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Book Review
After almost dying before emergency surgery saved him, he "wanted to squeeze more juice out of my new life." His life was happy and successful, but he continued to search for meaning. In this book, he looks back at the speeches he has made to try to see what he really thinks. It's a clever device, and because he is a skillful speaker and has led an interesting life, the speeches are fun to read and often wise. Enlivening the wisdom are anecdotes from his years as an actor. "In those days, plays went out of town to get the kinks out of a show. Ours was composed almost entirely of kinks, so they had to pick and choose which ones to drop." When his oldest daughter was ready to graduate from college, he was asked to give the commencement address. "I was more than touched. I would finally be able to talk about anything I wanted and she'd have to listen. But what would I talk about?" That speech is the first of several graduation speeches that are included in the book. They make one wish that Alan Alda gave all of our speeches. His family and career have been important to him, but he cares about the nation and the world, too, and has been part of demonstrations and activist groups. He looks back on the 1960s with nostalgia and realism. He tells students at Emerson College that if they can love the people they share their lives with and love the work they do, and try to do good just by doing well -- "Then you will have a revolution." Because he played a doctor on the very successful M*A*S*H, some people asked him for medical advice, and he was asked to speak to doctors' groups. He spent a number of years as the host of PBS's Scientific American Frontiers, and became an "expert" on science. He is not insincerely modest, but can make fun of himself. He knows that he is an artist, not a scientist, but he is genuinely interested in everything, especially science. "Artists try to say things that can't be said. In a fragile net of words, gestures, or colors, we hope to capture a feeling, a taste, a painful longing." About the New York towers, he says, "One by one they descended to the ground, billowing an ugly, toxic cloud while disbelief and confusion rose in each of us from a place in our chest where once we had felt safety and comfort." Alda tried to help the workers but soon realized that real experts were needed there. What he did do was to participate in a television show by many New York artists in response to the tragedy. "I knew that what we had done was trivial. . . . For a while, at least, life was a little less meaningless."
He closes with a commencement talk that he might give on his deathbed. You may be sure that it is not depressing. To read it and the other chapters, findThings I Overheard While Talking to Myself at the Mary Willis Library.
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