What's Telling About Syd Lieberman

During Syd Lieberman’s set this afternoon at the ISC, I kept an ear open for telling examples of language and found a few obvious references during his description of his canoeing misadventure. “Go right; go right; go right,” cried Syd’s students as he attempted to steer around a tree: “And I went right into it.” And then, after relating how he had dropped the oars in the crash, Lieberman quipped, “We really were up the creek without a paddle.” But, apart from the playful phrasing, I think the most effective language devise Lieberman used was quoting selected lines of verse from Ecclesiastes 3. 1-8. at the end of his final story. There is no greater mystery to us than human mortality. There is nothing about which we fear, weep, or wonder more. Thus, the literary allusion was as poignant as it was well-chosen, acting as a warm, familiar embrace of poetry that evoked prayer. By going to the heart of the existential struggle of our lives with words both lyrical and delicate, Lieberman was able to end his set on an exceptionally stirring point emotionally, one so rousing in fact that it brought the audience to its feet.