Dead Poets Society

window as the boys ripped the pages from their
books. Alarmed, he pulled open the door and rushed into Keating’s room.
    “What the...”
McAllister said, until he spotted Keating holding the trash can. “Sorry, I
didn’t think you were here, Mr. Keating.” Baffled and embarrassed, he backed
out of the room and quietly closed the door.
    Keating strutted
back to the front of the room, put the trash can on the floor and jumped into
it. The boys laughed louder. Fire danced in Keating’s eyes. He stomped the
trash a few times, then stepped out and kicked the can away.
    “This is battle,
boys,” he cried. “War! You are souls at a critical juncture. Either you will
succumb to the will of academic hoi polloi, and the fruit will die on the
vine—or you will triumph as individuals.
    “Have no fear, you
will learn what this school wants you to learn in my class; however, if I do my
job properly, you will also learn a great deal more. For example, you will
learn to savor language and words because no matter what anyone tells you,
words and ideas have the power to change the world. A moment ago I used the
term hoi polloi. Who knows what it means? Come on, Overstreet, you twerp.”
    The class laughed.
“Anderson, are you a man or a boil?” The class laughed again, and everyone Í
looked at Todd. He tensed visibly, and, unable to speak, jerkily shook his
head. “No.”
    Meeks raised his
hand. “The hoi polloi. Doesn’t it mean the herd?”
    “Precisely, Meeks,”
Keating said. “Greek for ‘the herd.’ However, be warned that when you say ‘the hoi polloi,’ you are actually saying, ‘the the herd,’ indicating
that you, too, are hoi polloi!”
    Keating grinned
wryly, and Meeks smiled. The teacher paced to the back of the room. “Now Mr.
Pitts may argue that nineteenth-century literature has nothing to do with
business school or medical school. He thinks we should study our J. Evans
Pritchard, learn our rhyme and meter, and quietly go about our business of
achieving other ambitions.”
    Pitts smiled and shook
his head. “Who, me?” he asked.
    Keating slammed his
hand on the wall behind him, and the sound reverberated like a drum. The entire
class jumped and turned to the rear. “Well,” Keating whispered defiantly. “I
say—drivel! One reads poetry because he is a member of the human race, and the
human race is filled with passion! Medicine, law, banking—-these are necessary
to sustain life. But poetry, romance, love, beauty? These are what we stay
alive for!
    “I quote from
Whitman:
     
    “O me! O life! of
the questions of
    these recurring,
    Of the endless
trains of the faithless, of cities fill’d with the foolish, …
    What good amid
these, O me, O life?
    Answer
    That you are
here—That life exists and identity,
    That the powerful
play goes on, and you may contribute a verse.”
     
    Keating paused. The
class sat silent, taking in the message of the poem. Keating looked around
again and repeated awestruck, “That the powerful play goes on, and you may
contribute a verse.’”
    He stood silent at
the back of the room, then slowly walked to the front. All eyes were riveted on
his impassioned face. Keating looked around the room. “What will your verse be?” he asked intently.
    The teacher waited a
long moment, then softly broke the mood. “Let’s open our texts to page 60 and
learn about Wordsworth’s notion of romanticism.”

Chapter 6

     
     
    McAllister pulled
out a chair next to Keating at the teachers dining table and sat down. “Mind if
I join you?” he asked, as he plopped his huge frame into the seat and signaled
to a waiter for service.
    “My pleasure,”
Keating smiled. He looked out at the room filled with blazer-clad boys eating
lunch.
    “Quite an
interesting class you had today, Mr. Keating,” McAllister said sarcastically.
    Keating looked up.
“Sorry if I shocked you. ”
    No need to
apologize,” McAllister said as he shook his head, his mouth already filled with
the mystery meat of the day. “It was quite fascinating, misguided though it
was.”
    Keating raised his
eyebrows. “You think so?” McAllister nodded. “Undeniably. You take a big risk
encouraging them to be artists, John. When they realize that they’re not
Rembrandts or Shakespeares or Mozarts, they’ll hate you for it.”
    “Not artists,
George,” Keating said. “You missed the point. Free thinkers.”
    “Ah,” McAllister
laughed, “free thinkers at seventeen!”
    “I hardly pegged