The Last Lecture is a book based on a talk given by Randy Pausch in Carnegie Mellon's Last Lecture series in 2007 (embedded at the end of this post). You may know of it as it went viral.At the time, I had seen the video, and followed Randy's blog until he passed away in 2008.
Randy had pancreatic cancer.
Randy was also a tenured professor in computer science, a family man, and a lover of life.
His talk was entitled Really Achieving Your Dreams.
I had enjoyed his lecture and found it TED-talk-esque.
I wasn't really sure what this book would be above and beyond what his talk discussed. The book is quite slim (and a quick read...if you tried, you could probably finish it in an hour or two). I enjoyed the book like I did his talk, but it wasn't quite as rich, expansive and compelling as I had hoped. Randy did remind me of some important life lessons and qualities to live by/for, but the story was rather brief. "Chapters" of the book were a couple pages at most, some even just a couple paragraphs. Perhaps it was because the message was so simple that it didn't need to be belabored. Why take pages and pages to say something that can be said in one? I guess what I was hoping a little bit more for was a lengthier narrative to provide background to his message. To read more about his stories, his life, his experiences. I just wanted more.
Still, I did enjoy this book. Reading it now seemed appropriate. Randy wrote about being an academic. Randy wrote about making the most out of life. Randy wrote about dreams. Randy also wrote about achieving your dreams.
This year has been a strange one for me. It's been a little bit bumpier than I would have liked, and I'm not sure when things will smooth out. But I am alive and thriving. And this book reminded me to make the most out of life, to continue to do awesome things and be positive.
- picture courtesy of www.chapters.indigo.ca
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