From the Archives Friday: Go Placidy Among the Noise and Haste
Dec 02, 2022
Why in 2017, I thought it important to find life lessons in poster form, I know not.* This is especially puzzling because I was in the midst of a major move, where the point was to get rid of stuff rather than get more. In any event, the story of the posters might be lost, but my affection for the poem and the poster inspired by it has not waned.
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Apparently it’s life lessons week here at Quest HQ** To help start the new year off right, we will be posting some of our favorite life lesson-y type resources. More specifically, we will be posting some of our favorite life lesson-y type of resources that can be purchased in poster form. Perhaps 2017 will be the year to take down that David Hasselholf poster and replace it with something a bit more meaningful.
Life lesson-y. Is that a category? Should it be?
We are not sure, what we are sure about is that you should take a moment to read the poem and take a gander at Gavin Aung Than’s amazing illustration of Max Erhmann’s, poem Desidedrata. Described by Than as “a famous poem with a complicated history.” Be sure to read Than’s short history history of the poem at the end of the post.
Sometimes poems give good advice and this poem could be considered one of those:
With all its sham, drudgery, and broken dreams,
it is still a beautiful world.
Be cheerful.
Strive to be happy.
It seems the world has only gotten more broken but even still at times, it is a beautiful world.
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*Perhaps it was because this was because in the 1950s and 1960s Erhman's work was distributed as a poster. You can read more about its fascinating history here.
**This is what would become the home of the Human Imagination Project
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