16 I CHRONICLESnVIEWSnA (PARDON THE EXPRESSION)nBACCALAUREATE ADDRESS by George GarrettnThe irrepressible John Towne tells us what he really thinksnof higher education. Something to oSfend nearly everyone.nI want you to know I share your disappointment thatnnobody you really care about and wanted could be herento make this speech. Sorry that Gary Hart is indisposed.nAlan Alda was too busy and so was Gloria Steinem. As fornall the others, I am almost as sorry as you are that youncouldn’t get Klaus von Bulow or Jean Harris, Jody Foster ornBrooke Shields, Mother Teresa or Maya Angelou, thenRefrigerator or James Baldwin, Gordon Liddy or GordonnLish, Fawn Hall or Donna Rice. I am especially sad youncouldn’t get yourselves a Norman—Norman Mailer ornNorman Podhoretz or Norman Lear, singly or as a kazoontrio. Believe it or not, there just aren’t enough famousnpeople out there to be everywhere these days. Same oldnnnfaces in People and W. . . .nWhoever came up with the idea of inviting a fictionalncharacter is either an inspired genius or a Woody Allenncopycat. Anyway, here I am and I’m glad to be here, free forna while from the printed pages of a minor novel. I am notnJoe Bob Briggs. Joe Bob is out on assignment. And some ofnyou may already have guessed, on account of my preppy,nslightly down-at-the-heels WASP appearance (actually,nappearance-wise, if you’ll pardon the expression, I am andead ringer for the brilliant young novelist Madison SmarttnBell) that I am not Nathan Zuckerman. Sorry about that.nThe odd thing about Nathan is, all things considered andnnot excluding the success of the books he gets to live in, thatnhe and his author get along pretty well. You can’t evenninvite one without the other, and you can’t afford either ofnthem, anyway.nMy name is Ibwne, John Towne, and I don’t get along atnall with my author. We aren’t speaking to each other, notnsince he exposed me to outrage and ridicule in a novelncalled Poison Pen. Boy-oh-boy, the critics! Here’s how theyndescribed me to potential readers (if any): Publishers Weeklyn—“a vulgar scapegrace”; New York Times Book Review—“anlow-life crank”; National Review—“a coke-befuddled redneck”;nBook World—“a full-time con artist, misanthrope,nand lecher”; Chicago Tribune—“a lecherous, misanthropic,nfailed academic”; Village Voice—“an exceptionallynsleazy picaro”; and, best of all, Fred Chappell’s descriptionnof me in the Greensboro News, “a loathsome, racist, crudenand gruesome creep.” Enough stuff like that could eventuallynhurt a guy’s feelings, you know? Anyway, I’m pleased tonbe here with you instead of back in that book hiding fromncritics. Thanks for thinking of me.nFirst thing, I want to congratulate all of you who havenmanaged to win prizes and awards. I hope you enjoy themnto the fullest, if only because irrefutable statistics prove mostnof you will never win another blessed thing as long as younlive. For most of you, this is it. The rest of you, the hugenmajority who didn’t win anything, aren’t going to changenyour luck out there. And no amount of weeping andnwailing, praying and fasting, goals, guidelines, and AffirmativenAction is going to change the odds against you verynmuch. Relax. We are all mostly destined to be losersnGeorge Garrett is a novelist and poet whose most recentnbooks include Poison Pen and The Succession.n