (Some of us try not to fly at all for environmental reasons.) And so far from feeling ground down by the “constant and myriad indignities” of life in the academy, many university teachers are well aware of the privileges of their position relative to the lack of autonomy and dreariness of so many other kinds of work.
The professor also has it back to front when he invites us to “look beyond sex and money” in order to understand Epstein’s power over the gullible. Most of us, academics or otherwise, can see perfectly well that there was nothing but sex and money involved.
Kate Soper
Professor emerita, London Metropolitan University
