December 28, 2005

Dear Colleague,

     This is the time of the year when the child--not only The Child, but children generally--come to our notice, and to do so more than any other time of the year. Even as the nights get longer and darkness seems the prevailing color of the sky, the child is among us to serve as a promise of renewed light and life.

    The light in the child's eyes is the light of wonderment. Everything about him or her is full of wonder, and in that sense of wonder the child wordlessly pays tribute to his Creator. To the degree that wonderment is at the core of worship, only the child truly worships. We adults are too full of ourselves to look outward and praise, whether this be nature, the work of God, or artifacts, the work of humans. Of course, there are exceptions. Scientists and poets are the exceptions--the one look starry-eyed at God's creation, the other look starry-eyed at not only God's creation, but also the creations of men and women. Among adults, therefore, poets show the keenest sense of wonderment and are the most consistent worshipers.     Among poets, there are differences too, Keats being more sensitive, more ready to be impressed by other people's accomplishment, than most. At age 20, he came upon Chapman's translation of Homer and was dazed by its grandeur and beauty. He tried to explain how he felt with the following lines:

    Then felt I like some watcher of the skies
       When a new planet swims into his ken;
    Or like stout Cortez when with eagle eyes
       He star'd at the Pacific--and all his men
    Looked at each other with a wild surmise--
       Silent, upon a peak in Darien.

      Later, Keats was even more taken aback by the beauty of the Elgin Marbles at the British Museum. In both instances, he sought to emulate these "incarnations of delight" with his own form of incarnation--poetry. The threat of failure did not destroy in him a sense of obligation to answer the muses, which, in plainer language, is simply to do the best with whatever talent God or Nature has implanted in him.

    To grad students, who (alas) are the least childlike humans I know, what I have just said may sound like an old-fashioned plea for inspiration, that is, for recognizing excellences "out there" that prompt one to do as well if not better. In our post-modern age, grad students seek confirmation rather than inspiration. Confirmation is the approval of one's peers, to gain which one aspires not to a hitherto undreamed of truth or beauty--the sort that arouses "a wild surmise"--but to submitting oneself to the language and beliefs of the tribe.

Best wishes,

Yi-Fu