Back when I was in college, and the dinosaurs still roamed the earth, I majored in English and Philosophy. I like to say that they were two things guaranteed to get me nowhere in the world. It's not necessarily true, but it's close enough for government work.
One of my English professors was a real sight to behold. He was stick thin and maybe three inches shorter than me. I'm a big boy, so that's not uncommon. What is uncommon is his wonderful Sam Elliott mustache. To my disappointment he comported himself in a very pretentious manner. He wore a scarf no matter what the temperature was, and he always seemed to have a stick up his ass. Back then, before alcohol saved my life and changed me into a much better person, I liked to take pretentious people down a peg or two.
I remember when he was teaching us Paradise Lost by Milton. We were discussing the differences in Adam and Eve before and after they had eaten of the fruit. (Not an apple, by the way. It was never referenced. It was just an unnamed fruit.) I wanted to see if I could shake this guy. I raised my hand to give my opinion on this discussion. I'm usually the first person to raise my hand in class. Everyone hates me for it. But no one else had their hand up, which was fucking typical, so he chose me.
"The main difference between the before and after is," I said, "that when Adam and Eve were together, they made passionate love to one another. After they ate of the fruit, they got down to some hardcore fucking."
Everyone in class laughed. It's easy to make people laugh. But my professor didn't so much as flinch. He actually agreed with me and used the thought as a theme through the rest of the class.
Never underestimate anyone. Ever.
I had another course with this professor. This time he was teaching Beowulf. People who don't care about the history of language never realize how different their mother tongue is from the original version. English is a Germanic language. There are three versions of it.
Old English. For an example, here is Beowulf in its original text.
Middle English. For an example, here is The Canterbury Tales in its original text.
And Modern English. Which, by the way, includes Shakespeare.
Do you know how rare it is for someone to speak Old English? Almost no one does. And yet I have met one person, in all of my 42 years, who could do so without so much as a stutter.
So there I was in class with this stick-in-the-mud trying to teach Beowulf to us heathens, and my professor, scarf and all, began to read to us from the original Old English. It stunned me. I fell back into my seat in a state of shock. It was so beautiful and overwhelming I never thought he had it in him. Here was this man I had ridiculed (to friends, not to him, but still) bowling me over with one of the most beautiful readings I have ever heard. I would never have thought that he had the emotional range to do this. Yet by the time he was done, you couldn't have pried me from my seat with a crowbar or a bullet.
Never underestimate anyone. Ever. You may not think they have the capacity for beauty, but they might. Often times, they do. I'm glad I'm a different man now. I don't know if he is still a professor, but I would give anything to hear him read from the original Beowulf again.
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