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Student speaker a fiery orator

Adam Swensek, a graduating senior from the College of Communication, put the eloquence that helped him win the Louisiana high school state championship in oratory to use as student speaker at BU's 128th Commencement exercises. A fire that gutted his Brighton apartment building a few months ago destroyed many of Swensek's possessions, but it also furnished him with a durable conceit for his speech, portions of which are excerpted here:

	Adam Swensek. Photo by Albert L'Etoile

"Bloodied and coughing, my friends stood in the snow screaming, 'Jump, Adam! Jump!' I couldn't. I wasn't wearing any pants. I was confused, because I'm not one to be gauche at a fire scene, and wearing a birthday suit to an escape is just so last summer. At the same time, I'd made a firm commitment not to die. So I did the only thing a rational, thinking, BU-educated man in my position would do. I ran back into a burning building and put on my pants.

"Parents, if you thought your kids came to college to get smarter . . . no, no, you got hoodwinked. My mother later called my decision "just plain dumb." And in retrospect, allowing my shyness to have completely obliterated my judgment does seem pretty dumb. But it got me thinking about the meaning of nakedness.

"So what does my fear of going pantless have to do with my university commencement? Well, a great deal, I think. In fact, the desire to clothe myself at all costs brought me to Boston University. In the Judeo-Christian tradition, Adam -- the other Adam -- realized his nudity only after defying God and eating from the tree of knowledge. He and Eve donned their fig leaves and hid in shame from their maker. Their garments were signs of weakness. I think there might be more to it than that.

"Clothes, including our hard-won red gowns, do hide our nakedness. They also protect us from the elements. They accentuate our beauty. They express where we fit into the world. Losing my clothes reminded me that nudity is more than physical. We don't simply clothe ourselves in cotton or wool. We clothe ourselves in our decisions, our friendships, the things we learn, and the places we seek knowledge.

"To be ignorant, then, is to possess a naked mind. To be callous is to have a naked heart. To be indifferent, a naked spirit. Four years ago I asked Boston University to outfit me with an education -- to clothe me intellectually and emotionally -- and BU answered very well. I learned that in addition to Allston and all-nighters, college is about weaving moral fabric from your moral fiber. Thank you, BU, for hiring on brilliant and controversial professors who have tailored our ideas, refashioned our opinions, and mended our assumptions. Boston University has also vested us with academic credibility that will stay with us all our lives. Our labors and characters will reflect the scholarly work of this institution, and it's now up to us to make those labors meaningful. . . .

"After the fire, the doctors bandaged our wounds, and we returned and picked through what was left of our home. Most everything was burned or smoke-damaged. My furniture, home movies, Huck Finn, The Iliad, my 16-year-old copy of The Town Mouse and the Country Mouse, all gone. I never felt more naked in my life. By evening, generous friends had given me food, clothing, and shelter. They asked nothing in return. Four years earlier, I didn't know the guy whose shoes I wore.

"The fire also burned my copy of Walt Whitman's Leaves of Grass, but the value of an education is that it can't be taken from you. . . . Ashes or no, Whitman's ideas are in me, as if I still owned his book, and even though I must now, to borrow from the poet himself, look for him under my boot soles, I wear his words, and that is the naked truth. Congratulations, graduates, and please, please, blow out your candles."

8 June 2001
Boston University
Office of University Relations