provocative opinion On the Importance of Being Eccentric Rubin Battino Wright State University, Dayton, OH 45435 Eccentric, One who or that which deviates from regularity; an anomalous or irregular person or thing. Eccentricity emphasizes the idea of divergence from the usual or customary; idinsyncracy (properly one's own peculiar temperament or bent), that of the personal, characteristic, and individual, especially in trait, trick, or habit. Webster's New International Dictionary, 2nd ed.
A graduate student from England once commented to me "This department has no right to have only one bona fide eccentric. You need more." He felt, and rightly so, that a department containing about twenty faculty members needed a t least one half dozen eccentrics. We were short-changing our students. How could thev oossihlv obtain a eood understanding about science wiihdut being exposed t o a small menaeerie of eccentrics? After all, the monomania that manages as motivation for most chemists has to have some outward &d public manifestations. I am not writing here about the mere idiosyncratic hehavior of an individual, the simple mannerisms that characterize us. I am writing about the deviations from "normal" or "regular" or "socially approved" behavior which makes the eccentric such a novelty to experience and know. One might begin by arguing that it is the eccentric who is the truly normal man. That is, he dares to be himself, which is what Henry Jones would like to be, only the neighbors would talk. C. Fadiman ( I ) If you do not currently possess eccentricities, then cultivate them if you wish to be an effective lecturer. From personal experience I recognize that the process of becoming an eccentric (at least for the time period when I am in the lecture hall and "on stare") - . is a difficult one. After all. we live in a world that prizes normalcy, if not "regularity." Going against the erain is hard. As I develooed mv eccentricities I was continually aware of feeling ~ n ~ o m f o r i a hal te the thought that my students would he secretly (hopefully!) laughing a t me. In time I not only became comfortable with my eccentricities, hut came to enjoy them. After all, whether they snicker is their problem. How I feel about myself is mine. And, anyway, no matter how they feel, they will remember me. What is an eccentric? First, the eccentric at his best is a little offcenter generally . . .Second, his eccentricity may be inconvenient socially, like that of Cavendish, but it must not be toodisagreeable; and, if it is charming, all the better. Third, his eccentricity must be permitted full play! That is, he must be so placed that society either excuses or overlooks it.. . .Fourth follows from the third: the perfect eccentric, like the perfect dandy, is at once un-self-consciousand self-assured. C. Fadiman ( I ) What are some of my eccentricities? Well, I have a great fondness for carrying hydrogen-filled balloons through the halls and exploding them a t frequently inappropriate times in mv lecture classes. It certainly wakes up the class! When I nm feeling dull or anticipaling a dull lecture or dav (or for no reason at all), thr ballunns come tu the rescue. Thev invigorate me as well as the class. I like to pace and wander around the lecture hall, and talk to individual students, and walk up the
584
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aisles (thus invading sacrosanct territory). I like to wear clothes I am comfortable in, the older the better--or, in winter, the warmer the better like-my heavyweight L.L. Bean all wool trousers whichmust be held up by bright red suspenders. Ilike wearing my 20-year old blue suit day in and day out, explaining to my students that I have been trying to wear it out for twenty years-I never liked it, hut am too stingy to throw it out. I like to perform skits, pun atrociously, involve the class in all variety of participatory demonstrations, make poor drawings, smile to myself knowingly, peer around the overhead projector, and reflect hack to the students the atmosphere in the lecture hall. Above all, I like to tell stories. I should say that the most interesting eccentrics are aristocrats, either worldly or intellectual. C. Fadiman ( 1 ) Ece&tricity exists particularly in the English, and partly, I think, because of that peculiar and satisfactory knowledge of infallibility that is the hallmark and birthright of the British nation. E. Sitwell ( 2 ) A number oivears ago I disrovered that my students tended forget much uf the chemistry I taught them, but did remember the stories. Sometimes the swries ar#:rrally relevant and Zermane ro the topic of the day. In this case they are metaphors, and metaphors are a particularly powerful and subtle form of communication. Fables are rememhered and work on the unconscious-thev anoear to make contact with a more fundamental and primi&epart of people. The stories can he about historic incidents or oeoole . . or iust made UD for the uccasiun. 1 Iwe talking ahout Cuunt Humturd, olie of the most hrilhant wientist/rorues in histor\,. (He was a'l'orv spy, the lie to the La~dric abandoned his rich ~ m e r i c a nwife, theorv. invented the science of nutrition to make money run&; the poor house which he turned into a workshop, and married Lavoisier's widow. Enough?) So, tell stories-they and you will be rememhered. I,,
If he is off-center, permanently, obstinately, but only on a single point, he is not an eccentric but a crank. . . . It is the mark of the ereat eccentric that his oddities are often touched with the Good. " the True, and the Beautiful. C. Fadiman (I) If you can't attain the stature of a bona fide eccentric, then a t least tw the more acceotable state of idiosyncratic behavior. I first becime nwarr of the importance oisurh hehavior when I was lecturiny to freshmen in a large hall where the clock was on the wall hehind me. Since I could not readilv consult the clock so as to pace my lecture, I fell into the practice of bringing an old pocket watch to lectures. My first activity upon entering the hall was to wind my watch, check it against the clock, and then place it on the lecture table. One day I forgot my watch and started lecturing without the opening ritual. For the first minute or so there was a great deal of unrest and whispering. Finding this annoying, I stopped lecturing and asked what was going on. A courageous student asked me about my watcl-where was it? had something happened to it? I replied that I had simply forgotten it, but that I would be sure to bring it in the future.
From Soerates to Bertrand Russell, those whose mental lives are charged with a power possibly five hundred times greater than that of, let us say, the average Congressman,have betrayed their interior ebullition by behavior generally set down as irregular. C. Fadiman ( I ) People, including students, senerallv the certainties . prefer . involved in ritual and tradition. (Just try running a course as essentially all prohlem-working with mini-request-lectures as I did one year, and you will discover the magnitude of the inertia for "straight" lecturing.) Brushing your teeth after breakfast and ooenine vour lectures in the same wav nrovide ... recognized and comforting starting points. Somehow, the day or the lecture does not feel "rieht" if the ooeninz ritual is missed. I find it both useful and important to consciously incorporate such rituals in my teaching. In addition to the pocket watch routine, other opening gambits I have used or observed include: saying "Good Morning" brightly; carefully unpacking my brief case and arranging my notes, pens, etc., in a prescribed manner; erasing the blackboard systematically; or simply listing the topics to be covered that day. Whatever you choose to do a t the beginning, middle, or closing of a lecture, do it routinely and systematically. Then, for special effect(s) you can consciously alter your routine and your impact will be greater.
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What in some persons is called eccentricity, in others would be called insanity. ( 3 ) All strangenessand self-particularity in our manners and conditions is to be shunned as an enemy to society and civil conversation, Montaigne ( 4 ) The recent article bv Bent and Bent (5) . . contained manv fascinating personal reminiscences. Careful reading showed that the thines that oeoole remember most about a eiven professor werenot th;content or their subject matter hGt the
personality and, in particular, the idiosyncratic or eccentric behavior of the professor. The moral is-"If you wish to be remembered fondly by your students, then pay more attention to your eccentricities than your systematic transmission of content." With respect to being memorable, style is more important than content. Of course, bizarre behavior which has no pedagogical intent or design buried in it can be harmful to the educational process. Be a conscious eccentric striving for the Good, the True, and the Beautiful. The effort to become an eccentric is worth it (eccentrics, like blondes, do have more fun!) since I am convinced that eccentrics are more effective teachers than dull pedants. After all. our duller colleaeues insuire students merelv to the deoths an ho&, or of counting the nunker of Ames they say " ~ in h to daydream or doodle away their lives (and yours). Students pay more attention to eccentrics, and I maintain that you can pump - more information and understandina into an attentive and awake and alive student than a dulledone. Eccentricity has always abounded when and where strength of character has abounded;and the amount of eccentricity in a society has been proportional to the amount of genius, mental vigor, and moral courage it contained. J. S. Mi11 ( 6 ) Acknowledpment .
T o my colleagues Professors R. H. Stokes, T. J. Neuhert, and Dr. John Jones for their ineffable inspiration. Literature Cited (11 Fadiman. C.,"Any Nurnher Can Plny,"TheWorld PublishingCompany,N~wY~rk 1957, PP. 11&42, "Do Not Destroy these Original# (21 Sitwell, E.,"English E E c e n t n d ' P h e VanguardPms,NewYork, 1957. 131 PdlMaliGaiierrr (1886). (4 M0ntai~nc;'Es~ayr.~ 151 Rent, H. A.,and Bent. H. E.. J. CHEM.EDUC.,S7.609 (1980). 161 Mill, J. S.,"OnLiherty." (18591. (71 You may also be inreresled in Wright, R.,"Americsn wags and Eccentrics." Rederick Ungar PublishineCn..NewYwk, 1965.
Volume 59
Number 7
July 1982
585
