The Millions recently posted a write-up about David Foster Wallace’s now-famous 2005 Kenyon College commencement speech, which was later published as This Is Water.
The article’s author tracked down Kenyon students who actually graduated that day (May 21, 2005) and heard/witnessed the speech.
Here’s what one of the Kenyon students had to say about DFW’s speech:
“The one emotion I remember is intensity: he was clear, driving, and inwardly focused. He also didn’t say anything dismissively. Whether it was his technique or his real feeling I have no idea, but he read the speech like he was passing on a message of importance. Sitting here, I picture a guy at a radio in a bunker intercepting a message, then reading it off to someone else, wasting no time and enunciating every syllable.”
And I didn’t know the speech was on the YouTubes: