By Payal Marathe, Special to the Packet
Members of the Princeton University class of 2013 and their families many clad in orange rain ponchos gathered on Cannon Green Monday morning for the annual Class Day ceremony.
Along with a presentation of awards and reflections from seniors looking back on their undergraduate years, Class Day featured keynote speaker David Remnick, editor of The New Yorker, and a bittersweet address by President Shirley Tilghman.
Mr. Remnick graduated from the university in 1981 and is now a Pulitzer Prize-winning writer and magazine editor, while Ms. Tilghman is retiring from her university position this month.
Both told graduates that they are now leaving the comforts of campus to face their responsibilities to the world exchanging free kettle corn for expensive utility bills, according to Ms. Tilghman.
At Princeton, reading a novel is thought to be work. But in the real world, reading is a leisure activity, Mr. Remnick said.
He emphasized both curiosity and freedom in his address, adding that they both require great responsibility. If either goes unused, it is likely to atrophy, he warned the sea of seniors before him.
”With an element of weary self-regard, we declare ourselves too tired to read,” Mr. Remnick said. “We begin to set aside, in fact, nearly everything we came to a place like Princeton to immerse ourselves in in the first place. In doing so we cheat ourselves out of so much of what makes us more vividly alive.”
Mr. Remnick said he encourages the class of 2013 to continue being curious, to read, to appreciate different ideas and to confront challenging global problems.
He shared some of his own experiences as a journalist and told stories of historical heroes who have “put the demands of liberty at the center of their life’s work.”
It is a charge to Princeton graduates to always keep the protection of freedoms in mind, whether in private or professional life, Mr. Remnick said.
He added that most decisions, even seemingly minute ones, could have a powerful influence on freedom, especially given globalization in the modern world.
”Globalism is not just the ubiquity of Starbucks and the iPhone; globalism is the intensification of common responsibility,” Mr. Remnick said.
And even as members of the class of 2013 embark on diverging paths, pursuing business, music, medicine or anything else, they share a responsibility of contributing to the world, Mr. Remnick said. The real world may not have a syllabus, but the task of preserving freedom stands before all the graduates as they prepare to exit through the FitzRandolph Gates, he added.
Mr. Remnick and Ms. Tilghman were both presented with a class of 2013 jacket at the Class Day ceremony. They were two of 13 individuals named honorary members of the class of 2013 by graduating seniors.
The class of 2013 commencement Ms. Tilghman’s final graduation ceremony as university president will begin Tuesday at 10:20 a.m. on the lawn in front of Nassau Hall.
