Born to Run...or to audit a class at Princeton?
I think too many people skip the author's acknowledgments in the books they read. I know it's a chore, but I figure they are there for a reason and I owe it to the author to read them. And sometimes, you are rewarded in small ways for having done so.
Right now, I'm reading "The Shape of Things To Come: Prophecy and the American Voice'' by Greil Marcus. Marcus is most famous for his book "Mystery Train'' a work that weaves American history into studies of the works of Elvis, Randy Newman, bluesman Robert Johnson and others. There are connections between Melville and pop music, he maintains. The book, like most of his work, is a tour de force of wit, analysis and fine writing, and well worth reading.
So I turned to the acknowledgments in the new book, just getting it out of the way, and one of the people he thanks is none other than Bruce Springsteen.
Marcus was teaching a course at Princeton and tells this story:
"Bruce Springsteen attended the last class, on Ginsberg's 'Witcita Vortex Sutra'; he came with an idea he wanted to put across, about the poem as Ginsburg's claim that as an American he belonged to any part of America, but by making his argument only by playing off arguments others in the class were making, he made himself both a catalyst and nearly anonymous.''
Now most of us know that Springsteen and formal education didn't get along. The nuns in Catholic school, the high school estrangements and a semester or two at college, and that infamous line from "No Surrender'' : "We learned more from a three-minute record, baby, than we ever learned in school.''
Now here he is at Princeton, using the Socratic method of asking questions and responding to questions to make a point.
Maybe all of us are born to run, or, as the Old Testament puts it, "born to trouble as sparks fly upward'' but it's good to know that some people run into ideas and books and good conversation.
Right now, I'm reading "The Shape of Things To Come: Prophecy and the American Voice'' by Greil Marcus. Marcus is most famous for his book "Mystery Train'' a work that weaves American history into studies of the works of Elvis, Randy Newman, bluesman Robert Johnson and others. There are connections between Melville and pop music, he maintains. The book, like most of his work, is a tour de force of wit, analysis and fine writing, and well worth reading.
So I turned to the acknowledgments in the new book, just getting it out of the way, and one of the people he thanks is none other than Bruce Springsteen.
Marcus was teaching a course at Princeton and tells this story:
"Bruce Springsteen attended the last class, on Ginsberg's 'Witcita Vortex Sutra'; he came with an idea he wanted to put across, about the poem as Ginsburg's claim that as an American he belonged to any part of America, but by making his argument only by playing off arguments others in the class were making, he made himself both a catalyst and nearly anonymous.''
Now most of us know that Springsteen and formal education didn't get along. The nuns in Catholic school, the high school estrangements and a semester or two at college, and that infamous line from "No Surrender'' : "We learned more from a three-minute record, baby, than we ever learned in school.''
Now here he is at Princeton, using the Socratic method of asking questions and responding to questions to make a point.
Maybe all of us are born to run, or, as the Old Testament puts it, "born to trouble as sparks fly upward'' but it's good to know that some people run into ideas and books and good conversation.
posted by Michael Riley at 9:33 AM
1 Comments:
Good dialogue is wonderful, as long as one is open. To be closed minded and walk into a classroom, or enter a blog, let's say, it can make for a battlefield. And some verbal battles are worth it...sometimes people spew absolute garbage and because they have said it aloud or typed it in a blog, others assume it's truth. It's okay to interject, to disagree, to explain a stance, isn't it, Mr. Riley? I think the key to it all working is to to do so with the idea to respect others, even if one doesn't agree with an opinion. And sometimes that's hard to do. But it should at least be attempted.
Margaret
Post a Comment
<< Home