KEB' MO' - America the Beautiful

Two great poems about "hope" and "love"

The first poem is called "An Essay on Man: Epistle I—Of the Nature and State of Man, with Respect to the Universe", by Alexander Pope. Much like the title, the poem is relateively long. I decided to read the poem after seeing the title "Hope Springs Eternal" in a cover story of the current issue of Newsweek magazine. Here is an excerpt of the poem, which contains the phrase "hope springs eternal":


What future bliss, he gives not thee to know,
But gives that hope to be thy blessing now.
Hope springs eternal in the human breast:
Man never is, but always to be blest:
The soul, uneasy and confin’d from home,
Rests and expatiates in a life to come.


And one of the greatest poems ever written about love - indeed, as the last two lines indicate, eternal love - is William Shakespeare's "Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?". Here is the sonnet in its entirety.


SHALL I compare thee to a summer’s day?
Thou art more lovely and more temperate;
Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,
And summer’s lease hath all too short a date:
Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines,
And often is his gold complexion dimm’d:
And every fair from fair sometime declines,
By chance, or nature’s changing course, untrimm’d.
But thy eternal summer shall not fade,
Nor lose possession of that fair thou owest;
Nor shall Death brag thou wanderest in his shade
When in eternal lines to time thou growest.
So long as men can breathe, or eyes can see
So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.


Blog focus

Just to finalize what will likely be discussed on the blog: as I noted in the "About me" section and has been the trend for much of the blog posts so far, the focus will be for the most part about volunteerism and its potential for far-reaching positive influence. To this end, I will read and comment on news developments and books directly associated with volunteerism.

However, I will also post blog entries that are not directly related to volunteerim. First, I will comment occasionally on ideas and trends about positive change as well as pressing social issues. A few examples of things I may discuss that concern questions of positive change: an article called What Makes Us Happy? from The Atlantic Monthly; the book Good Work: When Ethics and Excellence Meet; the recent article in The New York Times called "Fill it up with electricity, please". Second, I will periodically post entries about leisure interests, such as movies, music, novels, sports, photograhs, travel and so on.

Presidents Obama and Bush on Volunteerism

President Barack Obama will meet with President George Herbert Walker Bush at Texas A&M University, Rudder Auditorium, to discuss and encourage volunterism. Below is an excerpt from an article on the TIME magazine website, called "When Obama meets Bush 41: A Bipartisan Boost", about the upcoming event.

There is a long tradition of sitting Presidents courting, relying on and even plotting with, their predecessors, and the latest chapter is set to unfold Friday afternoon when former President George Herbert Walker Bush, accompanied by former Secretary of State James Baker, greets Barack Obama as he steps off a Marine Corps helicopter in College Station, Texas.

At Bush's invitation, the 44th Commander in Chief is paying a long-planned visit to the home of Bush's presidential library to mark the 20th anniversary of the voluntarism initiative begun by the former President in 1989. (See TIME's 2008 Person of the Year: Barack Obama.)

After being introduced by Bush, Obama will speak on community service before 2,500 people in Rudder Auditorium on the campus of Texas A&M University. Obama is expected to pay tribute to Bush's Points of Light Initiative, a community-service and charitable works program he launched in the early days of his presidency in 1989. Joining the two men on stage will be Robert Gates, the Secretary of Defense and former president of the university, who has worked for both Presidents.


I will post videos of speeches at the event once they become available.

Update: Please click on this link to view President Obama's speech on volunteerism. It was a great speech and I am glad to see the message of volunteerism is being supported in this way. Indeed, not just the two presidents but other famous individuals and organizations are getting into the act. And speaking of the seeming conflagation that volunteerism has become in recent days: I am currently reading a book called Tipping Point by Michael Gladwell. The central argument of the book is found in its subtitle: "little things can make a big difference." I will provide my thoughts on the book once I complete reading it.

Volunteerism in the wake of the recession

I am still following how the recession has affected the desire of Americans to volunteer. In a previous blog entry, I referred to two articles which reported there was a decrease in the number of people doing charitable works, both in terms of time spent volunteering and donations to charity. However, a few other articles I have viewed briefly (I will read them more carefully later on) seem to indicate that there was, actually, an increase in volunterism in recent months: specifically an article in The Bangor Daily News, called "Expert says recession has boosted volunteerism"; another article in The Columbia Chronicle, called "Volunteer numbers spike since recession"; and a press release from a site called Press Release Point, which comments on volunteer work internationally or in other countries. In either case, it does appear that volunteerism will pick up because of the nearing holiday season and will likely continue into winter and spring as the economy continues to emerge from recession.

Updates to site

I have visited a number of sites recently, some of which I have updated on the blog. Since I learn a great deal from simply exploring different resources on my own, I have added the free mitopencourseware site so I can occasionally browse topics, books and other information of some of the college and graduate level courses I may be interested in. Secondly, I have added a number of sites on volunteerism and social trends, including Lutheran World Relief; volunteermatch; Volunteering in America; and Pew Research Center. Third, I have updated a widget of the blog of the International Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies called "Our World. Your Move." The widget is a great resource for international volunteer work and features "Stories," video clips from Youtube, twitter updates and photographs from flickr.

And finally, I visited a blog called Back Issues on The New Yorker site; I was intrigued by an interview posted there of Maya Lin, an artist and architect I have read about and whose career I have followed for quite some time. Although I have not added the site to this blog, I think the idea behind the blog is an interesting one and I plan to visit the blog periodically in the future. Until next time.

Nobel Prizes in Literature and Peace

I look forward every year to the Nobel Prizes, particularly the categories of Literature and Peace. And this year is no exception: in fact, I am more eager to know who will win the Literature Prize, to be announced tomorrow, as well as the Peace Prize, to be announced the following day, because I don't have the faintest idea who the frontrunners are (if there is such a thing, when it comes to this particular Prize). However, while speculating on who the honorees will be, I also thought of a couple of the past winners I admire and the memorable Nobel lectures they gave.

Here's an excerpt from Alexandr Solzhenitsyn's Nobel Lecture on Literature, which by the way reminded me of a classic essay by Mario Vargas Llosa, called Why Literature?. (Note: I do not completely subscribe to all Llosa says about the future of the book; I believe there is some merit to the idea of digitizing books, as this opinion piece in The New York Times argues):

But woe to that nation whose literature is disturbed by the intervention of power. Because that is not just a violation against "freedom of print", it is the closing down of the heart of the nation, a slashing to pieces of its memory. The nation ceases to be mindful of itself, it is deprived of its spiritual unity, and despite a supposedly common language, compatriots suddenly cease to understand one another. Silent generations grow old and die without ever having talked about themselves, either to each other or to their descendants.

Also, here is an excerpt from Martin Luther King Jr's Nobel Lecture on Peace:

This call for a worldwide fellowship that lifts neighborly concern beyond one's tribe, race, class, and nation is in reality a call for an all-embracing and unconditional love for all men. This oft misunderstood and misinterpreted concept so readily dismissed by the Nietzsches of the world as a weak and cowardly force, has now become an absolute necessity for the survival of man.

Update: The 2009 Nobel Prize in Literature was just announced. The recipient is Romanian-born, German author Herta Mueller. From the little I have read about her so far, she appears to be a deeply moving writer (The New York Times printed reviews of her novels The Land of Green Plums and The Appointment), who has experienced incredibly difficult ordeals in her life. Please see this article from the BBC website for a brief profile.

Update: The Nobel Prize for Peace was awarded to President Barack Obama. Here's an interview from the Nobel Prize Youtube Channel, where Geir Lundestad, Secretary of the Norwegian Nobel Committee, explains the selection. I see the decision to bestow this amazing honor on President Obama as an act of grace. Also I am impressed with the humble and selfless way in which President Obama received the award. I wish him well; he will have the support of many, both domestically and internationally.

Selected pictures of Walden's Pond

Below are a few selected pictures of Walden's pond, courtesy of the Travel Section of The New York Times. I learned about Henry David Thoreau while taking a course on American Literary History and was fascinated with his poems (see his poem "Friendship", for example); his ideas on Civil Disobedience, which were later adopted and put to practical use by Rosa Parks, Mohandas Gandhi and Martin Luther King Jr; and his prescient writings on Ecology and the Environment (see his classic essay "Walking"). I also found his quotation on morality interesting; he said, "aim above morality. Be not simply good; be good for something." Until next time.



Eighteen miles west of Boston, the 462-acre state park surrounding Walden Pond is nearly deserted in September and October.

Photo: Jodi Hilton for The New York Times



In 1845 the iconoclastic Thoreau built his tiny cabin beside the pond, where he grew a garden, worked sporadically as a hired man and announced his intention to "live so sturdily and Spartan-like as to put to rout all that was not life." There is a replica at the park, along with a statue of Thoreau.

Photo: Jodi Hilton for The New York Times



Red maple leaves at Thoreau's Cove, a shallow inlet close to where he lived for two years and two months.

Photo: Jodi Hilton for The New York Times

Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

Like trying to peel a raspberry

I read Jeremy Waldron’s review of Kwame Anthony Appiah’s book Experiments in Ethics. The book’s title gives a pretty good sense of what it is about generally, which is thought experiments of what one would do in certain – often desperate - situations. The problem is that these situations are presented in stark black and white terms, or extremes of “categorical” versus “consequential” choices, whereas life is rarely this extreme and clear-cut; rather much of the choices we, as normal people, make are colored by shades of gray, dependent on the situation and, of course, influenced by psychological factors. Appiah’s position, however, is that ethics is fundamentally intertwined with the study of psychology - separating them would be “like trying to peel a raspberry,” he argued at one point - and that ethics can learn from what psychology has to say, although the latter cannot replace the former as is possibly the belief of some psychologists.

Nonetheless Waldron’s review of Experiments in Ethics was decidedly, well, lukewarm. A better review of Appiah’s book is found in a February 3, 2009 issue of The New York Book Times Review. Also I read two of Appiah's books, Cosmopolitanism and In My Father’s House, both of which were incredibly insightful and drew on interesting anecdotes from his unique and multifaceted background. Although I have not read the actual book, I would definitely recommend Experiments in Ethics.

On the decrease in Charitable work

Earlier I pointed out on this blog that in times of national tragedy, Americans have in the past displayed courage and compassion in meeting the challenge. After reading articles on two websites, Association of Fundraising Professionals and The Chronicle of Philanthropy, which shows that, according to the latest statistics, Americans have, in actuality, decreased the amount of charitable work, both in terms of donations to causes and time set aside to volunteering, in the wake of the economic crisis. It is no doubt true that, unlike say a natural disaster, the circumstances of the economic crisis are different than most other national tragedies because most Americans have been affected financially in some way and are understandably concerned about their own situation. I still feel strongly, however, that volunteering is the right thing to do given the condition we are in. There is certainly no better time than now to volunteer, when the need is so great and so many are in need of a wide range of services. That said, the issue of a decrease in volunteering is only part of the story; what’s needed, also, is some sign that the economic situation is beginning to ameliorate – this would give more citizens genuine hope, and has the potential to create a snowball effect.

Few sites I have visited

After listening to him on Bill Moyers Journal, I plan to read an article on Rory Stewart, called "Undaunted". Also, I plan to check out some of the National Parks: America’s Best Idea episodes I missed online (they are available for viewing until October 9, 2009, I believe). And finally, I updated a blog called Moral of the Story, a link to the website for Lutheran World Relief, a link to the website for This American Life, and a link to the website for the Documentary Channel; feel free to check them out.