[Partly edited December 8, 2008 and December
8,
2011]
20th Century Art, Music, and Literature
I've told you that one of the best ways to understand a
society is to look at the art, music, and literature it
produces.
Looking at the Baroque style tells you a lot about what is going
on in
the17th century. Looking at the Rococo and
Noe-Classical/Classical styles of the 18th century tells you a
lot
about that time period. Looking at the Romantic and
Realistic
styles of the 19th century also tells you a lot about that
century.
The artistic styles of the 20th century likewise tell you a lot
about
that century. The problem is that their are dozens of
different
styles and movements in the arts in the 20th century, not just
one or
two that typify the century. Nevertheless, regardless of
style,
one can point to three particularly distinctive trends in much
(though
certainly not all) 20th
and 21st century art, music, and literature:
- A tendency to be less and less accessible to average
person
- A tendency to glorify art itself
- A tendency to undercut traditional standards and
values
As an example, consider the development of atonal
music in 20th century.
Before the 20th
century, serious music, even the music of
the
greatest composers, was pretty easy for the
average person to
understand and enjoy. Serious music followed
common and easily
understood patterns (e.g., the "I, IV, V, V7, I" harmonic
pattern one
finds frequently in popular tunes).
In the 20th century, however, many of the most important
composers
began to move
away from
these patterns toward what is called atonal
music. Atonal music is music without
a home key. There is a
pattern, but the pattern is
not at all easy to recognize. Composers working in this
style
prepare for themselves a 12 tone grid and then use the grid
systematically in producing their compositions.
[See this excellent
video discussing Schoenberg's method. If the link is
broken, try
this Wayback
Machine
link.]
[My son Michael put together an atonal piece he calls Sleepers Speak and Dance. A
challenge
to the music majors: listen to the piece and see if you can
figure out
why Mike gave the composition the title he did. Looking
at the printed score
makes things
easier. One of the problems with twelve-tone music is that,
even a good
musician often has trouble understanding what's going on
without the
score in front of them. ]
If one has an exceptionally
good ear and special training, one just might be able to hear
the
patterns in 12 tone music. But Schoenberg doesn't even want you
to be
able to hear the pattern. Obviously, this is music much
less
accessible to the average person--and even to highly trained
musicians! How
many people listen to and enjoy the music of Arnold
Schoenberg?
Not many many. Even those that prefer "serious" music to
popular
genres tend to listen more often to the composers of
earlier eras, to the Bachs, Beethovens, Chopins and Mozarts
rather
then the Schoenbergs.
Twelve tone music also shows a clear tendency
to glorify art itself. What we are asked to admire here is
the creativity of the composer, his ability to find new ways to
use the
12 tone grid.
Also clear in atonal music is the tendency to undercut
traditional standards and values. The traditional idea was
that
music
should have pretty melodies and beautiful harmonies. Composers,
especially
the Romantics, might occasionally use dissonance (disturbing
combinations
of notes), but they did so knowing full well that the effect was
not particularly pleasant. With atonal music, the
situation is
very
different. Playing a C and a C# at the same time creates
what
would
traditionally have been viewed as dissonance--disharmony.
Schoenberg said that this might instead be what he called
"distant
harmony," and part of the composers art might be to create a
context
where sounding a C and a C# together is exactly the right way to
complete one's harmonic pattern.
Another 20th century composer working in the atonal style is
John
Cage. Cage studied with Schoenberg and produced some
interesting
12-tone compositions of his own. But Cage went on to
develop
another musical style, aleatoric music.
Atonal music sounds like random sounds even though it
isn't.
Aleatoric
music sounds like random sounds because that's exact;u what it
is! Cage
used many different methods to produce random sounds. He used
computers
to generate random sounds, splashed paint over blown up staff
lines,
etc. All this clearly violates the traditional idea that
music
should follow a deliberate pattern.
If fact, Cage challenges virtually
all traditional ideas of what music
should be. In one
of Cage's compositions (4:33) the composer sits
down at the piano--and
does nothing for 4:33!!!
Many other 20th century composers use the aleatoric style
is some passages,
e.g., Igor Stravinsky in his
Rite of Spring. One critic described this work as "raw
sound
freed from melody and harmony," what most of us would call
noise.
[ Is noise
music?
Cage thought so. Here's a clip of Cage's Noise.]
In the
visual
arts too one can see the tendencies I describe. Typical
of 20th
century art is the development of Cubism by artists like Pablo
Picasso
and Marcel Duchamp.
In Cubist art, the painter tries to combine multiple
perspectives, looking at an object from different
points of view and sometimes at different times. Marcel
Duchamp's
Nude Descending a staircase is a good
example. The painting is impressive in its discovery of
a way of
conveying a sense of motion in a still image. But the
average
person looking at a work like this can't even tell what it is!
The situation is even worse with a 20th century style
called Abstract Expressionism. In Abstract Expressionism
there
are no recognizable
objects. What we are asked to appreciate is the
artist's
use of color, line, composition. We get the expression
of an
artists feelings--or
(perhaps) the results of purely accidental processes only
partly under
the artist's conscious control.
Soviet dictator Nikita Khrushchev described one
abstract
work as
looking like what would happen if a little boy had done his
business on
canvas and spread
it around when his mother wasn't watching.
And, to the average person--maybe even to trained
artists--this isn't
so far from the truth.
There's an even greater
challenge to traditional standards of what art should be like in
a
style called
Dada.
In Dadaist works (like those of Marcel Duchamp), there is a
deliberate
attempt to eliminate all previous
artistic standards. Take a dead, stuffed monkey.
Label it
on three different sides "Portrait of Rembrandt," "Portrait of
Renoir,"
and "Portrait of Cezanne." And there's your work of
art!
Draw a mustache and beard on a reproduction of the Mona Lisa,
give
the picture a title with a semi-obscene double entendre (the
letters
on the bottom are pronounce "elle a chaud au caul")
and there's your work of art. Duchamp
here (and
elsewhere) is deliberately trying to destroy traditional ideas
of what
art should be like. "There's a great work of
destruction to be done." And the great tool
of destruction? Often, it's humor. See his "Fountain"
(left).
The Dadaist movement prepared the way for
another
movement in the arts, Surrealism. Surrealism
is
a style, not just of painting,
but of music and literature as
well.
In some ways, Surrealism is the best
example of trends I talk about.
Surrealism's challenge
to traditional standards clear. The surrealists (men like
Salvador Dali) say that what
the rest of
us regard as reality isn't truly reality. There is a
deeper
reality in the subconscious
mind, and true art should reflect that deeper reality. Notice
the
twist: what
most of us would
consider a distortion of reality is proclaimed by the
Surrealists as
the true reality. Surrealists incorporate automatism and
accident
rather
than logical control as they create their artistic works.
Also, the Surrealists tend to emphasize things the rest of
us
find
disturbing in
the extreme--and they tell us these these things are good!
Exceeding one's wildest imagination is the goal here--and
nightmare
visions, because they are so wild, are the epitome of beauty.
"The marvelous is beautiful," they tell us. "Only the
marvelous
is beautiful."
At the opposite extreme, there is Pop Art, a style that gives
us, not
unfamiliar images, but images that are as familiar as they can
possibly
be. The most famous of the Pop artists is Andy
Warhol.
Warhol gave us images from popular culture transformed into art:
Campbell's soup cans, Coke bottles, images of Jackie Kennedy,
images of
Marilyn Monroe. The trouble for us here is that it's hard
to tell
exactly what's going on. What's Warhol's attitude toward
popular culture. Is he embracing it, or making fun of
it?
Is this simply a continuation of Dada? Hard to say.
In most of these artistic styles there is a deliberate
attempt to shock the aesthetic sense, to produce something that
will challenge existing standards. In fact, in much
modern art, the only value in a piece is its shock value--and
the
more shocking, the
more likely the art world is to regard a work
as important.
Robert Maplethorpe gives us pictures of homosexual men in
various
sado-masochistic poses--and we've got art.
Andres Serrano gives us a crucifix upside-down in a jar of
urine: and
we've got a work art. One
recent exhibit required viewers to walk over American
flags in order to see the other images.
This kind of
thing was rare or non-existent in earlier artistic styles which
usually
tended to reinforce religion, patriotism, and traditional
standards. Only in the
20th century would such things be regarded
as art.
20th century
literature, too, reflects the trends I mention
above. An excellent example, what's happened to poetry.
For most of human history, the works of the great poets were
easy for
the average person to understand and enjoy. The average
person
living in ancient Greece would have had no trouble understanding
and
enjoying the works of Homer. The average Roman would have
had no
difficulty understanding and enjoying the works of Catullus,
Ovid, or
Virgil. The average person of the Middle Ages would have
had no
difficulty enjoying the Song of Roland. Clear up through the
19th
century, serious poets could be read and enjoyed by almost
anyone.
In the 20th century, however, serious poetry took a turn away
from easy
accessibility. Here's an example:
T.S. Eliot (1888–1965). Poems.
1920.
12. Sweeney among the Nightingales
APENECK SWEENEY spreads his knees
Letting his arms hang down to laugh,
The zebra stripes along his jaw
Swelling to maculate giraffe.
The circles of the stormy moon
5
Slide westward toward the River Plate,
Death and the Raven drift above
And Sweeney guards the hornèd gate.
Gloomy Orion and the Dog
Are veiled; and hushed the shrunken
seas;
10
The person in the Spanish cape
Tries to sit on Sweeney’s knees
Slips and pulls the table cloth
Overturns a coffee-cup,
Reorganised upon the floor
15
She yawns and draws a stocking up;
The silent man in mocha brown
Sprawls at the window-sill and gapes;
The waiter brings in oranges
Bananas figs and hothouse grapes;
20
The silent vertebrate in brown
Contracts and concentrates, withdraws;
Rachel née Rabinovitch
Tears at the grapes with murderous
paws;
She and the lady in the cape
25
Are suspect, thought to be in league;
Therefore the man with heavy eyes
Declines the gambit, shows fatigue,
Leaves the room and reappears
Outside the window, leaning in,
30
Branches of wistaria
Circumscribe a golden grin;
The host with someone indistinct
Converses at the door apart,
The nightingales are singing near
35
The Convent of the Sacred Heart,
And sang within the bloody wood
When Agamemnon cried aloud,
And let their liquid siftings fall
To stain the stiff dishonoured shroud.
40
What's going on here? Unfortunately, in order to
figure it out, you have to know extraordinarily well images
from
classical literature and other sources--but, also, details of
Eliot's
personal life. It turns out to be a great poem, but how
are we to
know?
At least here we are left with some traditional
elements
poetic elements: rhyme, meter, memorable images. But
what are we
to do with poems that abandon all these things, as much
contemporary
poetry does? Well, we abandon them. 20th century
serious
poetry isn't easily accessible, and so most of us give up.
And most of us have given up on serious novels as
well--or, at least, we've given up on some of those novelists
the
English professors would tell us are particularly
important. One
such, James Joyce.
James Joyce was a pioneer of what is called "Stream of
Consciousness" writing. Here's an example from his
"Portrait of
the Artist as a Young Man."
Chapter 1
Once upon a time and a very good time it was there was a moocow
coming
down along the road and
this moocow that was coming down along the road met a nicens little
boy
named baby tuckoo
His father told him that story: his father looked at him through
a
glass: he had a hairy face.
He was baby tuckoo. The moocow came down the road where Betty
Byrne
lived: she sold lemon platt.
O, the wild rose blossoms
On the little green place.
He sang that song. That was his song.
O, the green wothe botheth.
When you wet the bed first it is warm then it gets cold. His
mother
put on the oilsheet. That had the
queer smell.
His mother had a nicer smell than his father. She played on the
piano the sailor's hornpipe for him to
dance. He danced:
Tralala lala,
Tralala tralaladdy,
Tralala lala,
Tralala lala.
Uncle Charles and Dante clapped. They were older than his father
and
mother but uncle Charles was
older than Dante.
Dante had two brushes in her press. The brush with the maroon
velvet
back was for Michael Davitt and
the brush with the green velvet back was for Parnell. Dante gave
him a
cachou every time he brought
her a piece of tissue paper.
The Vances lived in number seven. They had a different father and
mother. They were Eileen's father
and mother. When they were grown up he was going to marry Eileen.
He
hid under the table. His mother
said:
--
O, Stephen will apologize.
Dante said:
--
O, if not, the eagles will come and pull out his eyes.--
Pull out his eyes,
Apologize,
Apologize,
Pull out his eyes.
Apologize,
Pull out his eyes,
Pull out his eyes,
Apologize.
Now this is impressive stuff, a great way of (in this
case) presenting the earliest childhood memories of Joyce's
central
character, Stephen Dedalus (who, by the way, is basically
Joyce himself
very thinly disguised). But, obviously, this is not the
kind of
stuff that is easy for the average person! Even more
difficult is
Joyce's most famous work, Ulysses.
In addition to showing the tendency to be less
accessible
to the average person, Joyce's work shows the tendency to
undercut
traditional standards and values. The plot of Ulysses
runs
parallel to Homer's Odyssey, and every character in the book
has a
parallel character in the Odyssey. But the basic values
are far
different. In the Odyssey, Penelope is the model of the
faithful
wife, waiting 20 years for her husbands return. In
Ulysses, the
corresponding character, Molly Blume, is anything but
faithful--and
with Joyce's apprent approval. Likewise, Joyce's "hero"
(Leopold Blume) certainly isn't heroic in the traditional
sense.
Further, Joyce's work show's the tendency to glorify
art
itself. In Portrait
of
the Artist as a Young Man, the young
Steven Dedalus throws away his Catholic faith for a new
religion: the
religion of art. For Joyce (and for many other modern
artists/writers) art really is a replacement for religion, and
we look
to the arts for answers that people once sought in religion.
Another 20th century writer using the stream of
consciousness style is Samuel Beckett. Beckett worked
with Joyce
directly for a time (helping with Ulysses), and then went on
to write
novels of his own, e.g., Molloy.
[See here the sucking-stone
passage
I talk about in class.]
Beckett's novels are filled with events with no logical
connection. "Absurd!" says the reader. "Right!"
says
Beckett. But life itself is absurd: much of what we do
has no
meaning, and literature should reflect the absurdities of
life.
Beckett expresses even better his ideas on life in his
theatrical works, works like Waiting
for Godot.
Waiting for
Godot
is perhaps the most famous example of
what is called Theater of the Absurd. The two central
characters,
Didi and Pogo, ramble on about this and that, and there
doesn't seem to
be much logical connection to the things they say or the
things that
happen to them. But then, in the middle of the play
there is a
moment where we think we are going to get clarity:
"Let us not waste our time in idle discourse! Let us do something,
while we have the chance! It is not every day that we are needed.
Not
indeed that we personally are needed. Others would meet the case
equally well, if not better. To all mankind they were addressed,
those
cries for help still ringing in our ears! But at this place, at this
moment of time, all mankind is us, whether we like it or not. Let us
make the most of it, before it is too late! Let us represent
worthily
for once the foul brood to which a cruel fate consigned us! What do
you
say? It is true that when with folded arms we weigh the pros and
cons
we are no less a credit to our species. The tiger bounds to the help
of
his congeners without the least reflection, or else he slinks away
into
the depths of the thickets. But that is not the question. What are
we
doing here, that is the question. And we are blessed in this, that
we
happen to know the answer. Yes, in this immense confusion one thing
alone is clear. We are waiting for Godot to come—or for night to
fall. We have kept our appointment, and there's an end in
that. How many people can boast as much?"
"Billions"
What are we doing here? We are waiting for Godot to
come. Notice that Godot is GODot. We are waiting for
God--or, at least, a revelation of purpose of some sort.
But
guess what? Godot never shows up. Message: there's
not much
point waiting to find out the meaning of life. You won't
find the
meaning of life because life has no meaning. Bleak, bleak,
bleak
stuff--except it isn't, or it isn't supposed to be.
Beckett subtitles his work a comedy in two acts (well, a
tragicomedy
says Wikipedia). We are supposed to be laughing. And
that's
what Beckett thinks we should do with life. Since we
aren't going
to
find any meaning in life, all we can do is laugh at its
absurdities.
And do you see how important art becomes from this point of
view?
It's our artists and writers who point out the absurdities, help
us
laugh at them and make life bearable.
Another master of the Theater of the Absurd style is Eugene
Ionesco. Both Beckett and Ionesco won Noble prizes, and
Ionesco's
plays were particularly successful. The Bald Soprano
had a more
than fifty year run in one French playhouse (it may be running
still
for all I know).
One of my favorite Ionesco plays is "A Stroll in the Air."
At one point, the central character, a writer named Berrenger,
mourns
the utter meaninglessness of life. He says he used to take
pleasure in
saying ther was nothing to say, but that, now he is so sure he
was
right, he can't even do that anymore. Again, bleak bleak
stuff.
But that's not the end of the play: it's the beginning!
Berrenger
goes out for a walk, and ends up "strolling through the
air," essentially, flying. Ionesco's message: when
you see
the absurdity and meaninglessness of life, don't give up in
despair. Take a leap--with your imagination.
And,
once again, one sees how important the arts become from this
point of
view. Since life has no meaning, it's our imaginations
that give
us the most we can hope to get out of life, and those people who
inspire our
imagination--well, let's have a round of applause for them,
shall we?
Closely related to the Theater of the Absurd are the works of
existentialist writers like Jean Paul Sartre. Albert Camus
is my
favorite of the existentialists, and I used to like Heinrich
Boll. However, the most famous of these writers (and the
one I
talk about in class) is Jean-Paul Sartre.
In the years after World War II, Sartre was treated basically
like a
rock star in France. His philosophical works, plays, and
novels
were extraordinarily popular. Eventually, he was offered a
Nobel
prize for literature--which he turned down. His was
surrounded by
thousands of admiring young people. What did he have to
offer? A special flavor of the existentialist philosophy.
There are several types of existentialism, but Sartre's brand is
what's
called atheistic existentialism. It begins with the idea
that
there is no God.
Now we have looked at atheistic philosophers already: Comte and
Marx,
for instance. But Sartre differs greatly from earlier
atheistic
philosophers in his attitude toward the godless world. For
Comte
and Marx, the idea that there was no God was liberating--a thing
to be
celebrated. For Sartre, it was a very bad thing that there
was no
god. If there is no God, there can be no universal
standards of
right and wrong. If there is a God, what God says is right
is
right, what God says is wrong is wrong. But if there is no
God,
all ideas are subjective--and that makes our lives very
difficult. How can we know what to do, how can we confront
difficult ethical decisions if we have no objective standards of
morality? Sartre's version of existentialism seeks a way out of
this
dilemma, offering a way of making moral decisions in the absence
of
objective standards of right and wrong.
Sartre says that, before taking any action, we should look deep
within
ourselves to discover where our own true values are, and then
should
act accordingly. If we do this, we will have acted in
"good
faith," authentically. If, on the other hand we do not
look
deeply within ourselves or if we fail to act in accord with that
which
is deepest within us, we will have acted in "bad faith,"
inauthentically.
Now this seems a plausible philosophy of life, similar to
Polonius'
advice in Hamlet, "This above all to thine own self be
true." But
what happens when one tries to apply this philosophy?
When I was in high school, I really liked Jean-Paul
Sartre--especially
his plays. One of Sartre's books was called "St. Genet, Actor
and
Martyr." It's about another French writer, Jean Genet, a
writer
Sartre greatly admired. I figured that, if Sartre liked
him,
Genet must be something special. There were no Genet books
in
the library, so I went to the bookstore and ordered a Genet
book, "Our
Lady of the Flowers."
It's the only book I have ever burned. The book is filthy,
featuring the most degraded and degrading stuff imaginable. So
why did
Sartre like it? Because Genet wrote about what he *really*
thought, what he *really* felt. Genet was, therefore,
"authentic"--and therefore good: good enough so that we should
call
Genet a saint! Note the tendency to stand traditional
ideas on
their head!
In Sartre's personal life, too, the existential philosophy led
to an
inversion of the usual moral standards. As Sartre looked
within
himself he saw a couple of things. He admits that he is
unable to
love. He admits that, as far as sex is concerned, incest
appeals
to him. His books and plays often applaud incestuous
relationships. And in his personal life--well, Sartre had
a
long-time live-in girlfriend, Simone de Beauvoir--his wife in
everything but the legal sense. Simone's young women
students
would often come to their home--and Sartre would seduce these
young
girls one after another. Horrible behavior in a
conventional
sense--but, from Sartre's point of view he was acting
"authentically." He really wanted these girls, and so, the
"right" thing to do is to act in accord with what he just
happened to
find deepest within himself.
[Simone de Beauvoir was the leading French
feminist writer of the time, and, when she died, French
feminists
proclaimed that they owed her "everything." Part of what
they
owed her a breaking down of the standards women can expect
from the men
in their lives.]
Interesting also is the political philosophy Sartre's
existentialism
leads him to adopt: Marxism. How is it that being "authentic"
leads one
to adopt such a brutal philosophy? My guess is that Marx,
and
many other modern artists and literary figures, are drawn to
Marxism
because of their hatred of the "bourgeoisie," and everything
associated
with middle class values. An awful lot of modern art and
literature is an attack on middle class values, an attempt to
shock the
bourgeoisie.
One example, a play we did at Stanford in the 1970's, Fernando
Arabel's
"The Architect and the Empire of Assyria." The play was
designed
to shock, featuring nudity, simulated cannibalism, references to
drinking urine and playing with excrement, sado-masochistic
priests,
pregnant nuns, and blasphemous lines.
But did it shock? Hardly. The audience, for the most part,
loved
it.
"Shocking
the bourgeoisie," a strategy adopted by so many modern
audience, didn't
work in the way that they intended. It did result in the
breaking
down of standards: if the great "artists" didn't have to
follow the
rules, why should anyone else? As the new standards
filtered down
into popular culture, the mediocre, banal and insipid was
replaced but
stuff that was equally mediocre, banal, and insipid--and
debasing at
the
same time.
This was not the way it was supposed to be. 20th
century
artists musicians and writers did want to break down
traditional
standards, but the idea was always that this
would be done to put up something better in their place.
And this just didn't happen. Plenty was destroyed, but
little worthwhile came out of the ashes. Instead, the
result of most of these 20th century artistic movements has
been despair, perversion, suicide, misery--not least for the
artists themselves. You see, the people I have been
talking
about, for all their talent, were not very nice people, nor
very happy people.
Pablo Picasso was a tremendous success--about as
successful as an artist can be. He had young women
throwing
themselves at him, all wanting to sleep with this great
genius.
Picasso was the kind of guy who likes a cigarette after
sex. And
what he would do is that, instead of reaching for an ash tray,
he'd put
out his cigarettes
on the body of the young woman he was sleeping with.
Psychologically healthy men do not treat women like
this,
and the absolutely awful way so many of the great "artists" of
the 20th
century treated women is strong evidence that they were not
happy
campers, and that there was something seriously wrong in their
approach
to
life. There seems to be a wrong turn--and it's easy to
guess
exactly where that wrong turn came.
Sartre wrote a short autobiography he called "The
Words." He describes his early years and his early
education in
the Catholic schools of France. He once turned in an essay on
the
Passion, the crucifixion of Christ. It had delighted his
family,
but it was awarded only a 2nd prize. He was disappointed
not to
be first, and said that this disappointment drove him into
prayerlessness. He "maintained public relations with the
Almighty, but
privately ceased to associate with him."
"Only once," says Sartre, "did I have the feeling he existed.
I
had been playing with matches and burned a small rug. I
was in
the process of covering up my crime when God saw me. I
felt his
gaze inside my head and on my hands. I whirled about in
the
bathroom, horribly visible, a live target. Indignation
saved me.
I flew into a rage against so crude an indescretion, I
blasphemed like
my grandfather: 'God damn it, God damn it, God damn it.' He
never
looked at me again.
This, it seems to me, is the wrong turn taken, not just
by
Sartre, but by much of the 20th century. We live in a
society
that has turned it's back on God, that thinks there's
something immoral and even illegal in talking about God.
In this class, many of you are uncomfortable whenever I
bring up religious subjects, and perhaps you think I'm doing
something wrong. But I want you to consider
something
exceedingly strange about our society. I could stand up
before a class and swear like John Paul Sartre (God d----) and
nobody would bat an eyelash. I could stand up and
blaspheme like Arabel (God's gone crazy...). And nobody
would
do a thing about it. But suppose I talked in a different
way
about God.
Suppose, instead of saying god d--- all the time
as
so many
people on this campus do, I used phrases like, "Glory to God",
"Praise the Lord." "Praise be to God." I'd get
into
trouble,
wouldn't I?
Suppose I told you that you ought to love God with all
heart, soul, mind, and strength. I'd get into trouble,
wouldn't I? And suppose I told you that the only life worth
living
was a life lived in obedience to the word of God. I'd
get into
trouble.
And when my students come to me, as they often do,
with tears in their eyes over the latest tragedy in their
lives,
carrying burdens so heavy that it breaks my heart--suppose
I told them what I would so much like to tell them about, a
God who knows every burden they carry, and wants to dry
every tear, and to give them lives of joy and peace and
happiness--I'd get into trouble, wouldn't I?
And if the shoe were on the other foot, as it so often
is,
and after another dreadfully difficult day where I am
struggling to
keep up, if I wasn't really up for a lecture, and started
class by
asking students to take a few minutes to pray for me, well,
I'd get
into trouble, wouldn't I?
And so I won't do any of those things. But I will tell
you
this. Ideas have consequences.
Every
major development in history begins with a set of ideas.
The
French Revolution, the Holocaust, Stalin's reign of
terror--all began
with ideas, ideas taught and spread in university classrooms.
Some of you are bored with ideas: but remember that it makes a
real
difference which
ideas win out. And remember that, every time you step
onto a
university campus, you are stepping on to a battleground--and
battle
for student hearts and
minds--and, perhaps, for their souls as well.
Good luck on the final exam.