I am somewhat prone to hero worship. I started with Madonna when I was 12 (don’t laugh. All twelve year old girls in the early nineties idolized Madonna. I think), and moved on to even more embarrassing pseudo-heroes, the identities of whom I choose to keep off the internet. My current and permanent focus of obsession, however, is J.K. Rowling. I have read the Potter books at least three times each. I have a huge amount of respect for her, admire her, listen to every word that escapes her lips during every interview and generally want to give her a big hug every time I see a picture of her.
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Lab Life
A discussion and dissection of a most unique workplace environment - the laboratory.
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Hero Worship, Rewarded
- Date:
- Tuesday, 17 Jun e 2008 - 20:56 UTC
I am not exaggerating when I say that she is, in large part, responsible for my defending and graduating when I did. In January, I found out that she was scheduled to give Harvard’s commencement address this summer. I swore to myself that I would defend in time to hear her talk. I spoke with my advisor and began scheduling my defense a few hours after finding out the news. Who knows how long I would have dawdled in scheduling the dreaded defense! I could still be in lab, banging my tired head against sharp rocks, were it not for J.K. Rowling.
J.K. Rowling helped me to get here, Harvard yard during commencement exercises.And you know what? I was right. She was worth it and her talk was worth it. She was fun, funny, comfortable in her own skin, real, self-deprecating, and human. She was insightful and thought-provoking in all sorts of non-trite ways. I was truly blown away. The full text of her talk can be found here (thank you, Martin, for the link). Her two main points (other than the unstated point that she is completely and utterly fabulous) were the importance of failure and the importance of imagination for a healthy and productive life.
She spoke of how we, as Harvard students, likely have a skewed view of failure. “Indeed, your conception of failure might not be too far from the average person’s idea of success.” Insert my Mom poking me in the ribs, saying, “I told you so!” Her own failure and her extreme poverty helped her get back to herself, her own talents and desires and only those allowed her to succeed (dramatically) in the end.
She also spoke about her experiences working with Amnesty International. Her descriptions of the oppression, abuse, and tyrannical horrors that she was witness to were somewhat balanced by the goodness she saw in the people working at her side and beyond, in the world as a whole. Her stories put her books in context and all of a sudden, it all made more sense. The control, oppression and cruelty perpetrated by the evil characters in her novels were met with an uprising, a band of devoted and brave individuals who risked all to bring down the regime.
I could go on for another eight pages about all the wonderful and enlightening and adorable things that she said that day, but I already sound like a drooling teenage stalker. I’ll stop (the writing, not the drooling).
I will say that I am finally done. All done. Though I failed innumerable times during my grad work, in the end I succeeded. Woohoo!
I even have the clown-like Harvard crimson gown to prove it.P.S. Do read the transcript of her speech. It really struck a chord with me, and I think it can do the same for less rabid fans.
Last updated: Tuesday, 17 Jun 2008 - 20:56 UTC
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Comments
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That’s not a Harvard gown. Those are Gryffindor Dress Robes.
CONGRATULATIONS!
looking forward to meeting you.
Pam
Congratulations!
The only thing I remember from my graduation ceremony (undergrad, I fled the country for my PhD graduation) is the chairs. They’d filled the hall with the kind of chairs whose cushions let out a woosh of air when compressed. The effect of hundreds of people sitting down at the same time was quite something.
Don’t even joke Henry. It took me a few hours to compose myself so that I wouldn’t burst out laughing when I saw all the people. Other professors, some with blue robes, were totally Hufflepuffs. No Slytherins though. Green velvet is apparently too tacky even for commencement gowns.
Pam – Thank you! Very much looking forward to your talk tomorrow.
Cath – Ha! That’s good. That’s very good.
Don’t even joke Henry
You thought I was joking?
Actually, on the subject of JKR-worship, if it were the case that Gee Minima (aged 8) anywhere near JKR, she’d probably explode (Gee Minima, that is, not JKR). Gee Minima has become a total Pottermane, reading The Order of the Phoenix while listening to Stephen Fry reading Philosopher’s Stone, while wearing her Gryffindor robe and Gryffindor tie. I think she’s morhong into Hermione Grainger.
morhong? I meant morphing, but it morphed.
Is it ever explained why Hermione (the character, not the chicken) isn’t in Ravenclaw? Isn’t that the academic house?
Mrs Gee tells me that Hermione and Luna (the chickens, not the characters) have gone broody at the same time, and spent the day in the nestbox, wedged in together, taking it in turns to sit on top of each other.
How clever of JKR to encode the answer to my question in the behaviour of Henry’s chickens.
People need mythic heroes to push us so we can outdo ourselves. After we have done that, we need to see that mythic heroes have feet of clay, so we know that we can outdo them too.
The speech is up on YouTube.
I avoided the graduation ceremony for my PhD. Partly because I was in Denmark, but also because the UEA holds it in the sports hall. Not much of a sense of occasion there.
That was a very good speech. I particularly liked the way she (subversively?) got the audience to reflect on human rights issues, an area where the Bush administration has greatly to tarnished the reputation of the USA. Mind you, respect for human rights seems to be in decline in our neck of the woods as well…
But I don’t really want to hijack your thread. Congratulations on your graduation – looks like it was a fantastic occasion, unlike Bob’s – shame on UEA!
Excellent, Bob! I was hoping it would go up in video. She is wonderful, isn’t she?
Stephen – There were a couple of jabs in there, yes. Appropriate and tasteful, but jabs. They were points very well done and well-taken.
Bravery (Gryffindor) is in the heart – this is why Neville was in it. And look what happened to him. QED.
Anna, a friend of mine sent me the link to the speech as soon as JKR had finished talking (;-) ) because my views on her are pretty well known. And when I read it I thought of you, being there — I was so pleased and thrilled for you, it must have been marvellous. And extremely well deserved, I am sure, despite your modesty.
I just read her speech and it struck me as to how closely her life experience really does follow the pattern of the monomyth which I see as the archetypal developmental pathway required to form a mythic hero (more or less). I think the reason her writing was so successful was because its authenticity of the human experience.
I think that the invocation of the supernatural relates to the inability of those who followed to understand the process by which the innovation occurred. I am thinking of this more in the context of scientific advancement and innovation, the development of stone tools, fire, agriculture, metal working, and so on. Fire was developed ~700,000 years ago, long before the human speciation event. Modern humans are unable to survive without cooking their food. As Arthur C. Clarke said, any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic. Those historians of times past related how those developments occurred in the only way they knew how, via supernatural events.
Extreme stress does cause physiological change including neurological changes. The cycle of violence is well known, as is PTSD. I am thinking a lot about this in the context of my NO research. Stress is a low NO state. There are many pathways controlled by NO that are important in development at all ages from in utero to old age. Loving and being loved are high NO states. Extreme stress fragments the mind to facilitate multi-tasking. Transformative love re-integrates it but with changes. Those are extremely non-linear and chaotic processes. The final state is not predictable from initial conditions.
Anna, the YouTube video is even better than the transcript of the text. Just wonderful. And I like the topics she picked for her speech. Failure is the norm and not the exception when doing scientific research. Unless you learn to handle it early on in your career, you will have a hard time later on.
Maxine – I was thinking of you during the talk! It would have been nice to have another devoted fan there with me. I think my parents were starting to get sick of me jumping up and down and poking them in the arm from excitement. Not that I would have poked you, but you know what I mean… I am sorry you couldn’t be there, but I am glad you read the speech ASAP. Sorry I didn’t get my report of it up sooner. Life doesn’t seem to get any less hectic after all graduations are done!
David – Good point. Yes, I think her books are so successful because of how real they feel, for the most part. My Mom told me how she got shivers down her spine from reading the books. They resonated very deeply with her, reminding her of living in the Soviet Union. Rowling’s characters and descriptions are very real, almost corporeal.
Martin – I didn’t even think how her topics applied to science! Very nice. I think the constant failure one of the parts I had such trouble with in lab. It’s not an easy thing to get used to. One could argue that it is not the healthiest thing in the world to become accustomed to.
You’re right, the written speech doesn’t do her justice. Now I want to hug her all over again.