Tag College Readiness

Separate Has A Rat In It

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All right: so I have two classes of College Readiness, and they both had to write a UChicago essay — and they both picked a prompt for me to write. (If you don’t know what I’m talking about, read this. If you want to see all the prompts, go here.)

The other class chose this one:

People often think of language as a connector, something that brings people together by helping them share experiences, feelings, ideas, etc. We, however, are interested in how language sets people apart. Start with the peculiarities of your own personal language—the voice you use when speaking most intimately to yourself, the vocabulary that spills out when you’re startled, or special phrases and gestures that no one else seems to use or even understand—and tell us how your language makes you unique. You may want to think about subtle riffs or idiosyncrasies based on cadence, rhythm, rhyme, or (mis)pronunciation.

Here is my response.

Language Separator

See the rat?

I am a dull man. 

I am utterly unspecial, solidly in the mainstream: I am a white American male, cis/het, raised vaguely Christian but now a non-practicing atheist. I am married. I am 49 years old. I own a car and a house, with a mortgage on the house. I have a Bachelor’s degree, more debt than savings, and I vote Democratic. All completely “normal,” in that people who look and live like I do have made sure that our culture believes that people who look and live like I do are the norm, the standard, the expectation – and therefore everyone else is a little weird, a little off, a little less than what they are “supposed” to be. Like most people who look and live like me, I am aware of my privilege, I oppose the unfair societal structures and institutions that promote it – but I don’t really do too much to change them, because after all, I do benefit from them. I feel guilty when I think about that, so I try not to think about it.

Sorry: that went too political. (I am keenly aware that some people find it awkward and uncomfortable – challenging – when I speak of political matters. I do not want to offend them, so I usually do not speak of political matters.) My real point is that there is very little about me that is, according to our society’s generally understood and accepted standards, abnormal.

Until I open my mouth.

My mouth itself is pretty normal (Though I have WAY more fillings than is normal, I think – over 40, with 5 crowns. I have abnormally bad teeth.), it’s what comes out that is abnormal. First of all, I have a weird accent: my parents (The most important influence on a person’s accent and dialect) are from the West Coast, Washington and California, so I speak somewhat in their accents; but I was raised first on Long Island, which has a distinct accent, and then in a suburb of Boston, which has a STRONG accent. I didn’t acquire or keep either of those accents in their entireties, but I did pick up a few pronunciations; and more, Boston’s speech patterns were strongly influential: I speak too fast, as Bostonians do, and I talk faster the more excited I get; and I cuss intemperately. So I sound like a mishmash of two coasts and four states.

It’s more than my accent and my speech patterns, though: it’s what I say.

Don’t get me wrong: I am a student and an artisan — a wright. A smith. — of language. I study literature and rhetoric, and have mastered them to a degree that allows me to teach, generally successfully. I possess linguistic capacity more than sufficient to enable the utilization of language both fanciful and ornate, drawing from the recondite and recherche realm of jargon as well as splashing through the filigree fountain of poetry.

I talk good, is what I’m saying.

 And, as you can see, because I can use language well: I can also abuse it.

My favorite form is mispronunciation. I enjoy completely destroying the actual sounds of words, especially foreign ones. Especially French. Because if any language has worse pronunciation than English, it’s French. That word I used between “recondite” and “realm?” I would enjoy saying that “ruh-churchy.” So I feel that we should pronounce La petite fromage, the little cheese, the way it is spelled: lah puh-teet froh-midge. I draw from classic influences to pronounce the K and the G in “knight,” and to describe for my students when they put the emPHAsis on the wrong syLLAble.

But mispronunciation alone is too simple; a little tame, really. Much more funner is improper forms of words, particularily when the wordination is constructicated of rootages and suffixery (Holy crap, autocorrect accepted that one!  Is that really a word?! Mmmmno, it’s redlined. I think I stunned the autocorrect.) that are close, almost recognizable — but also completely wrong. That’s the besterest. Though one step higher here is when I can corrupt a common usage of a modern slang term in order to make it seem more grammatical while also being deeply annoying: when I was on Twitter, for instance, I made a point of saying I twitted a twit, not tweeted a tweet – because after all, it wasn’t called “Tweeter,” was it? (Now it should be xitted a xit on Xitter, not xeeted a xeet on Xeeter. Though either one would presumably make Elon Musk apoplectic, and that’s a good use of language.)

I admit it’s a touch upsetting that I say these kinds of things and play these kinds of games with my students, because for some reason, they trust me to steer them right with their usage of English, the poor innocent fools; I’m sure I’ve given more than one a bad idea about words from some joke or other — though I will further admit that that’s funny. I do teach them the real insane trivia hidden deep in the pockets of the English language: the word floccinaucinihilipilification (WHICH I TYPED RIGHT THE FIRST TIME) and the sentence “Buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo.” Both of which are real. And “Y’all’d’nt’ve,” which is not real, but should be. These all show actual facets of this mad and madcap and maddening language that I love, so they are all lessons, on some level, at some point. And I’ll bet you dollars to donuts that most English teachers do not teach those lessons.

Then there are the foreign accents (Or as I am fond of saying, the furrin accents, which we don’t talk here in ‘Murrica.). A number of them show up when I read aloud, when there is some identifiable speech pattern in the dialogue, or a clear setting in an accentish area. I’ll read British stories in my best London fog, and I’ve read ev’ry danged word of Huck Finn by that Mark Twain feller in my best countrified speechery. I do sometimes use my past exposure to New York and Boston accents to play those characters when reading, especially if someone needs to be a tough guy; but I don’t put on my Pepe Le Pew when I read Guy de Maupassant’s “The Necklace.” And I never use Apu Nahasapeemapetilon’s accent, not even when I read The God of Small Things. On the other hand, I will neither confirm nor deny that Neil Gaiman’s story “Truth is a Cave in the Black Mountains” retains a place in my Fantasy Literature elective specifically because I get to use my Scottish brogue.

Of course, none of these accents have the same color, force or frequency as my pirate accent. Not only because I dress up like a pirate for every Halloween, and dress up my voice like one on every September 19th (International Talk Like a Pirate Day, if ye be of the uninitiated). Also because I love doing that accent, and so it shows up whenever anyone makes a pirate reference around me, which is fairly frequent given my reputation and the assorted pirate paraphernalia which I have acquired over the years. If anyone tells me a pirate joke, I am honor-bound to respond in the appropriate manner: “AYE LAD, THAT WERE A FINE SALLY — I’LL SHARE IT WITH ME OWN CREW, THE NEXT TIME I WANT THEM ALL TO FALL ILL OF VILE PUN-ISHMENT! HAR HAAARRRRRRR!!”

Even this list, though, is not exhaustive, because it doesn’t include the character voices I use. In class there are a few definite ones; I am very fond of the voice of Gollum from The Lord of the Rings, as performed by Andy Serkis; it’s a bit rough on the throat, but so very taassssstttyy, precioussssss… And just to one side of that, almost two sides of the same coin, is the voice of Edna Mode from The Incredibles, which I also love using, as long as it is attached to the right character (NO! CAPES!). Those two are my favorites, though also I am not above talking like a Goodfella (“Do I amuse you? What am I, some kinda clown to you?”) or the Lennie of the cartoons (“And I will hug him and pet him and love him and squeeze him and call him George!”) though never when I read Of Mice and Men because that book makes me cry and I can’t make fun of it that way. 

And it goes on from there. When I am reading test directions aloud and I get to a portion that is capitalized or in bold print, I will shout those words at the top of my lungs (“DO NOT WRITE IN THE MARGINS OF THE ANSWER SHEET”), without any warning at all; partly because I like to make my students jump (and laugh, because breaking the tension is part of my job), and partly because I want to make fun of the directions, which are universally terrible. I can actually sing reasonably well, but when I sing in class I usually make my voice sound as awful as I possibly can, intentionally breaking and scratchy and missing all of the notes. I sometimes read as fast as I can, which thanks to my Bostonian upbringing is pretty damn fast, so that all the words run together into a completely indistinguishable fog of sounds.

So the question is: why? Why do I do this? Why am I like this? Especially given my responsibility as a teacher, and my deep and abiding love for my language, and for speech both written and spoken?

Honestly? I don’t know.

It might be because I don’t want to conform. I have to follow the rules in too many ways already; even worse, I have to fight for the rules, have to make other people obey them, have to get them in trouble when they break them: and I hate that. I also can’t stand it when people turn up their noses – or even worse, break into that violent, assaultive cackle that people put on – when they catch someone saying something “wrong,” and they take advantage to say, “It’s ‘wrongly,’ you pathetic dolt!” I hate the arrogance of that, the contempt of it. I hate the hard-edged insistence on rules: when we all know that in English, the rules don’t apply. Tell me the “I before E rule.” Go on. I dare you. 

There are no rules in English, other than the only rule that matters in any language, in any form of communication: if communication was successful among all parties, then the language was effective. That’s it. That’s the whole point. We speak and we write in order to communicate something. Sometimes there is a secondary purpose (or even a primary one) such as intimidation or seduction or persuasion; but in those cases, the goal of the intimidator or seducer or persuader is still a goal that must be communicated, even if only by achieving it. But if my audience can understand what I want them to understand, then nothing else matters: that’s the truth. That’s what I want people to understand, to absorb and believe. That’s why I tell my students (sometimes to the chagrin of my fellow English teachers) that you may start a sentence with “and” or “but,” and you may use “I” in a formal writing context, and you may use contractions, as well. And you may cuss: because sometimes the only word that properly communicates one’s message is “FUCK!!”

Oops. Got too offensive there. Now this document’s going to get flagged. A much worse F-word.

I love playing with English. That’s why I love ee cummings (Even though much of his poetry is political, and even more of it is offensive: but all of it is fun.), who wrote like this:

love is more thicker than forget

more thinner than recall

more seldom than a wave is wet

more frequent than to fail

it is most mad and moonly

and less it shall unbe

than all the sea which only

is deeper than the sea

love is less always than to win

less never than alive

less bigger than the least begin

less littler than forgive

it is most sane and sunly

and more it cannot die

than all the sky which only

is higher than the sky

 and why I admire and enjoy the novel Riddley Walker by Russell Hoban (Even though it is very political, and therefore quite offensive… but it’s okay, because Russell Hoban also wrote this), which looks like this:

Looking at the moon all col and wite and oansome. Lorna said to me, ‘You know Riddley theres some thing in us it dont have no name.’ 

I said, ‘What thing is that?’ 

She said, ‘Its some kynd of thing it aint us but yet its in us. Its looking out thru our eye hoals. May be you dont take no noatis of it only some times. Say you get woak up suddn in the middl of the nite. 1 minim youre a sleap and the nex youre on your feet with a spear in your han. Wel it wernt you put that spear in your han it wer that other thing whats looking out thru your eye hoals. It aint you nor it dont even know your name. Its in us lorn and loan and sheltering how it can.’ 

 and A Clockwork Orange by Anthony Burgess (Which is both extremely political and EXTREMELY offensive, so…maybe we shouldn’t talk about it.), which looks like this:

“What’s it going to be then, eh?” 

There was me, that is Alex, and my three droogs, that is Pete, Georgie, and Dim. Dim being really dim, and we sat in the Korova Milkbar making up our rassoodocks what to do with the evening, a flip dark chill winter bastard though dry. The Korova Milkbar was a milk-plus mesto, and you may, O my brothers, have forgotten what these mestos were like, things changing so skorry these days and everybody very quick to forget, newspapers not being read much neither. Well, what they sold there was milk plus something else. They had no licence for selling liquor, but there was no law yet against prodding some of the new veshches which they used to put into the old moloko, so you could peet it with vellocet or synthemesc or drencrom or one or two other veshches which would give you a nice quiet horrorshow fifteen minutes admiring Bog And All His Holy Angels and Saints in your left shoe with lights bursting all over your mozg. Or you could peet milk with knives in it, as we used to say, and this would sharpen you up and make you ready for a bit of dirty twenty-to-one, and that was what we were peeting this evening I’m starting off the story with.

and all the fantasy novels and science fiction movies and so on that make up entirely new languages, and then translate them into English: because language is fun. The more fun you have, the better it works. The more fun it is, the more you want to use it: and that makes more communication, which means more connection, which means more peace, love, and understanding.

And that would be the besteresterest.

The point of this essay was meant to be what in my language use sets me apart, divides me from other people; I do think it is the degree to which I mess with language, the number of games I play with it, the variety of ways I push the bounds of what is acceptable and what is normal. I do all those things more than most people; and that’s what sets me apart. What I don’t try to do, ever, is make my language harder to understand, to make communication fail: it is maybe my worst habit as a writer that I always try, over and over, to make my communication more clear, to explain further, to give another example, another synonym. As you can see. It makes me much too wordy in my writing. But it also makes me a good (if talkative and boring) teacher. It makes me a good friend, and a good husband, because I always try to explain what I am thinking and what I am feeling; I always try to communicate (And I realize that communication also requires listening, if you were thinking that I do all the talking. I don’t. It’s just that my turn takes three or four times as long.). My wife and I rarely fight because of that, and our fights usually end in compromise and agreement: because we communicate. (I don’t deserve all the credit for that. My wife is exceptionally good at understanding me, and herself, and she listens too. She is also very patient with me, which I appreciate forever.) I think it’s good that I am able to use humor to break up those long, repetitive speeches in which I try to explain everything I am thinking, over and over again.

I just wish other people enjoyed my portmanteaus as much as I do.

Oo! That’s one I forgot to mention! Portmanteaus: when you put two words together into a single word, like breakfast+lunch=brunch, or smoke+fog=smog. I love those things. I think of them constantly, and I bring them up all the time – here, wait, I have a list of my favorite ones.

What’s that? Oh – you have to leave? No time to discuss word nerdery with me? I understand. 

Maybe next time.

And then again: maybe not. 

Just know that I’ll always be here, ready to talk about words, ready to play word games – and ready to communicate. And whether that makes me different, or makes me just like everyone else, I don’t actually care. As long as we’re having fun. And not being … too offensive.

Oh and — fun being offensive? That’s offunsive. And that is a portmanteau.

What A Piece Of Work

Dusty 1 Comment
Meeting Alien Astronaut On Mysterious Planet Stock Illustration 1796849164 | Shutterstock

So every year, I teach a class called College Readiness. It is intended, among other things, to help students apply to college and win admission; since I am an English teacher, that means helping them write application essays. I generally use the Common App prompts — which I recommend, if you’re looking for college admission essay topics — and they write several drafts over the year, with revisions and feedback about how to make their essays more interesting and more effective.

And then, for their last essay draft of the year, I have them pick one of the topics from the University of Chicago’s list of topics. They have two essay questions for their applicants: the first is a very standard, straightforward essay, about why you want to attend UChicago and what you are looking for there; and then the second — well.

They asked prior students and graduates for ideas for essay topics. And those students and alumni delivered.

You should go take a look at them — but here are some highlights.

Essay Option 1

Exponents and square roots, pencils and erasers, beta decay and electron capture. Name two things that undo each other and explain why both are necessary.
– Inspired by Emmett Cho, Class of 2027

Essay Option 2

“Where have all the flowers gone?” – Pete Seeger. Pick a question from a song title or lyric and give it your best answer.
– Inspired by Ryan Murphy, AB’21

Essay Option 3

“Vlog,” “Labradoodle,” and “Fauxmage.” Language is filled with portmanteaus. Create a new portmanteau and explain why those two things are a “patch” (perfect match).
– Inspired by Garrett Chalfin, Class of 2027

Essay Option 4

A jellyfish is not a fish. Cat burglars don’t burgle cats. Rhode Island is not an island. Write an essay about some other misnomer, and either come up with and defend a new name for it or explain why its inaccurate name should be kept.
– Inspired by Sonia Chang, Class of 2025, and Mirabella Blair, Class of 2027

Essay Option 5

Despite their origins in the Gupta Empire of India or Ancient Egypt, games like chess or bowling remain widely enjoyed today. What modern game do you believe will withstand the test of time, and why?
– Inspired by Adam Heiba, Class of 2027

Essay Option 6

There are unwritten rules that everyone follows or has heard at least once in their life. But of course, some rules should be broken or updated. What is an unwritten rule that you wish didn’t exist? (Our custom is to have five new prompts each year, but this year we decided to break with tradition. Enjoy!)
– Inspired by Maryam Abdella, Class of 2026

Essay Option 7

And, as always… the classic choose your own adventure option! In the spirit of adventurous inquiry, choose one of our past prompts (or create a question of your own). Be original, creative, thought provoking. Draw on your best qualities as a writer, thinker, visionary, social critic, sage, citizen of the world, or future citizen of the University of Chicago; take a little risk, and have fun!

So I require my students to choose one of the topics — there are over 40 others after these six — and write an essay on it. And I ask them if there is one topic they would like me to write an essay about.

This was their choice for this year:

You are on an expedition to found a colony on Mars, when from a nearby crater, a group of Martians suddenly emerges. They seem eager to communicate, but they’re the impatient kind and demand you represent the human race in one song, image, memory, proof, or other idea. What do you share with them to show that humanity is worth their time?

And here is my response.

Okay look. There are a bunch of assumptions in this question. First it assumes that I want to communicate with the Martians, when in reality I might just want to atomize them with my Blastotron 5,000,0000X Destructothunderation Disintegratorianator. And that does seem like a poor assumption since I am an American, after all. When have we ever talked first and slaughtered after? Then it assumes – even more strangely – that the Martians have the same senses we do, and would be able to appreciate something I could present to them at all, let alone having the same aesthetic senses or interest in what I would have to present. It assumes that I would have this thing on me at the moment I met them, or access to it (which probably shows an assumption based on the existence and ubiquity of smartphones, which is fine, I would no doubt have my phone with me on the Martian surface – but also, I bet the wifi signal there sucks.), and that I wouldn’t just be limited to what I would normally be able to produce on the spot – which now relies on my performance skills. (Which are, I grant, stellar. Out of this world, even. Especially my punnery.)

And worst of all: the question assumes I believe humanity is worth the Martians’ time. 

So, considering all these considerations, I have several answers, the specific choice between being reliant on the specific situation. 

First, I would not immediately blast the Martians, because of course it would be better to lull them into complacency and then carry out a sneak attack later, preferably on their home territory; that’s the proper American way.

Second, we’ll take it as a given that the Martians would have at least similar senses to mine – though I will say, if they do have a different set of senses, I would absolutely play to that, because a society focused on smell would be far more impressed by our greatest olfactory achievements than any symphony or art work or whatever I could present. (And in that case, the smell would be a Thanksgiving feast: the scents of turkey and gravy, fresh bread, and apple pie, with a delicate touch of the smell of candle wax burning, hickory wood burning in the fireplace, and a whiff of my wife’s perfume.) But for the sake of argument, we’ll accept that they would use primarily sight and sound to interact with their environment, otherwise they wouldn’t be able to communicate their intentions to me, and if they just came at me waving their tentacles or whatever, it’s Blastotron time. On sight.

So what would I show them to prove that humanity is worthwhile – or, in a more moralistic sense, that we are good? See, now we get into questions of aesthetics, for art, or into questions of values in general, and it becomes almost impossible to answer. I recognize that the goal of the prompt is to examine my aesthetics, my values, to find out what I think is the highest achievement of humanity; but since my area of interest and expertise is actually rhetoric, and that means I choose my communication with my audience in mind, I know better than to decide something like this only using my own criteria and nothing else. If you seriously just want me to pick the best thing in the world according to me with no other considerations at all, I’m going to go with the poetry of ee cummings, particularly “anyone lived in a pretty how town.” But see, much of the beauty in that poem comes from understanding both human society and the history of human poetry, and it wouldn’t translate quickly enough to the Martians; so that can’t be my answer.

If we imagine that the Martians have been watching us through Martioscopes for centuries – and why wouldn’t they? Don’t we watch fail videos constantly on YouTube? And what is human history if not one giant fail video? – then the background knowledge necessary to understand the context could actually be assumed; and in that case, I might go with something like cummings’s poetry. Or for visual art, I would probably select Michelangelo’s Pieta, or the Sistine Chapel ceiling. Or, for the sake of including multiple senses in my appeal for the value of humanity, I might go with a performance of an opera or a musical, because that can include singing, dancing, music and literature, all at once. In that case I would pick Hamilton, which I think is utterly brilliant  dramatically, musically, and poetically — though that thought process does lead me to consider movies as a way to include visual and auditory art, and to include many different kinds of aesthetic appeal: and in that case I would choose either Pleasantville, partly because it includes quite a bit of very beautiful art; or Fantasia, because it includes so much beautiful music.

But this all assumes that art is the highest achievement of humanity. I think there is an argument for that, because what is important for humanity, specifically, has to be the things that are unique to humanity; and the only things I believe are unique to humanity are the search for truth, and the creation of beauty, both for no reason apart from the intrinsic value of truth, and of beauty. Other creatures seek and discover truth – the best way to pull termites out of a mound, for instance – but they do it in pursuit of survival, not for the joy of discovery and the goal of understanding. Not that survival is less valuable than art for art’s sake and truth for understanding’s sake; but survival for survival’s sake is less human. So I do think that beauty is one of the crowning achievements of humanity: but I would have a much more difficult time arguing that it is the only, or the best, achievement of humanity, rather than truth.

So I have to also consider: what is our greatest truth?

Is it science? Perhaps; but the creation of the scientific method as a formula is pretty well associated with only one man – and I have a hard time accepting that a dude who died trying to freeze chicken is literally the one best person in the history of humanity. Especially when his name was Francis Bacon. But then, if it’s not science, what is it? What is the one greatest truth that humanity has ever known, which I could then speak to an alien race and show them what we have accomplished?

I can’t think of one. (Take it as a given that it is not math.) Mainly because so much of our truth-seeking has to do with ourselves: and we still don’t know jack about ourselves, not really. I could go with “The only thing that I know is that I know nothing,” from Socrates, or “Existence is suffering, and suffering is caused by desire” from the Buddha; but honestly, I think “All you need is love” by Sir Paul McCartney is just about as profound and valuable as either of those. 

That’s why I turn to art. But that’s not fair: because I’m biased. So my biased answer suits the intent of the essay prompt, as my choice says something about me; but it wouldn’t actually present the pinnacle of human achievement unless I assume that I am qualified to judge that – which implies that I am the pinnacle of human judgment. And I’m not: I ate Peeps dipped in salsa. That was not sound judgment on my part. This, of course, also implies that I should not be choosing the pinnacle of human artistic achievement (though I sure did that without hesitation, didn’t I?), as that too requires judgment.

So I think the best answer is this: I would not choose.

Because I know nothing, because I have great respect for humanity (And much respect for myself, don’t get me wrong; but more for humanity), and because I don’t actually accept the premise of this question, I think that what I would choose to present to show the worth of humanity is – humanity. 

All of it. All of us. Because part of the glory of humanity is how incredibly different we all are, how various, how multifarious; and yet at the same time, how similar: because my mom is nothing like your mom, and yet somehow, the way my mother used to kiss my head when she tucked me in is exactly how your mother kissed you when she tucked you in. Or maybe how your father did, or your grandparent. The way I look up into warm raindrops and smile is exactly the same way you do it, when we are dancing in the rain. The incredible pride I feel when I finish the project I’ve been working on – whether it’s a novel about vampires or pirates, or a bookshelf I built, or the successful sale of my mother-in-law’s house after her husband died – is the same as the incredible pride you feel when you finish what you’ve been working on, whether that is a sales presentation, a complete re-watch of every episode of Supernatural, or helping your child master their dance for the Christmas recital. And yet how much does your child’s dance recital routine resemble my pirate novel?

It depends: does your kid dance the hornpipe?

If I want to show humanity’s greatest achievement, I think I have to show humanity’s greatest strength: our diversity, our individuality, and our unique and personal ability to take almost anything and turn it into a work of art, a magnificent accomplishment, just because one human being – and often, no one else on the whole damn planet – saw that activity, that pursuit, that project, that idea, as worth all of one human being’s time and energy and focus: and thus that one human being accomplished something incredible.

Now, this would likely encounter some resistance from the Martians. Because, as the prompt says, these beings are impatient: they are the ones who asked me for one single piece of work to present to them to represent all of humanity.

But really? That’s just a request for a sales pitch. They’re asking me to convince them that one thing is the best thing in all of human history. (I would prove this by asking them to show me, first, the one thing that represents all of Martian culture. And by the way, if they could do so, then I would have an excellent idea of what their aesthetics or values are, and I could think of one wonderful example to show them in return. But I bet I’m right: because this seems like an absurd request with any race. I mean, show me the best cat of all time. The best horse. The greatest star. You see? There are too many criteria, too many options, in almost any collection of items as large as everything accomplished in an entire race’s history.) So I would first show them this:

And then express that here we have an example of nearly perfect writing, combined with – I wouldn’t necessarily call it nearly perfect acting, because I don’t want to judge; but it’s not only one artist, you see? The words have to be brought to life by the actor, and the end result – is that the accomplishment of one human? Or two? Or many, since directors and acting coaches and everyone else who contributed to these performances also participated in the creation of this moment. And since there are so many interpretations and versions of this particular speech written by William Shakespeare, it’s hard to say if this one is the best version of it – or maybe this one.

Or this one.

Or no. It’s this one.

(Actually, I can’t find a clip of my favorite version of this speech, which was my first encounter with it: when Nick Nolte gives the monologue in the movie Down and Out in Beverly Hills. Other than that one, I think I actually like Cumberbatch the best out of these.)

But the point is, I would argue, that because of the individual ability of humans to interpret reality, and to translate it, inculcating our own ideas and feelings into what we take in, blending what we learn with what we are – to understand one great accomplishment of one human, one also has to appreciate the other versions of the same idea, the same art, the same achievement. When I was young, I was deeply impressed by Thomas Edison – and then when I learned about Nikola Tesla, I was even more impressed by him, because of what I had felt about Edison; and then, honestly, I was once again impressed by Edison (Though I know that isn’t the popular interpretation, as the memes nowadays would have us believe that Tesla was all of the genius and Edison only stole it: but no, Edison was more than that. But this isn’t the argument I want to have with these Martians.).

If I got them listening with my versions of this speech as presented by different actors, I would then point out that every one of Shakespeare’s plays was based on a story written by someone else. That the Bard himself, whom I still consider the greatest wordsmith in the history of the English language, wrote adapted rather than original screenplays – and who knows, maybe the Boccaccio version was better. 

(Okay, that pun might be the greatest accomplishment of humanity. But probably not.)

So then, once I had them on the hook with this idea that different humans can create different versions of the same masterpiece and make it into entirely new and different masterpieces – then I would show them all of humanity that they could ever want to see.

I would show them the internet.

I would hand over my phone, and starting with the items that I have mentioned here – the poetry of ee cummings, and the art of Michelangelo, and the work of Shakespeare and of Lin-Manuel Miranda, and of Pleasantville and Fantasia, and also Mozart’s Requiem and the album In the Court of the Crimson King and Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings and Arundhati Roy’s The God of Small Things and everything else that is perfect – I would show them everything that can be found on the internet that shows what humanity is and what humanity can do.

Including the wars. And the genocides. The atrocities and the errors and the destructions. The atomic bombs. The Holocaust. The history of holy wars around the world. Because those, the perfect masterpieces of evil that we have created: those are humanity too.

And the Martians should have some warning, at least.

And then, once they were all completely riveted by what they saw on the screen?

Blastotron.

And a One, and a Two, and a Trivium, and a Quadrivium…

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As I am wont to do, I assigned my students an essay. As I am also wont to do, I wrote the essay myself. 

The essay topic was free choice within parameters. This was for my College Readiness class: a tangled web, that one is, since it is, first of all, not much about readying the students for college; more about readying them for the college application process, primarily the ACT – which just happens to be the standardized test used to determine the school’s success rate and overall quality rating. Which is, understandably, more important to the school than it is to the students. Also, the class has two sections, and three teachers; so I have one group only on Tuesdays and Wednesdays, and the other group Thursdays and Fridays; they also have math two days a week, and “college and career counseling” on the fifth day, with the school counselor. In addition, the class is required, but it doesn’t fit into the usual categories, so the students get elective credit: making it a required elective, an amusing little oxymoron. Also, it is not required for everyone, because in theory all Juniors have to take the class – but if there happens to be a conflict with a “more important” class, such as math or science, then the student is excused from College Readiness: but if the class is a mere elective, such as life drawing, which happened to be scheduled for the same period as College Readiness this year, then the students who want to take the art class are instead forced into College Readiness.

But all that is beside the point. (Actually, it’s not, which is why I said all of it. But hold on.) The point is, I assigned my class an essay, and then gave them free choice in the topic of the essay. I love doing that, because they SUCK at picking topics. Completely terrible at it. There are some with interests of their own, and enough capacity for words to have something to say about their interests; they have a very easy time of choosing a subject and then writing about it, and good for them. But for the most part? Yikes. Free choice is the worst kind of essay.

YARN | don't make me choose, | Twilight: New Moon (2009) | Video gifs by quotes | 2605222e | 紗

So to help them out a little, I gave them a resource. My part of the CR course has two elements: first, yes, I do try to prepare them for the ACT, and the SAT if they want to take that one; college application tests are valuable and difficult, even though we make far too much of their ability to predict success, which is limited at best. But in my part of the class, we do practice the test, work on process of elimination and strategies for finding information in a reading passage, and so on. The second element is application essays: if they are planning on going to college, then next year, when they are Seniors, they will need to write an application essay; so we work on that now, in Junior year, in this class. I use the Common App, a website that creates a single set of application materials which the students can use to apply to any number of colleges around the world; it’s a useful efficiency, and also a good generic application format, for practice. For those who aren’t going to college or who aren’t sure, I see these essays as simply good writing practice: also, I want them to get better at speaking well of themselves, and advocating for themselves, which are both useful skills in all walks of life, and both things most teenagers suck at, because they think talking about themselves is cringey, and bragging about themselves is appallingly arrogant. So we practice essays.

For the first three, I insist they choose a topic from the Common App, which has seven generic topics – things like “What is a problem you overcame and how did you learn from it?” “What is a part of your background or identity that isn’t on your application, but which you think we should know?” – but then for this last one, I show them the University of Chicago supplemental questions.

You see, U. Chicago has, for the last several years, offered a specific question as part of their application. The first question they ask is of the usual type: How does the University of Chicago, as you know it now, satisfy your desire for a particular kind of learning, community, and future? Please address with some specificity your own wishes and how they relate to UChicago.

But then for the second essay, they do this:

Each year we email newly admitted and current College students and ask them for essay topics. We receive several hundred responses, many of which are eloquent, intriguing, or downright wacky.

Those essay topics, which can be found here, are everything they say they are. They include topics like this:

What advice would a wisdom tooth have?

–Inspired by Melody Dias, Class of 2025

And

You are on an expedition to found a colony on Mars, when from a nearby crater, a group of Martians suddenly emerges. They seem eager to communicate, but they’re the impatient kind and demand you represent the human race in one song, image, memory, proof, or other idea. What do you share with them to show that humanity is worth their time?

—Inspired by Alexander Hastings, Class of 2023, and Olivia Okun-Dubitsky, Class of 2026

And

UChicago has been affiliated with over 90 Nobel laureates. But, why should economics, physics, and peace get all the glory? You are tasked with creating a new category for the Nobel Prize. Explain what it would be, why you chose your specific category, and the criteria necessary to achieve this accomplishment.

—Inspired by Isabel Alvarez, Class of 2026

And

Genghis Khan with an F1 racecar. George Washington with a SuperSoaker. Emperor Nero with a toaster. Leonardo da Vinci with a Furby. If you could give any historical figure any piece of technology, who and what would it be, and why do you think they’d work so well together?

-Inspired by Braden Hajer, Class of 2025

And so on. 

Last year, my students challenged me to write an essay to this prompt:

Find x.

—Inspired by Benjamin Nuzzo, an admitted student from Eton College, UK

Because they were hoping to force me to talk about math, which I frequently and loudly say I dislike. (I don’t, but the whole school community where I work promotes STEM and talks smack about the arts – why do you think the math and science students get out of College Readiness, but not the art students? – and I want to push back a little bit. Also, I do have some issues with math, but that’s not important right now.) So I wrote about a pirate finding treasure where X marks the spot. 

Checkmate, Math Nerds. 

This year they didn’t want to choose a topic for me: so I chose one for myself. Here it is:

 The seven liberal arts in antiquity consisted of the Quadrivium — astronomy, mathematics, geometry, and music — and the Trivium — rhetoric, grammar, and logic. Describe your own take on the Quadrivium or the Trivium. What do you think is essential for everyone to know?

And here is the essay I wrote about it.

Understanding the Trivium and Quadrivium

Dr. Jeffrey Lehman Explains the “Arts of the Word” and the “Arts of Number”

Written by Finn Cleary

The trivium consists of grammar, logic, and rhetoric, while the quadrivium consists of arithmetic, astronomy, music, and geometry. Together, Dr. Lehman says they lead students to see a “unified idea of reality.”

“The trivium was always pursued first,” Dr. Lehman says. “It’s commonly called the ‘Arts of the Word’ and focuses on different ways you can attend to words. Grammar is used in logic, which is used in rhetoric, for example. All of them move toward a proper presentation of the truth, which speaks to the mind and to the passions.”

Next, students of the liberal arts traditionally move to the quadrivium, or the ‘Arts of Number or Quantity.’

“Humans communicate with each other using words. Humans communicate with the natural order in numbers and in quantities. By discerning those natural relationships, we come to better understand the cosmos. It speaks to us, and we can talk to the greater universe. “

Source

This, by the way, is the image of me teaching that my students took. And altered.

I have often thought that I was born in the wrong century. I would like to exist a hundred years earlier than I do; because my professions and my passions would be, I think, more valuable then; I would still be able to teach, perhaps at a college instead of a high school (but also, I think I would make a decent one-room-schoolhouse teacher) and my writing would be more marketable, and would perhaps furnish me a non-teaching career, which would be lovely. 

But there is an attraction with going back even further in time: perhaps to a time when universities taught the quadrivium and the trivium, the two sections of what are bafflingly called the liberal arts, even though they were at the time pretty much all sciences. I appreciate that there is a professor at a small liberal arts college in southern Michigan who teaches about the quadrivium and the trivium, which I quoted above, but I’m not sure I agree with his explanation of them and how they work and why they are important. 

Math is how we interact with the natural order? Is it really? I guess we quantify and measure and compare natural things, all of which are math-adjacent if not actually math; but is that all we do? What about living in the natural order in the natural world, of which we are a part? But okay, we’re not talking about life, we’re talking about academia and education. Still: what about art inspired by the natural world; is that not how humans communicate with the world around us? It seems to me like it is. Of course, the classic quadrivium did include music, which I appreciate; but I’m leery of music being the one art when someone starts speaking about mathematics (and when two of the other subjects are math, and the last of the four is a math-heavy science), because there is a strong correlation between music and math. I don’t think that’s all of music, by any means; but I suspect that studying the quadrivium in a program that thinks math is the key to the universe would not teach me so much about improvisational jazz.

(Somewhere right now there’s a math/music geek just revving up a lecture on how there is many maths in jazz. The silences and the spaces between the notes on the scale, the rhythms and repetitions and so on. I get it, sir. Keep your beret on.)

I also take some issue with the trivium, as Dr. Lehman describes it and as ancient universities taught it: grammar to logic to rhetoric as the “arts of the word” is a good way to study language, I agree. But the idea that you could even consider the arts of the word and not talk about poetry? About the great works of literature, past and present and future? That doesn’t even make any sense to me. And “logic” as part of the art of language is a little too close to the math of language, as well: logic is important, both to life and to the proper use of language; but it’s also just about the only place where language can be turned into formulae and equations and functions. 

The other place is grammar. Or word problems, but I think we can all agree that those are abominations.

Doug Maclean Mac GIF - Doug Maclean Mac Kyper GIFs

However: I do think the study of language as a foundation for further learning makes perfect sense. I don’t know that I would split it out in that manner, though. I don’t know that studying grammar would be as effective now as it was in the long-ago past; partly because people are far more grammar-savvy now (assuming that they actually read) when they get to university than they would have been in the illiterate ages where nobody had access to books or very much printed media at all; and partly because I don’t think that studying grammar really helps appreciate and understand language all that much. It helps you to understand grammar. And that enables you to write correctly, but writing correctly does not mean writing well, and I think writing well is far more important. 

So I have some suggestions for an update of the trivium and quadrivium. 

If we consider the trivium to be the stage when we learn how to understand things, instruction in the processes rather than the actual content, I consider that both a reasonable lens to look at the curriculum through, and also a reflection of how we do most school: elementary and middle school are largely about learning how to learn, learning the basic processes and systems of thought, including learning how to read and write, learning how to do math, learning how to think scientifically. Basically for the first seven or eight years of school, we are learning how to think. Then high school, and even more so college, is where we learn things to think about: this is where the serious content appears, and gives us something to understand, which then allows us to build what should be the final goal of all education: our own understanding of the world and our place in it. Every individual should find and create that understanding for themselves, and since that understanding shapes all of one’s life afterwards, it seems like the right goal to see as the pinnacle of education: as the final project before graduation.

So the trivium in university should be the fundamental ways that we think: Language. Mathematics. Art. (“What?!” I hear you cry. “You’re including math?!?!” Sure, I don’t like it, but I respect what it is and what it can do for people.) I think there is room in these to allow for some individual course selection, meaning that the “art” umbrella can comprise visual arts, music, dance, and even poetry, though that might focus too much attention on language when combined with the other strand of study. Definitely we need to learn more about language and how language works and how to manipulate it: too many people focus on too few aspects of language, and that leaves most of us open to manipulation in various ways, and whenever we are manipulated, we don’t learn something we should learn – and that makes it easier to manipulate us next time, and the next thing you know, Donald Trump is president. The same is true for mathematics, and I’d like the university trivium study of mathematics to be more in applied mathematics: probability, statistics, and probably economics, though I’m certainly open to a stronger statement from a more mathy perspective on the specifics there. The language study in the trivium should include some study of grammar in the sense of learning how language is constructed and how we construct meaning with it; I tend to think of that as rhetoric. It should also, without a doubt, include the learning of a foreign language, and I’d like to see that be a different language than the one people “learned” in high school, and I’d like to see the study of that language include study abroad. 

But I’m getting a bit far afield here. The point is that the trivium should be about the ways that we can interact with the world, the ways we can construct thought, the ways we can create meaning: it’s the modes of thought that we can control, that we can manipulate. It’s how we think and how we learn, not necessarily the content, yet.

That’s where the quadrivium comes in. That’s when we learn the material that we are now ready to understand better, to chew and digest, to manipulate and shape, to make something out of. The raw material for building, after the trivium shows us how to build. Where the trivium focused inward, on the ways we think and the ways we communicate – communication with others would be outward, of course, but we also communicate with ourselves, through language and math and art, all three – the quadrivium should focus outward. It should show us about the world we live in, and the people we live with, and how we all, world and people, fit into the larger universe. My first quadrivium subject, then, would be history, as that would give us some understanding of who we are as a people, as a human race. (I would also start with that because I think of “liberal arts” as being the humanities, so science can wait its turn.) I think we need to learn history, but I think we struggle with it in school because we don’t follow the thought process of the trivium and quadrivium, first learn how to learn and then learn things worth learning; learning history when one is still mastering how to read is too difficult, because there is so very much information to take in. Learning the impact of history without having a grasp on the mathematical concepts of probability and statistics means we miss the scale, we fail to understand the interactions between events. Recognizing here how important it is to understand causation, I suppose I should include some focus on logic in the trivium: though I think that would happen best as an interaction between language and mathematics; I also think art wouldn’t be lessened by some connection to logic.

So history (And again, opportunity for individual courses here such as sociology or anthropology, along with the study of civilizations and recorded events), and then, I suppose, it’s time for science. Just like with history, I think we need an understanding of both language and applied mathematics before we can really appreciate science: my science study in high school was just a set of difficult courses to master, where my science study in college was eye-opening. Not that my science teachers in high school were sub-par compared to my college teachers; quite the opposite, in fact. But I wasn’t ready for science, I didn’t understand the full implications of chemistry and physics and biology. I think that’s the best argument for college and university education coming at the end of thirteen years of compulsory education: we’re not ready to really learn until we reach college age and college-level mastery of the fundamentals. (I do also think there’s a great argument for having a break in schooling somewhere between 6th grade and 9th grade, but that’s a whole other topic.)

The quadrivium should include a study of biology and ecology. We need to understand where we fit in with the rest of life on this planet and in this universe, if for no other reason than just so we don’t kill it all. Almost all of the problems we face in our future are related to biology and ecology, so if there is material in our world of knowledge which we need to be chewing and digesting once we learn how to chew and digest, it’s biology and ecology. I also think we should study astronomy: because just as humanity is one race of beings in an almost infinitely complex web of life, so the Earth is one tiny planet orbiting one tiny star – but also intricately connected to the rest of the universe, affecting and affected by it all. And if we do ever manage to solve the problems we face as a race (And I should also point out that the problems which are not covered by biology and ecology will be covered by history: though not solved by it), then astronomy will show us where we need to look in the future, to find our next set of challenges to face and adapt to: the stars.

Best Stars GIFs | Gfycat

So that’s three of the four (and please note, two sciences, one a lab and one a theoretical science; I’m a little disappointed in myself that my education plan is so similar to high school curriculum; but also, I think that shows the curriculum we have now is not bad) – and that’s where I got stuck. I think there is probably value in studying the world of computers and the internet, but I’m not convinced that’s a good subject for university study. I don’t know that a whole lot of overarching theoretical work has been done, that a body of knowledge about the internet and computers has been created; that is, several different bodies of knowledge have been created – and then made obsolete. Are there theories and concepts that can teach students about both the personal computer revolution and Tik-Tok? I don’t know. If there are, if there is a reasonable course of study that would be general enough to include most of the important themes, but also specific enough to be useful, then computer science would be a good choice for the fourth part of the quadrivium. Certainly the digital age is well begun, and understanding and navigating it will be critical. 

If that’s not a reasonable course – or, if like many other things in life, the study of related subjects makes us sufficiently well-prepared to deal with the computer world (which is the same reason we don’t really need to study how to do our taxes in high school, and all those smarmy memes about the Pythagorean theorem can shut it), and personal experience fills in the gaps – then the fourth subject had me stymied for a bit. I think philosophy would be useful: but I don’t know that it needs to be its own study separate from the logic and language of the trivium and the history of the quadrivium. Physics might be a good science to work with, as it enables so many other applied sciences like engineering; but I don’t know that it is applicable enough outside of that, if physics is actually how we solve the problems in our world (And my physicist father is cringing right now, as I write this. Sorry, Dad. I think physics is cool.).

But I did have a thought. As I said, there is a gap in the original trivium of grammar, logic, and rhetoric: the study of actual literature. I do recognize that in the Medieval period, when the trivium and the quadrivium were being codified and then taught, there wasn’t quite the wealth of material that we have today; there was Chaucer, and Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, and a whole ton of stuff about Christianity – and I guess a couple of Greek plays – but it was more limited. Still: I don’t think you can say you understand language unless you understand the art of the language. The same goes for music and visual arts and all of it; you have to know the history of it, have to study the past masters, to know what is possible and how to build for the future. 

So it seems like a good idea for the fourth quadrivium subject would be the history of the subjects in the trivium. Literature, as the history of language that has already been created; the history of mathematics, both the people who built it and how it got built; and the history of art and music and whatever other elements were included in the trivium – and more, if possible, because I don’t really think you can learn too much art. All of that seems to me like good material to chew and digest, and then use to make something new. 

And isn’t that what education is all about?

(Also, this is in no way connected to this topic, but I couldn’t stop thinking about the band Trivium every time I wrote it for this, and this is my favorite song of theirs. So enjoy.)