I'm guessing you easily have 100x or more experience with Java than you do Lisp. Do you suspect that this might have something to do with it? Lisp has a very d

I'm guessing you easily have 100x or more experience with Java than you do Lisp. Do you suspect that this might have something to do with it? Lisp has a very different syntax from C-style languages, and this seems to trip people up much much more than the functional components of it. Not being familiar with the idioms of another language doesn't mean those idioms are hard. It just means you aren't familiar with them.