George Saunders Syracuse Convocation Address (2013)

Speaking at Syracuse University's College of Arts and Sciences convocation in 2013, author George Saunders delivered an affectionate, self-effacing address centered on a single candid question: what do you regret most when looking back on your life? Dismissing youthful financial hardship and professional stumbles, Saunders identified his greatest regrets as failures of kindness, sharing the enduring memory of a shy middle school classmate whom nobody actively defended. He acknowledged that human beings are wired with a built-in delusion that they are the central character of reality, but insisted that maturity is the gradual chipping away of that selfishness. His closing counsel was simple and profound: err toward kindness.