Chris: I found this not just melancholic - the discussion of Mike Tyson - but distressing, too. Just recently my wife and I watched the movie Raging Bull from I guess around 40 years ago - and yes, a movie - but I had had no idea of the anger and rage and violence of that film - of the hate which consumed and fired aspects of that boxer's life. Nor had I realised you had been boxing when much younger - so an insider's perspective to this conversation. Of the earlier part - and the observation made by your guest/you - that many former war veterans become engaged in giving back to those who have most suffered physical and psychological wounds - I am put in mind of a distant cousin who served with Australian Forces sent to be part of the US war in Viet-Nam - who over many years has been part of the Viet-Nam Veterans support group of his region. An admirable volunteer engagement. Thank-you for this discussion.
Thanks Jim. Raging Bull is a masterpiece. My boxing coach told me I would never make a great boxer as I did not have enough "hate in my heart." What those who suffered, and caused suffering, can best do to heal themselves is heal others - those Jung called "wounded healers." Take a look of my commencement talk to the incarcerated students I taught: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=30qeXqM4Hs0&t=42s
Oh, Chris. Such an emotionally moving Commencement Address. Each time you paused during the delivery I thought - come on brother - you can do it - though had you wept at any point - there would have been none who were not already weeping with you. I'm a teacher - in some senses retired - but yes - like you - my students are forever my students - MY students... and though not out of the hardships so heart-breakingly outlined by you as you described all of the ways in which YOUR students had integrity - so indeed did many of the thousands of my students over nearly 40 years of formal teaching also show integrity as they overcame the various tragedies and trauma of their lives. Your comment about Raging Bull (1980 - Scorsese, Robert De Niro et al - input from the real Jake La Motta) sent me to Wikipedia - and yes - I have to agree with your assessment of the film as a masterpiece...indeed as Scorsese - not a fan of boxing by any means - came to understand it - as an allegory for whatever you do in life. I do so appreciate your reply and sending the link to your address. Normally I would have answered this hours ago - here it is now Saturday afternoon April 1st. I have finally finished a first draft of a tribute I have been working on for 15 months (a conversation I have not wanted to finish, I suspect) - addressed to the family of a Shintō priest mate in western Japan who passed away on Xmas Day, 2021 - several years younger than me - of cancer. His friendship - through my final five+ years of over 16 in Japan - were way beyond what one might expect in a foreign land. Of course given all my years there - Japan is integral to my identity of self - even if not apparent to those unknown to me looking on at my Anglo-pinkness. I am somewhere beyond 60,000 words in my story of the friendship and of my final five years in Japan (2004-2009) - now into re-reading and editing before sending it on its way to the widow and two sons - and others of that circle - who will help them to make sense of my farewell.
Thanks Jim. Teaching is a sacred profession. There are pictures of a few of my teachers on the walls of my office. How wonderful of you to take time to write this tribute. I know it will mean a lot to his family. You might like my book Our Class: Trauma and Transformation in an American Prison. My heart is on every page. Take care. Chris
Chris: I have your book - your heart on every page was easily apparent. At the start of the Covid-19 pandemic and lockdowns I began to write a memoir - I got as far as heading away to university (with some later inclusions on my "mentors" - not a word in use when I was younger) and on my own beloved teachers - Infants, Primary & Secondary schools and at University - and during my years in Japan - thinking more clearly from that distance - getting in touch with them (and visiting them on journeys back to Australia.) Maybe with the Tribute I am now editing - out of the way - I may revisit that attempt at memoir and how I became - if ever so slightly - the teacher striving for social justice in my classes - on so many levels - with literature and so forth as my guides. I am reading Michael Parenti's 2013 memoir of his NYC childhood Waiting for Yesterday (Pages from a Street Kid's Life) and Canadian academic Daniel A Bell's 2022 book - The Dean of Shandong (Confessions of a Minor Bureaucrat at a Chinese University) - both tell me to lighten up... Jim
Chris: I found this not just melancholic - the discussion of Mike Tyson - but distressing, too. Just recently my wife and I watched the movie Raging Bull from I guess around 40 years ago - and yes, a movie - but I had had no idea of the anger and rage and violence of that film - of the hate which consumed and fired aspects of that boxer's life. Nor had I realised you had been boxing when much younger - so an insider's perspective to this conversation. Of the earlier part - and the observation made by your guest/you - that many former war veterans become engaged in giving back to those who have most suffered physical and psychological wounds - I am put in mind of a distant cousin who served with Australian Forces sent to be part of the US war in Viet-Nam - who over many years has been part of the Viet-Nam Veterans support group of his region. An admirable volunteer engagement. Thank-you for this discussion.
Thanks Jim. Raging Bull is a masterpiece. My boxing coach told me I would never make a great boxer as I did not have enough "hate in my heart." What those who suffered, and caused suffering, can best do to heal themselves is heal others - those Jung called "wounded healers." Take a look of my commencement talk to the incarcerated students I taught: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=30qeXqM4Hs0&t=42s
Chris
Oh, Chris. Such an emotionally moving Commencement Address. Each time you paused during the delivery I thought - come on brother - you can do it - though had you wept at any point - there would have been none who were not already weeping with you. I'm a teacher - in some senses retired - but yes - like you - my students are forever my students - MY students... and though not out of the hardships so heart-breakingly outlined by you as you described all of the ways in which YOUR students had integrity - so indeed did many of the thousands of my students over nearly 40 years of formal teaching also show integrity as they overcame the various tragedies and trauma of their lives. Your comment about Raging Bull (1980 - Scorsese, Robert De Niro et al - input from the real Jake La Motta) sent me to Wikipedia - and yes - I have to agree with your assessment of the film as a masterpiece...indeed as Scorsese - not a fan of boxing by any means - came to understand it - as an allegory for whatever you do in life. I do so appreciate your reply and sending the link to your address. Normally I would have answered this hours ago - here it is now Saturday afternoon April 1st. I have finally finished a first draft of a tribute I have been working on for 15 months (a conversation I have not wanted to finish, I suspect) - addressed to the family of a Shintō priest mate in western Japan who passed away on Xmas Day, 2021 - several years younger than me - of cancer. His friendship - through my final five+ years of over 16 in Japan - were way beyond what one might expect in a foreign land. Of course given all my years there - Japan is integral to my identity of self - even if not apparent to those unknown to me looking on at my Anglo-pinkness. I am somewhere beyond 60,000 words in my story of the friendship and of my final five years in Japan (2004-2009) - now into re-reading and editing before sending it on its way to the widow and two sons - and others of that circle - who will help them to make sense of my farewell.
Thanks Jim. Teaching is a sacred profession. There are pictures of a few of my teachers on the walls of my office. How wonderful of you to take time to write this tribute. I know it will mean a lot to his family. You might like my book Our Class: Trauma and Transformation in an American Prison. My heart is on every page. Take care. Chris
Chris: I have your book - your heart on every page was easily apparent. At the start of the Covid-19 pandemic and lockdowns I began to write a memoir - I got as far as heading away to university (with some later inclusions on my "mentors" - not a word in use when I was younger) and on my own beloved teachers - Infants, Primary & Secondary schools and at University - and during my years in Japan - thinking more clearly from that distance - getting in touch with them (and visiting them on journeys back to Australia.) Maybe with the Tribute I am now editing - out of the way - I may revisit that attempt at memoir and how I became - if ever so slightly - the teacher striving for social justice in my classes - on so many levels - with literature and so forth as my guides. I am reading Michael Parenti's 2013 memoir of his NYC childhood Waiting for Yesterday (Pages from a Street Kid's Life) and Canadian academic Daniel A Bell's 2022 book - The Dean of Shandong (Confessions of a Minor Bureaucrat at a Chinese University) - both tell me to lighten up... Jim