Harvard After Sept. 11

To the editors:

Re: “Things to Think About” (Opinion, Sept. 14):

Over the past few days, a feeling of frustration and helplessness has swept over me. As firefighters and volunteers stand side-by-side passing buckets of debris from what were once the twin pillars of the New York skyline, I wish I could join them. Instead I sit in the Langdell Law Library with several books arrayed before me, attending classes and living the ordinary life of a college student. But in this extraordinary period of history, I question my purpose and my future path.

The call for reexamination was made by many who commented on last Tuesday’s events. However, while America’s luminaries weighed in on the events of Sept. 11 with incisive sentiments that will be documented for posterity, the words of Dean of the College Harry R. Lewis ’68 resonate most with those of us at Harvard.

I am not in Lewis’ computer science course, but I have read and reread his comments as printed in The Crimson. Indeed, this moment aptly compels all members of the Harvard community to engage in contemplative introspection. It is not only the fragility of life that we too often take for granted, but the fact that we are here, at one of history’s greatest institutions of learning. Although we may have acquired countless accolades in our relatively short lives, teenagers abroad with as much talent and ambition are hamstrung by corrupt governments and hampered by illnesses that the Western world has long since conquered.

It is then that I realize that we all have a higher calling, a necessary purpose here at Harvard: to use what we have gained from this unparalleled institution and contribute something to a world that too often seems divided. Let us not fail our nation or the ideals that so many before us have stood for, and let us continue on, doing the things that students do, aware that overarching our lives is a higher calling for action.

Michael F. Maltese

Sept. 16, 2001

The writer is a special student at the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences.