28 June 2007, ST
A collection of famous eulogies makes for moving and inspirational reading
By Loh Keng Fatt, booksforthesoul
THEY say the true test of a life well lived is what others say about you when you are dead.
Which is why author and magazine columnist Phyllis Theroux has compiled the eulogies made by the friends of famous people like Abraham Lincoln and Robert Kennedy in The Book Of Eulogies.
Her point is that life goes on and those who come after can draw inspiration and courage from the departed.
Here's an excerpt of a eulogy to author Mark Twain (real name Sam Clemens, 1835-1910) by Helen Keller (1880-1968), a deaf-blind author, activist and lecturer.
'He knew with keen and sure intuition many things about me and how it felt to be blind and not to keep up with the swift ones - things that others learnt slowly or not at all.
He never embarrassed me by saying how terrible it is not to see, or how dull life must be, lived always in the dark.
Once when someone exclaimed, 'God, how dull it must be for her, every day the same and every night the same as the day,' he said, 'You're damned wrong there, blindness is an exciting business, I tell you; if you don't believe it, get up some dark night on the wrong side of your bed when the house is on fire and try to find the door'.
He thought he was a cynic but his cynicism did not make him indifferent to the sight of cruelty, unkindness, meanness or pretentiousness. He would often say, 'Helen, the world is full of unseeing eyes, vacant, staring, soulless eyes'.
He would work himself into a frenzy over dull acquiescence to any evil that could be remedied. True, sometimes it seemed as if he let loose all the artillery of heaven against an intruding mouse, but even then, his resplendent vocabulary was a delight.
He often spoke tenderly of his wife and regretted that I had not known her. 'I am very lonely sometimes, when I sit by the fire after my guests have departed,' he used to say.
To one hampered and circumscribed as I am, it was a wonderful experience to have a friend like Mr Clemens. I recall many talks with him about human affairs. He never made me feel that my opinions were worthless, as so many people do.
He knew that we do not think with eyes and ears, and that our capacity for thought is not measured by five senses.
He kept me always in mind while he talked, and he treated me like a competent human being. That is why I loved him.
Perhaps my strongest impression of him was that of sorrow. There was about him the air of one who had suffered greatly.
Whenever I touched his face, his expression was sad, even when he was telling a funny story. He smiled, not with the mouth but with his mind - a gesture of the soul rather than of the face.
His voice was truly wonderful. To my touch, it was deep, resonant. He held the power of modulating it so as to suggest the most delicate shades of meaning, and he spoke so deliberately that I could get almost every word with my fingers on his lips.
Ah, how sweet and poignant the memory of his soft, slow speech playing over my listening fingers. His words seemed to take strange, lovely shapes on my hands.
His own hands were wonderfully mobile and changeable under the influence of emotion. It has been said that my life has treated me harshly and sometimes I have complained in my heart because so many pleasures of human experience have been withheld from me, but when I recollect the treasure of friendship that has been bestowed upon me, I withdraw all charges against life.
If much has been denied me, much, very much has been given me. So long as the memory of certain beloved friends lives in my heart, I shall say that life is good.
The Book Of Eulogies is available for loan from The National Library Board under the call number 920.02 BOO.
Books For The Soul is a weekly column that highlights books which move, comfort or inspire.
A collection of famous eulogies makes for moving and inspirational reading
By Loh Keng Fatt, booksforthesoul
THEY say the true test of a life well lived is what others say about you when you are dead.
Which is why author and magazine columnist Phyllis Theroux has compiled the eulogies made by the friends of famous people like Abraham Lincoln and Robert Kennedy in The Book Of Eulogies.
Her point is that life goes on and those who come after can draw inspiration and courage from the departed.
Here's an excerpt of a eulogy to author Mark Twain (real name Sam Clemens, 1835-1910) by Helen Keller (1880-1968), a deaf-blind author, activist and lecturer.
'He knew with keen and sure intuition many things about me and how it felt to be blind and not to keep up with the swift ones - things that others learnt slowly or not at all.
He never embarrassed me by saying how terrible it is not to see, or how dull life must be, lived always in the dark.
Once when someone exclaimed, 'God, how dull it must be for her, every day the same and every night the same as the day,' he said, 'You're damned wrong there, blindness is an exciting business, I tell you; if you don't believe it, get up some dark night on the wrong side of your bed when the house is on fire and try to find the door'.
He thought he was a cynic but his cynicism did not make him indifferent to the sight of cruelty, unkindness, meanness or pretentiousness. He would often say, 'Helen, the world is full of unseeing eyes, vacant, staring, soulless eyes'.
He would work himself into a frenzy over dull acquiescence to any evil that could be remedied. True, sometimes it seemed as if he let loose all the artillery of heaven against an intruding mouse, but even then, his resplendent vocabulary was a delight.
He often spoke tenderly of his wife and regretted that I had not known her. 'I am very lonely sometimes, when I sit by the fire after my guests have departed,' he used to say.
To one hampered and circumscribed as I am, it was a wonderful experience to have a friend like Mr Clemens. I recall many talks with him about human affairs. He never made me feel that my opinions were worthless, as so many people do.
He knew that we do not think with eyes and ears, and that our capacity for thought is not measured by five senses.
He kept me always in mind while he talked, and he treated me like a competent human being. That is why I loved him.
Perhaps my strongest impression of him was that of sorrow. There was about him the air of one who had suffered greatly.
Whenever I touched his face, his expression was sad, even when he was telling a funny story. He smiled, not with the mouth but with his mind - a gesture of the soul rather than of the face.
His voice was truly wonderful. To my touch, it was deep, resonant. He held the power of modulating it so as to suggest the most delicate shades of meaning, and he spoke so deliberately that I could get almost every word with my fingers on his lips.
Ah, how sweet and poignant the memory of his soft, slow speech playing over my listening fingers. His words seemed to take strange, lovely shapes on my hands.
His own hands were wonderfully mobile and changeable under the influence of emotion. It has been said that my life has treated me harshly and sometimes I have complained in my heart because so many pleasures of human experience have been withheld from me, but when I recollect the treasure of friendship that has been bestowed upon me, I withdraw all charges against life.
If much has been denied me, much, very much has been given me. So long as the memory of certain beloved friends lives in my heart, I shall say that life is good.
The Book Of Eulogies is available for loan from The National Library Board under the call number 920.02 BOO.
Books For The Soul is a weekly column that highlights books which move, comfort or inspire.
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