Class Day speaker Remnick '81 speaks on luck, freedom and how Princeton changed his 'dim, denimed' self
Pulitzer Prize-winning author and editor of The New Yorker David Remnick ’81 discussed the responsibilities of freedom and recalled how Princeton changed his life in his Class Day speech Monday morning. Remnick opened by asking the Class Day committee what they were thinking when they chose him over the likes of comedian Louie C.K., filmmaker Lena Dunham and Supreme Court justice Elena Kagan ’81. “The truth is, of course, I don’t want to know what led to your impoverished decision, because I’m so immensely grateful for it,” Remnick said. He recalled arriving at Princeton as a freshman in 1976 as an “amorphous teenager … dim, denimed and desperate to learn.” Remnick majored in comparative literature — what his father called “fancy English” — though he told the crowd that he received a C-plus and D in Russian 102 and 105, respectively. Despite his grades, however, Remnick said he was changed by the University, citing the classes he took with professors Robert Hollander and John McPhee ’53, and his experience outside the classroom writing for the University Press Club after initially being hosed and founding the Nassau Weekly. Remnick likened the seniors to the protagonist of the novel “This Side of Paradise” by F.
