Quotes from Straight Man (1998), by Richard Russo.  A novel about an English professor at West Central Pennsylvania University, written by an
author who was a professor at Penn State/Altoona.

p 27  an admission that promotion in an institution like West Central
Pennsylvania was a little bit like being proclaimed the winner of a
shit-eating contest.

p 72  not wanting to reinforce such a romantic view of writing for a
young man with talent as modest as Leo's.

p 73  The student newspaper contains a lot more humor, though most of
it is unintentional.

p 94  Before you illuminate all those young minds with your eloquent silence...

p 106  In English departments the most serious competition is for the
role of straight man.

p 132  got an opportunity to move into administration, which would have
been doing both himself and his students a favor...

p 133  the increasingly militant ignorance of our students let so many
years slip by

p 153  he has the kind of face that reveals nothing.  Behind such
expressions convictions go to die

p 155  Jacob isn't particularly malicious, at least by the rather
liberal standards of academia

p 155  the books on these shelves, which seem not to have been
organized, except perhaps by size and color

p 165  his carefully calculated sincerity is almost indistinguishable
from the real thing

p 182  scrapple is like a lot of food that's conceptually challenging.

p 184  I'm a rather vague pain in the collective ass.

p 191  Mediocrity is a reasonable goal for our institution.

p 196  It's a measure of how long she's been married to an academic
that Lily sees nothing unusual about this.

p 203  Come sit on my lap.  I want to hear all about your sexual
harassment lunch.

p 242  There are lots of dull teachers.  You can't make them all deans.  

p 246  He's been a reasonably well-intentioned, lazy, honorable, mildly
competent dean, and that's about the best you can hope for.

p 254  Having her help you do something is a lot like doing it alone

p 279  Better whiskey than hypocrisy

p 280  Why would I lie to you? ... Because that's what deans do?

p 287  If we had a dean who took things seriously ..., Finny begins. He'd
have killed himself years ago, Jacob finishes

p 301  If it weren't for erroneous conclusions, these people would
never arrive at any at all

p 310  I play the innocent dean every bit as convincingly as my dean.
Which may even be a reason to believe I'd make a good dean

p 353  He says I'm smart and mean-spirited. I'm sure he meant it as a
compliment

p 357 A liberal arts dean in a good mood is a potentially dangerous
thing.  It suggests a world different from the one we know.

p 374  Which is why we have spouses and children and parents and
colleagues and friends, because someone has to know us better than we
know ourselves.  We need them to tell us.  We need them to say, "I
know you, Al. You're not the kind of man who."

p 377.  "Lucky Hank"

p 378  Perhaps no man should posses the key to his wife's affections,
what makes and keeps him worthy in her eyes.  That would be like
gaining unauthorized access to God's grace. We would not use such
knowledge wisely.