WHAT have I learned at Harvard?

It's a question that every student here must ask him or herself, sometime in his Harvard career. Some ask it freshman week, and find they haven't learned much at all. Some ask it after Commencement, when even the most sublime answer is dim consolation for the dark road of employment that lies ahead.

So let me ask it now, as the twilight hours grow dimmer with every passing December afternoon, as the last brown leaves cling tenaciously, forlorn, on the branches of Cambridge's flora.

So, to return to the original question: what have I learned? My senior tutor, if I knew his name, would probably wish for me to say that I learned a great deal about Mathematics, Systematics, German, Fine Arts, Sanskrit, Archaeology, Biology, and Pottery, during my three and a half years at fair Harvard. But somehow, what little book learning I have acquired here seem pale and gaunt compared to the true wisdom I have come to call my own. Stand ever firm, O Stacks of Widener; but not down thy revered stacks shall I tread.

No, while Harvard has tried to teach me of worldly learning, instead I have come to a much different plane of learning. Not of God, and teachings of the higher being, mind you; my moral reasoning requirement remains, at this writing, forlornly unfulfilled. Nor have I come to understand in my heart the clocklike precision and sweeping grandeur of design that marks the natural world. The cerulean dome that arcs above our mortal heads remains, as ever, a mystery to my soul and mind.

Perhaps you may think, dear reader, that within the gates marked "abandon all hope, and grow in wisdom" this writer has acquired knowledge of a more earthy nature. For what is Harvard really known for, in the "real world," if not as the nursery of captains of industry and political masterminds? But the truth is that I never joined the Student Productions Association, never met the undergrads who wear power ties to lunch in the Union. I never tapped into the great politico-economic power grid they call "the old school tie." I may be an ass, but I have my pride.

What remains--the conquest of romance, the acquisition of a catlike grace that makes women's hearts turn to a cheeselike substance? Did you know that Mel Torme wrote The Christmas Song? No? Well, that's your answer.

The sad, lamentable truth is that while at Harvard I have learned nothing except a seemingly useless and unconnected series of facts that can be best described as trivia. And, despite the fact that someday you, too, will have a Harvard diploma, the truth is the same in your case.

I know, I know: on your transcript it says that you took Rice Paddies. But do you really have a comprehensive overview of Chinese history, politics, art, and society from 2000 B.C. until the present? Or do you possess only a vague feeling of having been bored once in a huge lecture hall while slides of vases flashed on a distant screen?

Those of you who, like me, took Math 21: do you still remember how to solve a third-order differential equation? And if so, do you think it will ever come up in conversation between now and the time you die?

Unless it may seem like I'm picking on particular courses, allow me to generalize: has anyone out there ever taken a course which is likely to be of any real use in later life, assuming of course that boring people at cocktail parties is not a useful function? After spending roughly $60,000 on becoming educated, do you feel that your ability to win at Trivial Pursuit has substantially improved?

The answer, I suspect, is the negative. And yet, I am happy. If there's one thing that's worse than being ignorant, it's having the world think you're ignorant. And for the lucky few who hold a Harvard degree, that will never come.

Anybody looking to hire a smart kid from Harvard?