Commencement Address at Richmond College
London
May 11, 1989
Mr Leestamper was the Deputy Director of Richmond College.
----------------------------------
"Welcome parents, relatives, friends, colleagues,
distinguished guests and the very reason for our presence - the
members of the Class of 1989. Let me begin by stating I have two
firm convictions about commencement speeches: first they should
be brief; second they should have some direct connection with
the occasion. They should be brief because the graduates are
eager for the ceremony to move swiftly and by doing so they will
have center stage. After all, we are here tonight to see the
graduates, not to listen to a speech. But graduation from college
is an important occasion; a ceremony is in order; and to witness
it you must pay the price of admission - listening to a commencement
speech.
"I'm honored and pleased to be here - but if I have any right
to address you, the graduates, it is because I am older, because
I have already graduated, because I have worked with college-age
students most of my adult life and I have been a husband, a father
and a counselor for over 30 years. Therein lies my claim to speak
to you tonight.
"Ah, but what am I going to say? I see no reason to keep
this a secret. What I have to say will come in four parts:
"Part I. An introduction (this is what I am doing now and
it is just about completed)
"Part II. A lighthearted attempt to construct an all-purpose,
generic commencement speech.
"Part III. The body of my speech.
"Part IV. The conclusion with an allusion to King Arthur's
Round Table and Camelot.
"As an aid to you the listeners, I'll tell you when each
part is over and another part is about to start. There is no
reason to hide my structure and it may even keep you alert. To
keep faith with you, I now announce: Part I, the introduction
is over.
"Part II, a lighthearted attempt to construct an all-purpose,
generic commencement speech is about to start.
"I know you'll share my pleasure in learning that I have
solved a problem that has puzzled higher education for generation.
I refer to the problem of devising a commencement speech that
is timely, memorable, brief and inspiring. "I want you to realize the world is twice as bad as it is good and you must do something about this. You may reasonably ask, 'Why me?' " This problem, which
recurs every spring, has frustrated the best efforts of scholars,
scientists, scribes and statesmen. I discussed this problem with
a friend of mine, a veteran of many years of writing television
ads. He said, "Commencement speeches are easy. Just do what
any good advertising man does. Take several quotes and brief
passages that worked in the past, rearrange them and offer them
to the public as a wonderful new creation." With his advice
in mind, and help from Shakespeare, Jefferson, Lincoln, Kipling,
Churchill and various unnamed contributors, I offer the following:
A timely, memorable, brief and inspiring commencement speech
of which no one word is mine but I do claim authorship of structure.
The challenge in this for you is to try and recall the names
of the actual authors of the following brief speech.
Members of the graduating class, lend me your ears; these are
times that try men's souls, but tell me not in mournful words
that life is but an empty dream for when in the course of human
events it becomes necessary to strive, to seek, to find and not
to yield, then we must summon up remembrance of things past, recalling
that our forefathers brought forth new nations, and asked not
what they could do for them, but said instead 'we have nothing
to fear but fear itself.' In this our time, ask not for whom
the bell tolls, for ours is not to reason why, ours is but to
hand together or we will all hang separately! I want to make
one thing perfectly clear: the world will little note nor long
remember what I say here, but generations yet unborn will hold
this truth to be self-evident: to thine own self be true, for
no man is an island. Fear not the slings and arrows of outrageous
fortune, but keep your head when all about you are losing theirs
and blaming it on you - and then, like a bridge over troubled
waters, from sea to shining sea, a brighter day will dawn and
bring your finest hour, and never before will so many have owed
so much to so few.
"Well, I'm quite sure that's enough facetious rhetoric for
one day, and you'll all be satisfied if I confine the rest of
my remarks to plain English. The bit of nonsense I've just shared
with you, however, does make an interesting point. So many familiar
quotations, so much of the great prose of the past, deal with
a common theme: that times are tough, that we need courage to
face the future. Perhaps that's why commencement speakers have
such difficulty in coming up with a fresh approach. The situation
is almost always the same: every graduating class faces an uncertain
world, and because they are the graduating class, they are asked
to take up the challenge of the future leadership and to succeed
where their elders so often failed.
"I'm afraid that tonight is not going to be much different.
These are trying times, the future is full of uncertainty - and
yes, like many of my predecessors, I'm going to suggest that you
can do something about it.
"Herein ends Part II and I'm about to begin the body of my
speech. If you are already restless, bear in mind, we are already
half finished.
"Today's challenges seem so complex that it is virtually
impossible to select any single one of them as the most important.
Is it war, terrorism, hijacking, riot, famine, inflation or simply
uncertainty. Time doesn't allow me to do any more than list ten
headlines of the past few weeks:
1. Peru Suffers Economic Chaos: 10,000 percent inflation
2. NATO Alliance Under Stress
3. Drug Barons Control Columbia
4. Civil War in Kampuchea
5. Homeless Die in Washington D.C.
6. Children Killed on the West Bank
7. Afghanistan War Continues
8. Demonstrators Killed in Georgia and Armenia
9. Bombing continues in London
10. Vietnam Boat People Killed by Pirates (yes pirates in 1989)
"But all is not despair, here are five hopeful headlines:
1. Elections in Russia
2. Solidarity Now Legal
3. Innocent Man Set Free
4. Forty Million Contributed for Food Aid
5. Major Retailers to Phase out Ivory Sales
"You will note I listed ten troublesome headlines and only
five hopeful ones. There are two reasons for this. First, it
is easier to find troublesome headlines and secondly, I want you
to realize the world is twice as bad as it is good and you must
do something about this. You may reasonably ask, "Why me?"
The answer is: Because you have had the opportunity to learn,
to travel, to live in freedom, and you are also gifted, otherwise
you would not be here tonight. In addition, you have lived in
an international community and the troublesome headlines I have
just listed are international in scope. You are also better prepared
than most; you are distinguished from graduates of other colleges
because are about to graduate from Richmond. Since you sample
of colleges attended is small you may thing all colleges are like
Richmond College. Well, if not all, at least most. The facts
are very different: few colleges have the mix of faculty and students
that Richmond has. Fewer still have multi-cultural curriculum
and no other institution has the same commitment to its mission.
However, let me not seem too idealistic. Richmond is not perfect,
everything here has not been to you satisfaction. But keep in
mind, Richmond is an institution made up of people, and people
are subject to error. This is not Utopia, Shangri-La is not here.
So, reserve your judgment on our blemishes because from a distance
of time and space your alma mater will be a very attractive woman.
Even King Arthur's Round Table had flaws. And this leads me
to the last part of my speech.
"King Arthur and his Round Table have been evoked many times
in the centuries since the balladeers of old England first told
of the legendary king and the brief golden age over which he presided.
To Lord Tennyson, Camelot represented the worldly environment
in which the human soul must work out its individual destiny.
To Mark Twain (in his Connecticut Yankee), Camelot was
a place where religious and economic oppression had to be overthrown
by individual integrity and ingenuity. To T.H. White ( in The
Once and Future King), Camelot was a place where one man's
dreams of a better world were what really mattered - and mattered,
even though the dreams crumbled, leaving only a memory. Twenty
years a go, on the Broadway Stage, the musical, Camelot, by Lerner
and Loewe, somehow managed to blend all of these themes into a
rousing, popular entertainment that was also unusually thought
provoking. Its imagery and its music seemed to be saying something
to everyone about what they were, what they are, and what they
yet might be.
"I hope you know the full story. Time allows me only to
focus on the ending. The climax of Camelot comes when Arthur
realizes that his dream of a just and ordered society, under law,
is crumbling, and the long night of the Middle Ages is descending
again after "one brief shining moment." The dream is
crumbling because human weakness - including his own - has overpowered
the beauty and strength of an ideal of justice whose time has
not quite come. He is on a battlefield, and knows he is doomed
to defeat. Those whom he most loved and trusted have deceived
him. His own death is a certainty. Camelot is about to end.
But then, something wonderful happens. A young boy, Tom Warwick,
unnoticed until that moment, suddenly comes forward to tell Arthur
that he shares his dream of Camelot, that he has listened, and
understood, and that he has the courage to keep the dream alive.
"King Arthur suddenly realized his dream could still come
true. His hope lay in young people like Tom Warwick who would
carry the dream forward. Young people would believe that right,
made might, not might made right, that justice was possible, that
being reasonable was not a weakness, that a society under law
was possible.
"King Arthur called out,
Tom Warwick, if you believe, do not die on this battlefield
because Camelot would die with you. As you king I command you,
run! Keep the dream alive! Run Tom Warwick, run!
"Tom left the battlefield but he could hear in the distance
King Arthur's commands:
Ask every person if he has heard the story, And tell it strong
and clear if he has not; That once there was a fleeting wisp of
glory - called Camelot. Camelot. Now Tom say it out with love
and joy - Camelot! Camelot! Run tom Warwick, run! Keep the dream
alive!
"And now my conclusion and the most important part of this
speech is directed to the graduates. You have a special responsibility.
You must become the Tom Warwicks of Richmond College. The task
will not be easy. Tom only had to run to every village and farm
in England; you must run to every city and nation on this planet.
Tom kept King Arthur's dream alive. You must keep Richmond College's
dream alive.
"Ask every person that you meet if they have heard this story:
That people must be judged by their intellect not the loudness
of their voices.
That people must be judged by their character and not the color
of their skin.
That women must be judged by what they can contribute not by sexist
standards.
That people of different religions can respect the convictions
of others. That people of different nationalities can live together.
That cultures are not right or wrong they are simply different.
That we live in an inter-dependent world.
That to be fully educated one must have a global perspective.
Tell them you share this dream.
Tell them that you believe.
"But you will meet doubters, haters, bigots and war mongers
but tell them you lived life as it could be. Tell them that you
shared at Richmond College the pride of your differences and the
joy of your togetherness. Keep this dream alive!
