Category Archives: People

The Reason Why

Teaching is not a lost art, but the regard for it is a lost tradition–Jacques Barzun

William Arthur Ward wrote that the mediocre teacher tells, the good teacher explains, the superior teacher demonstrates, the great teacher inspires. Carl Vipperman, my very first history professor at the University of Georgia, died on June 28, 2014, at the age of 86. I was honored and humbled to be the only one of the thousands of students he had in a 30-year teaching career to speak at his memorial service in Athens on July 2. I was privileged that day also to spend time with many of Carl’s friends and family, including his beloved wife Reggie, son Carl Jr.—known as Vip—and Vip’s wife Vickie (all pictured below, left, at Vip’s 1982 wedding). I visited his beautiful Tudor-style historic home on W. Cloverhurst Avenue (at right), perused the book-lined shelves in his study, sat in his reading chair in the writing nook that he built in the backyard (reminiscent of writer Christopher Morley’s famous similar retreat, the Knothole), and walked the well-manicured grounds of Reggie’s beautiful gardens. Vip and I spent time in his father’s writing retreat that evening reminiscing over a glass of wine about his father and his own successful career as songwriter and musician. It was an emotional day of tribute to the good and gentle man who inspired me to choose the path of historian. Carl Jackson Vipperman was a great teacher, in the finest tradition of that honorable but too often undervalued profession. You will see why I was asked to speak in the remarks that follow, which I delivered at his memorial service:

“I begin with a quote from Charles Dickens, which is
fitting not only because of what it says, but also because Carl Vipperman could quote literature like few other people: ‘That was a memorable day to me, for it made great changes in me. But it is the same with any life. Imagine one selected day struck out of it, and think how different its course would have been. Pause you who read this, and think for a moment of the long chain of iron or gold, of thorns or flowers, that would never have bound you, but for the formation of the first link on one memorable day.’

One of those days for me was Friday, September 17, 1982, my first day of college and the day I first met Carl Vipperman. I was taking History 251, the first half of American history, in the PJ auditorium and was one of 300 people waiting for class to begin. In walked Carl Vipperman. He was silver haired (though only a little older than I am right now), wearing a white button-down oxford shirt, blue jeans, and comfortable brown shoes. Unassuming. He didn’t look like a professor so much as the guy you meet hanging out down at the hardware store. There wasn’t much to go on, but I remember thinking that I might actually be able to do this college thing, and that I liked Carl Vipperman. I didn’t know it at the time, but that day was for me one like Dickens described, a memorable day that made great changes in me and bound me with chains of gold and flowers.

For the next 10 weeks, Monday through Friday, Carl walked up on stage and talked about American history. He started with the Norse invasion and it seemingly took him weeks and weeks to get to anything resembling American history, but I loved it. He not only was a master lecturer, but his knowledge and depth of learning were constantly on display. He casually dropped in names of historical sites we should see, books we should read; he somehow managed to work in lyrics from songs and he recited poetry as well. I wrote it all down in my notes and it often sent me scrambling in those pre-Google days to the library to track down the source of the poetry, the rest of the song, or the book he had mentioned. And he did it all without a single note. Here was a man who loved what he did, was good at it, and who put his passion and enthusiasm on display five days a week without fail for all of us to see. I had never seen anything like it, certainly not among my high school teachers, bless them. Quite simply, he set a model for how a professor should conduct his class that left me disappointed many times over in most of my other non-history classes that I took during the next 4 years. (It certainly wouldn’t have happened the next quarter with the professor who taught HIS 252, the second half of American history. He was deadly boring and shall remain nameless.) Carl Vipperman lit a fire in me that never burned out.

Carl almost pursued a musical career and maintained that love all his life. He played the upright bass in an Athens trio called “The Professors” for years.

I loved history but didn’t major in it, getting my undergraduate degree in journalism instead. But I immediately went back for a master’s degree in history and was privileged to be in the history department in LeConte Hall at a very special time. I took more classes with Carl and got to know his remarkable colleagues: Nash Boney, Phinizy Spalding, Jim Anderson, Emory Thomas, Jean Friedman, Ron Rader, Charlie Wynes, Joe Berrigan, Kirk Willis, Bill McFeely, Bob Pratt, Will Holmes, Bud Bartley, Lester Stephens, Alf Heggoy, John Inscoe, Tom Dyer, Aubrey Land. These were scholars who treated us with respect and expected us to do the same with each other. They welcomed us into their homes for social gatherings with a warmth of spirit and generosity, of collegiality, that set a very powerful example. I learned later it was a rare thing indeed in the academy. I have never forgotten it or them.

My path led me into public history, where I’ve had a wonderful and very fulfilling career that has allowed me to do things I never would have imagined when I began this journey on that long ago September Friday. In January 2006 I decided the time was way overdue for the man most responsible for launching me on that journey to know what he had done for me. So I wrote the following letter to Carl Vipperman:

‘Dear Dr. Vipperman: Please allow me to re-introduce myself to you. In my very first quarter at the University of Georgia, in the Fall of 1982, I took your American History class and it set me on the course of my life’s work as a historian and writer. For all these years, I’ve wanted you to know the enormous and positive influence you had on my life, but I’ve never taken the time to write you. Having gotten a doctorate and done a bit of teaching myself on the college level, I have had students approach me and tell me how much they enjoyed my class and appreciated how exciting I made my subject, how I had pushed them and challenged them to expand their minds. I would respond, ‘I studied under one of the masters.’ It always made me think about my own teachers–like you–and how much that was true of the best of them, but yet I’d never taken the opportunity to tell them so, to tell them how much they’ve shaped who I’ve become, the important role they played in my journey, and how much they mean to me–in short, to say a heartfelt and profound ‘thank you.’

Carl was an accomplished woodworker, carving this bust of Abraham Lincoln.

First and foremost, you made history fun and exciting. Your teaching style was engaging and lively, your lectures were informative and humorous, yet packed with insight and analysis. And you did it all without any notes whatsoever! You could pick up on Monday morning exactly where you had left off on Friday, and never miss a beat. When the lecture was over, you always had time for students and their questions, and you never tired of conversations after class. Your warmth and generosity continue to inspire me, and the lessons you taught me in that classroom–as a scholar and as a gentleman–have stayed with me throughout my life. It was a privilege to be in your class.

As I watched you all those years ago, I asked myself, “How can I get a job doing what he’s doing?” I came to your office once and talked to you about a career in history, and though you discouraged me from getting an advanced degree in history due to the depressed job market, I didn’t listen! I went on to take your upper division course on Jefferson to the Civil War and though I received my undergraduate degree in journalism, I took my master’s degree in history there at UGA (working with Bill McFeely) and went on to get my Ph.D. in history at the University of Florida, where I studied under Bertram Wyatt-Brown. I would have never written my dissertation on South Carolina without your influence in that first class. It was you who first sparked my interest in South Carolina history, and it was your lectures that led me to take my first trip to Charleston. The vineyard of South Carolina history and historiography is a rich one, and your works on Rawlins and William Lowndes are both models of careful and thorough scholarship, good writing, and penetrating analysis. Indeed, anyone who labors in the field of history knows that their study would not be possible without the hard work and scholarship of those who have walked the vineyards before us and all who study the history of South Carolina stand in your debt.

They say that a teacher’s influence never ends, that their influence is passed down from generation to generation. You are living proof of that. Rest assured, my dear sir, you have touched many other lives besides mine. To quote Thomas Jefferson, writing to his friend John Adams in 1812, ‘No circumstances have lessened the interest I feel in these particulars respecting yourself; none have suspended for one moment my sincere esteem for you, and I now salute you with unchanged affection and respect. ‘ With all good wishes…’

Some time went by and I heard nothing. I thought, well, maybe my letter got thrown out with the junk mail. Who writes letters anymore anyway? Maybe I should have called or gone to visit instead. And then one day, nearly two months later, I found this email waiting for me one morning, with the subject line ‘Landmark Letter of January 31’:

Carl and his beloved Reggie

‘Dear Dr. Deaton: I have delayed far longer than I intended in answering your letter and for that I must apologize. Part of the reason was the profound impact it made at our house. As I didn’t have my glasses, my wife Reggie opened the mail and started reading your letter to me. She was in tears before she got halfway through it, and when she finished, I said, ‘If I should fall over dead tomorrow, I want that letter read at my funeral, and I’d like for Stan Deaton to read it.’ If that comment sounds flippant, I assure you I could hardly be more serious. Your letter established a landmark in my professional life. Over the years I have received many compliments, mostly verbal and some written, and the year after I retired in 1994, the history department established the Graduate Teaching Assistant Award in my name, which I appreciate very much. But your letter is the first of its kind, coming from a student who did not major in history under my guidance, who wrote neither his thesis nor dissertation under my direction, who decided to become a historian against my market-prompted advice, who sought out the most challenging (and most rewarding) road to advanced degrees by choosing to study under McFeely and Wyatt-Brown, two of the best in the business

The writing nook built by Carl in his backyard that he enjoyed after his retirement.

and among the most demanding in the profession, and who went on to establish himself as a respected member of my profession and especially among the community of historians in Georgia. What I found most gratifying and at the same time most humbling in your letter was that you considered the American history survey course you had with me to be a pivotal point in turning your attention toward history as a profession. That tends to vindicate what I have always believed, that introductory history courses are so important (1) for the enlightenment of ordinary American citizens on the historical character of their country and (2) for the recruitment of students like you for the history profession, that indifferent or uninterested instructors should never be allowed near them. Stan, in closing I must say that your letter was a great gift to the household of this old retired historian. You were lost to my memory before it came, but never again. Reggie and I thank you again for your priceless gift, and wish you every success and future happiness.’

Someone should read Carl’s letter at my funeral.

One month ago I spoke in Savannah at the memorial service for a dear friend of mine who committed suicide. One of his cousins said to me, ‘there are going to be some rough days ahead. Let’s all be there for each other.” I say the same to you today, in the spirit of my friend and mentor, who meant so much to me. Take the time to tell people what they mean to you, the influence they’ve played in your life. Before we are historians, scholars, teachers, we are human beings. Be kind to each other, lift each other up. Forgive other people, and be the first to reach out. Be there for each other. The academy—indeed, life in any profession—can be a petty, mean-spirited, ugly business, with nasty backbiting and turf wars that can hurt feelings and leave friendships and reputations destroyed. Carl Vipperman was living proof that one can rise above all of that, and live one’s life with honor and integrity while treating others with kindness and respect. He told us in class one day that our lives would last longer than our careers, to fill it with things like community, culture, conversation and friends. Service to others. Absorption in things other than self is the secret to a happy life, well-rounded and well-lived, like Carl Vipperman’s. I regret that I didn’t go to greater lengths to see him and spend time with him in these latter years, but I’m grateful that at the end of the day he knew how much he meant to me and the influence he had on my life.

Peace to Carl and all who knew and loved him, and honor and glory to his memory.”

The Light Shines in the Darkness

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Under the look of fatigue, the attack of migraine and the sigh
There is always another story, there is more than meets the eye.
W.H. Auden, “At Last the Secret is Out”

On a grey Friday, the seventh day of December, 1984, one of my best friends from high school, Chuck Fuller, ended his own life at age 20. Chuck suffered from depression, but none of us knew it. No one saw it coming—not his parents, not his closest friends. All who knew and loved Chuck experienced the gamut of emotions that one feels at the news of suicide: grief, devastation, anger, guilt. If only we’d done this or that, maybe, just maybe, we could have made a difference. We always think that. It shook all of us to the core, and we carry it with us still.

Twenty-five years after Chuck’s death, I wrote his parents a letter to tell them both how much their son meant to me and how his life had touched mine and so many other lives. Chuck’s father told me of the pain of losing his only child, and said this about Chuck’s death and depression: “This life is filled with mysteries and it is not meant for us to understand everything. We would be as wise as God if we did. From time to time each of us has a terrible burden to bear. Burdens of the mind are surely the heaviest. I learned from Chuck’s death that mental anguish is virtually invisible and no matter how deeply we might love and care for someone we often have no idea the burden exists.” The darkness behind the light.

Here’s to the hearts and the hands of the men
That come with the dust and are gone with the wind.
Bob Dylan, “Song to Woody”

I first met Will Brown at the Memorial Hospital gym. Will was a radiologist resident at Memorial and a gym rat like me. The Memorial gym, on the third floor of the Health Institute, has been my home away from home for nearly 13 years, and I’m there a lot. But no matter how much I went, it seemed that Will was there even more. No matter what time of the day or night I went, he was already there. Will riding a stationary bike, reading his Ipad. Will with his retro headphones on, bench pressing nearly 300 pounds. Will doing pull ups with a weighted vest. Will doing sit ups with a 45-pound plate on his chest. Will laughing. Will smiling. Will in the zone. Will being Will.

Like everyone else, I was naturally drawn to him, and we connected instantly. Our conversation and friendship was natural and easy. I learned so many new things to do in the gym just from watching him, but of course we talked a lot too. No matter what he was doing, it was something to see, and I was in awe of him. Will being Will, he’d have none of it. He would invariably say, “If I can do it, you can do it.” I’ve never known anybody who wore all of his accomplishments and talents so lightly, and they were many—champion athlete, musician, physician. And he was right, at least to a point: I tried all sorts of things I hadn’t done before in the gym, and learned that I could do them. And Will being Will, he always acted as if he was in awe of me. He always encouraged me, acted as if he wished he could look like me, and always complimented me. We would see each other across the parking lot, and he’d yell, “Here comes the gun show!” “Stan,” he’d say, “please cover up those arms, you’re putting all of us to shame!” Never mind that he was twice as big as me; that was his way, Will being Will, as I learned very quickly watching him interact with other people.

When he found out that I was 15 years older than he, it just ratcheted everything up a notch. He seemed incredulous. He didn’t just say “I hope I look that good when I’m almost 50,” he would say, “I wish I looked like you right now!” As if he didn’t. With a smile and a body that could conquer cities, he somehow found a way to make you feel like the special one. Will being Will.

One day you’ll look to see I’ve gone
For tomorrow may rain, so I’ll follow the sun
The Beatles, “I’ll Follow the Sun”

Last fall I decided rather late in the game to run the Rock & Roll Half Marathon but didn’t have anyone to run with. Most people who had run it before that I knew would have nothing to do with it again. They had better sense, which is why I of course approached Will one night in the gym and asked him if he’d run it with me. He said, “I haven’t run at all since I ran the Half last year.” I waited. He grinned. “I’d love to run it with you.” That’s the kind of person he was. As far as I could tell, he didn’t train much at all, if any. He even bought a new pair of running shoes the week before the race and planned to wear them, another no-no. The day before the race I drove over to the Savannah Convention Center to pick up my race packet, and as I was walking in, Will was walking out. He was in scrubs, I was in a suit. I realized later that it was the only time I’d ever seen Will when he wasn’t sweating. Will being Will, he gave me a big hug and wouldn’t stop talking about how sharp I looked in the suit. We finalized our plans for the next morning. I would drive to his house at 5 a.m. His friend and fellow doctor, Lee, would meet us there and we’d drive downtown together.

I got up at 4, anxious to get the day started, and left the house at 5. Will lived just minutes away, and I called him to tell him I was on my way. No answer. I got to his street, unsure exactly which was his house but figured it would be the only one with lights on. They were all pitch dark. I called Will again. And again. And again. And again. No answer. Crap, they’ve left without me, and I was only a few minutes late. I’ll never find them downtown and I’ll have to run by myself after all. I was getting a little panicky, driving up and down the street, the minutes ticking by, when I noticed a car sitting in a driveway with someone in it. Taking a chance, I parked and walked up and knocked on the window. “Are you looking for Will?” He was. It was Lee, whom I’d never met. His calls had gone unanswered too. He tried again. This time Will answered. He had not only slept through at least 10 phone calls but through 8 different alarms, having worked late the night before. Nevertheless, Will being Will, he was out in less than 5 minutes, smiling, looking fresh as ever. Off we went.

Lee was a lot faster than both of us, and he was in a different corral. Will being Will, he pumped both of us up as we shivered in the pre-dawn cold, fist-pumping, hugging, high-fiving, “We’re gonna do this!” At the gun, we took off together and stayed together. He kept our time on his watch, and I pestered him throughout: How we doin? How’s our time? After every mile, he’d fist bump, high five, and never stopped encouraging us both: “We’re doing great! You’re awesome Stan! I’m having a hard time keeping up with you!” I’d tell him, “You gotta keep up with the old man!” And he’d just laugh and smile that smile. Will being Will.

At mile 8 the blisters came and I wasn’t sure I could run 5 more miles. Will never stopped encouraging and pushing us. He was in new shoes, for cryin’ out loud. He even took phone calls. Our pace would slacken and then increase. Finally, at Mile 13, Will slowed down. I could sense the finish line was near and wanted to turn it up, but I didn’t want to leave him behind. Will being Will, he could sense that too. “Go on Stan, get your best time! Go!” “No way man, we’ve been together for 13 miles, I’m not leaving you now!” “Stan, go on! Get your best time brother! I’ll meet you at the finish line!” I’ll never forget those words. With a thumbs up, I took off and left him behind. He finished right behind me, just five seconds off my pace, but I felt terrible when it was over. Will being Will, he’d have none of that either. He gave me a big Will hug and told me how proud he was of me. He told me he’d have never been able to finish but for pushing him and keeping him going. We posed together, had our pictures taken together, basked in our collective glory.

I learned so much a bout Will that day, about true friendship. I learned about his loyalty, that he would get up at 5 in the morning—or at least try to—to run with and encourage a friend in a race he’d already run before, a milestone he’d already accomplished; about the sheer physical and athletic skills he possessed that allowed him to do something so grueling without training or preparing, on little sleep, and in new shoes; about his selflessness in encouraging me to go on without him at the very end to achieve a personal milestone. He made me feel that he could have never run and finished the race without my encouragement, when actually the opposite was true. I learned that day about the character of Will Brown. I had always had a sense that he was something special. That day confirmed it. Looking back, every encounter I ever had with him confirmed it. Will being Will. The memory of that November day, of my strong and gallant friend with the heart of a lion, will remain with me when many autumns have become distant, vanished memories.

They say that all good things must end someday
Autumn leaves must fall
But don’t you know that it hurts me so
To say goodbye to you
Wish you didn’t have to go
Chad & Jeremy, “A Summer Song”

It was only fitting that the last time I ever saw Will was in the gym, sweaty as always. He was in great emotional pain following a personal setback the day before, and I sat with him and told him that I was his friend and that I was there if he needed me, and even if he didn’t. He was devastated, shattered. I had never seen him like that. I told him that I would check on him in the days to come to see how he was doing. Will being Will, he thanked me that day and managed to smile, and we said goodbye.

Forever and forever farewell, Cassius;
if we do meet again, why we shall smile;
if not, why then, this parting was well made.
William Shakespeare, “Julius Caesar”

The next week, I sent him a text to check on his emotional state: Hey buddy, how you doing? He responded immediately: “Hey Stan! I’d be lying if I said I was doing well. Been praying a lot.” I told him that I was free on Friday night and that we should get together. No response. When Friday night came, I thought about calling him and inviting him out again but decided against it. I didn’t want to bother him; I had offered my company and he hadn’t accepted. I didn’t want to push myself on him.

Will suffered from depression, but I didn’t know it. In talking with his friends and hospital colleagues later, we all had a little piece of the puzzle, but none of us had the whole picture or understood how it all fit together. Later that evening, in the early morning hours of Saturday, May 24, Will took his own life. He was gone at 34.

The saviors come not home tonight,
Themselves they could not save.
A.E. Housman, “1887”

Memorial Day in Savannah was dark and rainy, as if the heavens themselves were weeping. It was for me a day of profound sorrow and mourning, of feeling what I felt for Chuck all over again, nearly 30 years later—grief, devastation, anger, guilt. But this time I knew and accepted the fact that I had reached out to Will in his last days and that he chose not to accept the lifeline that I and undoubtedly so many others had extended. Will had many friends who loved and cared about him, and he was gone by his own choice. It was a journey that none of us could have prevented. The darkness behind the light had finally overtaken him, and most of us never even knew it was there.

And in the streets the children screamed;
the lovers cried and the poets dreamed;
but not a word was spoken.
The church bells all were broken.
Don McLean, “American Pie”

The following Friday I drove 500 miles across the Florida panhandle to attend the memorial service in Will’s hometown of Gulf Breeze, Florida. The small Episcopal Church there was packed to overflowing, as was the service at Memorial Hospital here in Savannah the following Monday, at which I was privileged to speak. The Rev. Christie Olsen led a beautiful service in Gulf Breeze. The connecting theme, repeated over and over again by all who spoke at both services, was that this remarkable young man touched so many lives and, as one of his friends said, his soul was as bright as his smile. He was the real thing. We all struggled to reconcile the Will we knew with the Will who felt compelled to take his own life. Afterwards, I met his parents, Tom and Lita Brown, and his three brothers, Tad, Alex, and David, at the home where, as his father put it, Will was conceived, born, and raised, and to which he returned all his life to reconnect and renew his spirit. His father Tom and two older brothers, Tad and Alex, all are doctors. His younger brother David is a paramedic. Extraordinary children come from extraordinary parents and families. To the Browns, I say thank you for the wonderful gift you gave the world in Will. He touched and changed our lives in ways that none of you—nor he—could imagine.

Friendship is hard work. All things in life that are worthwhile are. Friendship has to be cultivated, maintained, refreshed, renewed. We all get busy and we lose touch. It’s hard enough sometimes just getting through our own day and dealing with our own troubles. We’re all too busy trying to shove our own rocks up the hill every day. Paying attention to other people’s moods or problems, no matter how much we may care about them, is often just too much work, too heavy a load. But in the wake of Will’s death, I hope now that I pay more attention to those around me and to the burdens they carry within them. Take the time to ask people how they’re doing, and really mean it when you ask. It’s a cliché, but it’s true: be kind to all those you meet, because we really don’t know the silent struggles within or the dark but quiet battles people are fighting. Even in the midst of all the hurries and bustles of modern life, I hope I can stop long enough to pay attention to those around me, and that somehow, some way, next time I can better see the darkness behind the light.

When he shall die, take and cut him out in little stars;
and he shall make the face of heaven so fine
that all the world shall be in love with night.
William Shakespeare, “Romeo & Juliet”

As Mr. Viviana said to Sherlock Holmes in “The Abbey Grange,” there are those in this life who are what you might call large-souled, who are a privilege to know. Will Brown was one of those. Will didn’t just make those around him better, his friends and colleagues, though he certainly did that. He made the human race better, and the world desperately needs more people like him. Will wasn’t a saint, nor was he perfect. None of us is. But he was a good and compassionate friend who always worried more about other people than himself, who invariably made everyone feel better and more cheerful after having spent just a few moments with him. I will struggle all of my life to keep faith with Will and all that he was, but I am so grateful for the privilege of having known him, for all that he taught me and gave me in so short a time.

One thing I know as I stand on the threshold of 50: real friendship is a rare and fleeting thing. I grieve the loss of this special friend. I am angry and heartbroken that there will be no more of him and all that might have been—no more learning from him, connecting with him, running with him. There should have been years and years and years left for this friendship to grow and for it to nourish us both.

But ultimately, the light that shined through Will—and that now shines through all who knew him—was much more powerful and lasting than the darkness behind the light. All the good that Will did and the joy he brought to so many others will far outlive the darkness that ultimately took him from us. And I realize now that Will needed to finish the race before me. As I left him behind on that November day—however briefly—so has he left us. Go on Will; get your best time. Will being Will, he’ll be waiting for me—for all of us—at the finish line. Godspeed my beautiful friend.

The light shines in the darkness,
And the darkness could not overcome it.
The Gospel of John, 1:5

The Kids Are Alright

“I Miss Her If She Goes to the Bathroom”: The Richard Burton Diaries

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The Richard Burton Diaries. Edited by Chris Williams. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2012. $35.00. 693 pp.

“Do you really keep a diary? I’d give anything to look at it. May I?” So asked Algernon, to Cecily, in Oscar Wilde’s The Importance of Being Earnest.

Reading someone else’s letters and diaries can be a great guilty pleasure. What people choose to say about themselves in their diaries can tell us a great deal about who they thought they were and, usually, what they wanted the world at large to know about them. Because let’s face it, everyone who keeps a diary knows that at some point someone besides themselves is going to read it. So one chooses very carefully what to put in and what to leave out. The very act of keeping a diary or a journal is an act of self-selection, self-editing, and self-censorship.

Richard Burton was one of the most gifted actors of his generation. He was born in Wales in 1925 and died in Switzerland of a stroke at the age of 58 in 1984. Years of hard living, primarily booze and cigarettes, took their toll. He was one-half of one of the most famous Hollywood couples in history, having been married—twice—to Elizabeth Taylor. And he had a reputation of being an enormously talented artist who squandered that talent on lesser roles because of alcohol, women, laziness and lack of ambition. Why, one might ask, would anyone publish his diaries 30 years after his death, and why would anyone want to read them?

Because they are absolutely fascinating. Most good diaries are. Samuel Pepys was a government clerk, but his diary is still widely read 300 years after his death (“I went out to Charing Cross to see Major General Harrison hanged, drawn, and quartered; he looking as cheerful as any man could in that condition.”) James Boswell’s journals—the famous biographer of Dr. Samuel Johnson—were long thought to have been lost but were rediscovered at Malahide Castle in Ireland in the 1920s 150 years after his death, and they are still being published. When Boswell’s London Journal was published in 1950, it became an immediate world-wide best seller, much to the surprise of the publisher and editor. There’s something voyeuristic about us, and reading other people’s diaries, letters, or emails is almost irresistible, particularly when the juicy parts are left in, as when Boswell accused his mistress Louisa of giving him gonorrhea: “Madam, I have had no connection with any woman but you these two months. Such a thing in this case is worse than from a woman of the town, as from her you may expect it. You have used me very ill. I did not deserve it.”

Richard Walter Jenkins was born November 10, 1925, at Pontrhydyfen in the Afan valley of Wales to a family of coalminers. He took the surname of his legal guardian Philip Burton in 1943. Burton was nominated for seven Academy Awards but never won, and was best known for playing Mark Antony opposite Elizabeth Taylor in Cleopatra (1963), Thomas Becket in Becket (1964), Henry VIII in Anne of the Thousand Days (1970) and O’Brien in 1984 (1984). His family deposited his personal papers, including his diaries, at Swansea University in Wales in 2005. The Burton Papers now are a central part of the new Richard Burton Archive facility, which was formally opened in April 2010.

Burton began keeping a diary as a teenager in 1939 and sporadically kept up the practice until his death 45 years later. There are enormous gaps in the chronicle, but what’s here makes for wonderful reading. Burton was a gifted writer, and I found myself underlining and underscoring passages throughout. He had a keen insight into human nature and character and was remarkably honest about his own talents and foibles.

Two things stand out above all else in these pages, one a surprise, the other not. The surprise: Richard Burton loved books more than anything else in the world and would rather spend his time reading than acting, drinking, or chasing women. Books remained the one constant in his life from childhood to death and he read constantly, widely, voluminously. Who knew that Burton and Taylor read the Encyclopedia Britannica together?

Second—not so surprising—he was infatuated with Elizabeth Taylor. Everything about her—her acting ability, her brain, her conversation, but above all else, her beauty, captivated Burton, and some of the most stunning passages in his diaries are about her. His descriptions of her physical attributes and his attraction to her make the book worth reading all by itself.

In these pages, Burton is amazingly self-effacing. He often thinks that acting is a silly way for a grown man to make a living, and he says so. He loathes so much about his profession and he grouses constantly about it: “One of those days when acting seems peculiarly silly. What a sloppy job to have.” For him it was a means to an end: good books, good food and drink, good living, great women. He dreads having to go to work, hates reading scripts and trying to memorize lines. There is a lot of small talk and gossip here about other actors and their faults and failures, but he is equally unsparing about his own.

Here we see Richard Burton stripped of much of his glamor. He watches his weight and his waistline, usually complaining about both. He tries to cut down from as many as 100 cigarettes a day. He drinks too much—at one time apparently 3 bottles of vodka a day: “I became very drunk later and shouted a lot. At E. I don’t know what about. Just plain sloshed…I have been more or less drunk for two days. I don’t know why but I enjoyed it thoroughly.” He quarrels too often with fellow actors, strangers, and especially with his four wives through five marriages. He feels old and out of shape and can’t sleep. He falls behind in his diary and chastises himself for it. He wishes he could stop working so he could spend all his time reading, drinking, playing Yahtzee, and doing crossword puzzles: “Both Eliz and I agreed that we never want to work again but simply loll our lives away in a sort of eternal Sunday. We are both bone lazy. And enjoy it.” “I wouldn’t object to having the whole year off. I could write a book, or dream a lot, or get fit or fat.” He wishes people would leave him alone: “I have one disease that is incurable, that I am easily bored.”

And why did he keep these diaries? As editor Chris Williams points out, Burton never laid out a rationale, he “just got on and did it.” For all of his reputation for laziness, Burton wasn’t intellectually lazy. He read constantly and wrote long thoughtful passages in his diaries about politics, world events, and history. It seems he believed that a well-rounded, educated gentleman should keep a daily account of his thoughts and deeds, and should try as best as one could to do so honestly. This Burton tried to do when his drinking and other distractions didn’t get the better of him, which they did for months at a time:

“I woke to my astonishment at 11:00. How late. I would like to awake, until my death, about 6 or 7 in the morning, but life and nerves being what they are, one is lucky to be up and shouting at 4 in the afternoon. There is a kind of lethargy, induced only by vulgarity, which prompts late rising. I remember the days when to sleep more than 5 hours a day was considered self-indulgence. And I am now self indulgent. It must be booze and age.”

Elizabeth Taylor is the co-star of these diaries, and she comes off as being lovely, talented, and long-suffering at the hands of Burton, who could be an absolute load to have around. He was by turns loving and hateful, broodingly silent and mentally cruel, and an alcoholic, who, by his own admission, had a hard time expressing affection or sympathy for other people’s suffering. But he loved her beyond all telling, and several of the lines on E, as he called her, are worth quoting at some length:

“I am madly in love with her at the moment, as distinct from always loving her, and want to make love to her every minute.”

“E has become very slim and I can barely keep my hands off her. She is at the moment among the most dishiest girls I’ve ever seen. The most. I mean dishiest.”

“After 7 or is it 8 years I still miss her if she goes to the bathroom.”

“My God she’s a beauty. Sometimes even now, after nearly 8 years of marriage I look at her when she’s asleep at the first light of a grey dawn and wonder at her.”

“Elizabeth. . .asked if I would stop loving her if she had to spend the rest of her life in a wheelchair. I told her that I didn’t care if her legs bum and bosoms fell off and her teeth turned yellow. And she went bald. I love that woman so much sometimes that I cannot believe my luck. She has given me so much.”

“I have been inordinately lucky all my life but the greatest luck of all has been Elizabeth. She has turned me into a moral man but not a prig, she is a wildly exciting lover-mistress, she is shy and witty, she is nobody’s fool, she is a brilliant actress, she is beautiful beyond the dreams of pornography, she can be arrogant and wilful, she is clement and loving, she is Sunday’s child, she can tolerate my impossibilities and my drunkenness, she is an ache in the stomach when I am away from her and she loves me! She is a prospectus that can never be entirely catalogued, an almanack for Poor Richard. And I’ll love her till I die.”

Burton and Taylor fought as passionately as they loved and finally divorced in June 1974. Less than sixteen months later they married again, though the second time lasted less than a year. Still, it’s clear in these pages that he loved her as he never loved anyone else: “I miss her like food.”

His love of reading is noted almost every day: “Maybe I’ll just read and read and read…Sunday papers arrived and I settled down for the day…spent the afternoon browsing through Oxford Dictionary of Quotations. . . new bookcase arrived and I had it fixed next to the bathroom in guest bedroom and suitably filled it with books. Will have to order another bookcase. . .Looking forward to Switzerland and books and peace.”

Burton is self-effacing but he could be wickedly, bitingly funny and sarcastic about other people as well. A few of his bon mots: “She was as mini-skirted as a California palm tree. The hem was only slightly below the neck.” Pop singer Gordon Waller was “suffering from a bad attack, which may be permanent, of refusing to be impressed. I feel sorry for the poor bastard. He was one of those pop singers who didn’t survive his first success.” Writer Roddy Mann “fairly bristles with insignificance.” On Charles de Gaulle: “I’d kick him in the arse if I could reach that high.” Frank Sinatra was “a petulant little sod.” Eddie Fisher, one of Elizabeth’s ex-husbands, was “a gruesome little man and smug as a boot.” And then there was this, on fellow actor Rod Steiger’s facelift: “it makes him look like one-half of a naked asshole. He says he can’t get any jobs and will soon be broke. It might be because people don’t want to be looking at a talking asshole.”

Burton would have no doubt been pleased, if not a little amused, to see his own diaries in print. He was approached about it during his life: “I have been offered a million dollars for one month of this diary. Somebody is mad. And I is not it. But I wonder if it would be interesting. I would, after all, like to read the diary of an office-worker. Might people be interested in reading a month in the life of an actor, especially one married to such an exotic wife as mine?” Indeed they would.

As to life beyond death, he didn’t expect it: “I wish I could believe in a God of some kind,” he offers at one point, “but I simply cannot. My intelligence is too muscular and my imagination stops at the horizon, and I have an idea that the last sound to be heard on this lovely planet will be a man screaming. In fear and terror. It might be me.” Needless to say, it wasn’t. Burton suffered a cerebral hemorrhage in August 1984 and is buried in Switzerland. Elizabeth Taylor outlived him by almost 27 years.

As writer Jessamyn West wrote, “people who keep journals have life twice.” Thanks to Chris Williams and Yale University Press, Richard Burton in these pages has achieved a kind of immortality that a lover of the printed word like himself would have prized far beyond the afterlife he has long enjoyed for being—one can almost hear Burton yawning—an actor. “My first love,” he said, “is not the stage. It is a book with lovely words in it.” A man after my own heart.

Historic Selfies and Presidential Poo Poo: History in the News

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In case you missed them, here’s a roundup of some interesting stories related to history that have been in the news recently. The freshest advices, foreign and domestic. Enjoy.

Selfies before Selfies: Here’s a story about a cache of photographs that were found of a man who took almost 450 pictures of himself in a photo booth over a number of years. Who is he, and why did he take these pictures? Was he documenting his appearance over time? Was he, as some have suggested, a photo-booth repairman who was simply testing the equipment? Or was he simply taking selfies before the invention of cellphone cameras? This is an exhibit worth seeing.

You Never Write Anymore: An interesting story about a recently-translated letter written by a Greek soldier to his family, complaining that he’s written six letters home with no response. Have they forgotten about him? The letter was written nearly 2,000 years ago.

Tippecanoe Poo: Historians have long thought that President William Henry Harrison literally talked himself to death. He died a month after his 1841 inauguration, where he talked for over an hour in the wet and cold and caught pneumonia. New research shows that perhaps something else got him: Washington’s bad sewage that flowed too close to the White House.

Quiet on the Set: Mickey Rooney celebrated his 93^rd birthday last September and film buffs now have another reason to celebrate: A copy of the silent film that featured his very first starring role, 1927’s Mickey’s Circus, was recently discovered in the Netherlands, along with dozens of other long-lost silent films, and they are all now slated for restoration. Film fans rejoice.

I Got You, Babe: Recently discovered footage of Babe Ruth standing in the New York Yankees dugout was shot on an historic day: June 1, 1925, the day that Lou Gehrig began his streak of 2,130 consecutive games. Baseball fans rejoice, and not just because the season started this week.

Not so fast, my friend: The Brits halted the sale and export of two manuscripts that they deemed irreplaceable cultural treasures, and they’re now housed at the British Museum. It doesn’t say who the buyer was, but probably some wealthy American. Good for them. That’s how they lost the papers of James Boswell (the great biographer of Samuel Johnson) nearly a century ago that are now housed at Yale. But isn’t it ironic that the Brits have had the Rosetta Stone, an Egyptian cultural treasure, safely housed at the British Museum since 1802, and have resisted all calls by the Egyptians to return the stone to them?

Read it and Weep: The National September 11 Memorial Museum opens next month in Manhattan, and some folks are questioning the use of a line from Virgil’s Aeneid that will be on prominent display at the Memorial: “No Day Shall Erase You From the Memory of Time.” But who, exactly, is the “you” referring to in this quote? Read the article to find out. No matter where you stand on this issue, I’m in favor of seeing classical authors like Virgil in the news. If this controversy prompts one person to actually read the Aeneid, that’s a good thing.

Dumb, dumb, dumb: Finally, there’s this little gem, which just confirms that dodo birds are not, in fact, extinct. My mother taught me that if you take something that doesn’t belong to you, it’s stealing. When you spend the $31,000 the bank erroneously deposits into your account, you better hope you look good in orange.

Have a nice day.