A cocky, arrogant narcissistic professor writes his last lecture
in the form of a memoir. First before everyone chastises me for giving this
only 3 stars and my previous descriptive statement, let me begin with the
context. I read this on my e-reader while lying on a gurney in the ER of a
major level one trauma center of a big city hospital. I did not expect to be nor was I diagnosed
with a terminal illness. I had never seen the lecture and had been meaning to
get to this book on my list for a long time.
This book kept me entertained while I waited for a room in the hospital
after being admitted. I could not put it down.
It is unusual for me to rate a book with which I was so taken on an emotional
level, so low. However, it is Randy’s
believed misrepresentation of the quality of his character which has made me
down rate it. I was pretty miserable
physically with an illness that had laid me low. For most of the time I read it, I was bawling. It is a real tear jerker. I never saw the lecture either in person or
on the internet. I may do so now. I think this is a wonderful gift for his
children who will at least realize that since Randy loved himself so much he
almost assuredly deeply loved and would have continued to love his offspring as
they grew had he lived to see it. Thank
goodness the sale of his book has made his family financially secure, because
so many young families tragically left without the chief breadwinner are mired
in poverty. This fate will not befall
Randy Pausches’ children. I wondered why
he did not charge a small fee for his lecture.
Some of it could have been donated to cancer research with the great
portion being held by his wife in trust for her use and the use of his
children. That would not have offended me in the least. I suspect that Carnegie Mellon University
owned the rights to the lecture.
However, under the circumstances no one would have chastised them for
charging a fee for the video lecture and agreeing to convey part of the profits
to the family.
Further, in addition to Randy’s smug attitude offending me,
I found some of it did not ring true.
For example, when he was wooing his wife and her response was lukewarm,
he could not accept that the Randy charms were not the most winning of
all. He describes her reticence as
fear. She had been married before and
divorced at a young age. She was gun shy
was his excuse. However, though she came
to love him I suspect she properly evaluated his arrogance. When there was a choice of giving his “Last
Lecture” in Pittsburgh in front of his enamored students or spending her
birthday alone with her which we knew would be the last they would ever spend
together, he chose the stage and the adoration of his students. This was a selfish act. He could have filmed the production and shown
it to the students at a later date.
However, then he would not receive the immediate adoring feedback from
the live audience. I don’t know why the
lecture could not have been scheduled for another day in the same week or
two. Hopefully, he did not schedule it
then to be available for the largest audience of his students. However, I would not put that past him. On various occasions he chose a public
presence over spending more quiet and private time with his three children
under 5 who would probably never remember being with him anyway.
Another issue that did not ring true was his representation
that he was offered a job as a Disney imaginer.
I doubt it. His dream job would
have been to be a Disney Imagineer or a creative/technical employee at Lucas
Films, Pixar or the like. In fact he
lists among his greatest accomplishments that one of his students went to
Disney and one went to Lucas. Because he
had not been offered such a job, he asked for a sabbatical and he interned at
Disney. My understanding of these
internships are that they are unpaid.
Surely, Disney doesn’t just take anybody into their internship programs,
but it is likely that it is easier to get an unpaid internship spot than a paid
employment spot. Probably, many more internships are offered than actual paid
jobs because of Disney’s personal interest in education and the spread of its
culture. Randy readily admits that he
loved his six months at Disney. At the end
he claims that they offered him a permanent job. Why didn’t he take it? He loved teaching so much that he felt
compelled to return to his adoring Carnegie Mellon students. At least that was the reason he gave. They don’t have students in California? CIT comes to mind as does USC and UCLA right
there in L.A. There is probably a U.C
Anaheim and a California State University system too. So I do not believe that he was offered a
meaningful job with them. Maybe to save
face Disney kicked around offering him a job.
However, I believe there was no real concrete proposal with a
competitive salary. Why could he not
have been candid about that? It would
have made him more human and less arrogant. Though Randy had the technical
stuff down pat, the artistic and creative side is predominantly inherited. Yes,
it can be and must be developed, but there must be some innate artistic ability
which Randy probably did not have. Obviously, he could not admit that Disney did
not love Randy as much as Randy loved Randy.
Randy had good self-esteem and that was great. His strong self-esteem was one reason he was
so successful and so well liked.
The real hero of this story is his wife, Jai pronounced
Jay. The daughter of a military family
which moved around, she relocates without much help from Randy from Pittsburgh
to Virginia near her adult brother and his wife. We don’t hear much about her parents. I suspect that relationship was not
great. Though they too live in the area
most of the family help Jai relied on came from her brother or Randy’s mother
and sister who had to travel from Pennsylvania.
Unless they asked to be kept out of the book, I do not understand why
they weren’t present. Perhaps, one had Alzheimer’s
disease, but I suspect it is something more.
It might have been alcoholism. A
form of substance abuse would have given the book another dimension and taken
it out of the arrogant, smug, narcissistic category at least in part.
Jai Rausch also wrote a book called Dream New Dreams. Randy was not a writer and it was really a
colleague who put his tome together.
However, Jai who was an English major wrote her own book without help
other than the typical editor. Her writing is good and it does not fall into
the overly sentimental hole. Jai writes about
the end of Randy’s life including his last day and how she picks up the pieces
and goes on with her life. Spoiler
alert: Was Randy so overwhelmingly
charming that she can never again find a mate to fill his shoes? No and she does. She is most grateful for the income from the
best- selling book which allows her and her children to consider nothing but
their physical and emotional welfare when making decisions about their
future. She goes on the speaker circuit
and is earning a good income as a motivational speaker (for what else could it
be called). So she too and not just
Randy can command an audience. However,
when Randy and her children needed her most she was not touring the speaker’s
circuit to aggrandize herself and earn much needed (at that time) income.
Hopefully, Randy also recorded both visually and in writing
more messages for his children to be offered them as they age. I think he did but they were not and should
not be offered for public consumption until the children themselves after
reaching majority decide that they want the recordings/writings released.
Whenever a nurse, aide or orderly entered my ER cubicle
where hooked up to an IV, I waited for an empty hospital bed and saw me crying
therein, they all knew what book I was reading.
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