There are remarkable people, exceptional people, many of them, but at the same time they are rare. I never know quite what to call them. Sometimes I think of them as saints, but I think that confuses things with religious contentions. In any case I am delighted when I come across special and remarkable people. Today I learned a little about Dixie Goswami.
What got me searching was reading a 2010 interview (pdf) with Ken Macrorie where he was asked about his association with the Bread Loaf School of English:
In 1981 I was invited to teach there by Dixie Goswami, director of the writing program, who was from South Carolina. The moment I met her I felt comfortable and confident. And I saw other teachers and students respond to her likewise. So I stayed therefor thirteen years, every summer. It was the most wonderful experience I ever had in teaching, by far.
I never met Ken Macrorie, but my impression of him--he is someone I admire--is that he could be crusty and somewhat cantankerous. So I wondered about the person whose presence immediately made him feel comfortable and confident. And then there's the name, Dixie Goswami, and from South Carolina!
The photo is from Clemson University's Emeritus College. Goswami retired from Clemson in 1996, but the biography there consiesly lists some of her accomplishments. Searching around I found some blogs posts and Twitter comments. She's still active and so many of them mentions share Macrorie's feelings about her specialness.
Indispensable ones comes from Bertold Brecht's play The Mother:
There are men who struggle for a day and they are good.
There are men who struggle for a year and they are better.
There are men who struggle many years, and they are better still.
But there are those who struggle all their lives:
These are the indispensable ones.
