A graduation speech is a time of
celebration and rejoice and happiness and it is a time to look forward to the
bright future you got the education for, yet Wallace’s speech comes and goes
leaving not much hope for the dark bitter path that is life. I think in his own kind of way he was trying
to convey a very special thing to the audience, his view on the world and how
it functions. Though I don’t believe he was being to wise when he decided to do
this as a graduation speech. He chooses the ideas he did because they held
value and truth to him that he wished to express to the rest of us. He talks in
a very satire like manner and the occasion, a graduation speech, was a very
unusual place for him to give the sort of speech he gave to his audience. I
felt weird reading the harsh way he spoke knowing that these things are not
very commonly spoken at a graduation speech.
Wallace seems to be assuming that his entire, if not most of his
audience share his same cynical views on the world. Or at least that they should
be as obvious to us as they are to him how cruel and unfair the world is. The
people excluded in his speech would be the ones who did not enjoy how lightly
he brought about the subjects that are usually treaded lightly on. Such as the
suicide and the cancer. He calls everyone on earth self centered and the one he
speaks and what he is saying just makes you feel grimy about yourself. I
learned from Wallace a very narrow minded but yet very somewhat factual truth
about the reality of what life really is and what it means to live life “day in
and day out” as he put it. As for how
Wallace presents himself I can describe him with many words, I will start with
my favorite cocky, foolhardy, arrogant, detached, cynical and bitter. I can
tell all these things with the way he talks and the way he addresses each of
the issues he picked. I do not agree in the least bit with Wallace’s argument,
he has a very narrow minded and harsh view of the world as a whole that does
not give life justice. He thinks of the game of life as one pointless day after
another and the education he just received as something that is nothing more
than a start of a lifetime of harsh teachings.
I am going to have to disagree with you, because even though Wallace gave an unusual commencement speech, you have to look beyond the surficial for actual meaning and understanding. I do agree though that It wasn’t the best graduation speech to give, but I do believe it was needed, not just for the graduating class but for all listeners (in attendance and readers like ourselves today). Wallace speaks of capital T- truths because the situation might not be you at this very moment, but at one point in our existence, if even for just a second, this was you (most of everyone); self-centered in their thought process. Wallace comes off pretty harsh in his explanation of life after graduation, because he wants to change the listener’s mindset, so they won’t fall into the fallacies of the typical everyday livelihood of self-centered tendencies. This new found degree broadens the horizon, and with that horizon might come power, which often leads to responsibility (to do the right thing and think of more than just self in your understanding and doing). Yet typically when power goes to one’s head, one must do whatever to maintain a sense of that self-power, thusly becoming a slave to the master. Kenyon is a private school of a seemingly quality of education, containing some of the upper crust of society and so are some of the parents and people in the audience, so who better to gain a mind state change of thinking other than themselves, but to think of the smaller people that make up their comfortable existence as well, instead of turning their nose up at them. In all when faced with our faults or with truth, people automatically get turned off or offended of the gesture (especially if its harsh) because who are you (Wallace) to tell someone of their faults and to think about a sense of change when you have so many yourself. Genius is very closely knit with insanity and I believe the main point of the speech in general is to just grasp a broader view of life (outside of your own) and what it means to be alive, to coexist, in a world of unequal unison.
ReplyDelete