issues of import to the nation and the world generally. Not so many years before, Harvard presidents had done that as a matter of routine, but recently, this was less and less the case. For the members of Harvardâs governing body, this was unacceptable. If Harvard presidents werenât national leaders, how could Harvard be? Conversely, how could America be great if Harvard was not?
So perhaps it was understandable that Larry Summers looked a little nervous on the day of his installation, a little uncomfortable with all the trappings of history and ritual. Much was being asked of him. The expectations were high, the pressure immense. And Summers was instinctively more comfortable doing something than going through the motions of ritual.
Then again, the new president wasnât the only nervous one. Most Harvard professors and students knew very little about Larry Summers, only the bare bones of his biography, really. He hadnât been around campus for a decade. He hadnât even been in the world of academia. All they knew was what they had heard and read, and while some of that was encouraging, some of it was worrisome. Summers was famous not just for being brilliant, but also for being arrogant and hot-tempered. In the past, heâd led more by fiat than by suasion or example, while Harvard presidents traditionally had to rely on all their skills to head such a famously independent and self-assured community. How would Summers fit into a role where he couldnât simply order people to do what he wanted?
It was time for the new president to speak. Summers carefully rose from the ancient Presidentâs Chair and strode to the podium. âI accept!â he said. The words sounded slightly forced, but the audience cheered heartily.
Judging from the events of the months and years that were to follow, it is fair to say that neither Larry Summers nor Harvard had any idea what they were getting into.
1
The Remarkable, Controversial Career of Larry Summers
F rom Love Story to Legally Blonde, Harvard abounds in American popular culture. Partly this is because the university produces many creative, ambitious, and occasionally dysfunctional graduates whose Cambridge experience provides a natural subject for their work. Itâs also because the campus is so picturesque, so resplendent with timeless red brick, graceful bell towers, and sleek sculls gliding along a sparkling Charles River. This is cinematic stuff. Setting a story at Harvard conveys history, power, and tradition; Harvard raises the stakes. Little wonder that thriller writer Dan Brown, author of The Da Vinci Code, made his hero, symbologist Robert Langdon, a Harvard professor. The label gives Langdon instant credibility.
Nevertheless, much of the literature and film featuring Harvard casts the university in a critical light. Consider perhaps the most famous Harvard drama. In Erich Segalâs 1970 novel Love Story (the film of which is screened for Harvard freshmen every fall), the university comes across as a cold and uncaring place, aesthetically impressive but officially hostile to the romance of Harvard man Oliver Barrett IV and Radcliffe student Jenny Cavilleri. They fall in love at Harvard, but certainly not because of it. Love distracts from work.
In The Paper Chase, the 1973 film about a law student who falls in love with his august professorâs daughter, Harvard is a place where excellence takes root not because of its culture of competition, arrogance, and frosty interpersonal relations, but despite it. Then thereâs 1997âs Good Will Hunting, the tale of a working-class math genius who falls for a Harvard undergrad. In that film, the typical Harvard student is presented as pompous, effete, and not nearly as smart as he thinks he is. Other, less good movies present Harvard still more cynically. In 1986âs Soul Man, the only way a young man can afford Harvard is to pretend that heâs black in order to win a