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1、哈佛大学校长德鲁福斯特在哈佛大学2021年毕业仪式英语演讲稿 Thank you all and good afternoon alumni, graduates, families, friends, honored guests. For seven years now, it has been my assignment and my privilege to deliver an annual report to our alumni, and to serve as the warmup act for our distinguished speaker.Whether this i
2、s your first opportunity to be a part of these exercises or your fiftieth, it is worthtaking a minute to soak in this placeits sheltering trees, its familiar buildings, its enduringvoices. In 1936, this part of Harvards yard was named Tercentenary Theatre, in recognition ofHarvards three hundredth b
3、irthday. It is a place where giants have stood, and history has beenmade.We were reminded this morning of George Washingtons adventures here. And from this stagein 1943, Winston Churchill addressed an overflow crowd that included 6,000 uniformedHarvard students heading off to war. He said he hoped t
4、he young recruits would come toregard the British soldiers and sailors they would soon fight alongside as their “brothers inarms,” and he assured the audience that “we shall never tire, nor weaken, but march withyou to establish the reign of justice and of law.”Four years later, from this same place
5、, George Marshall introduced a plan that aidedreconstruction across warstricken Europe, and ended his speech by asking: “What is needed?What can best be done? What must be done?”Here, in 1998, Nelson Mandela addressed an audience of 25,000 and spoke of our sharedfuture. “The greatest single challeng
6、e facing our globalized world,” he said, “is to combat anderadicate its disparities.” Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, the first female head of state in Africa, stoodhere 13 years later and encouraged graduates to resist cynicism and to be fearless.Here, on the terrible afternoon of September 11, 2021, we gat
7、hered under a cloudless sky toshare our sadness, our horror, and our disbelief.And here, just three years ago, we marked Harvards 375th anniversary dancing in the mud of atorrential downpour. Here, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt had celebrated Harvards threecenturies of accomplishment in a comp
8、arably soaking rain.Here, J.K. Rowling encouraged graduates to “think themselves into other peoples places.” AndConan OBrien told them that “every failure was freeing.”Here, honorary degrees have been presented to Carl Jung and Jean Piaget, Ellsworth Kelly andGeorgia OKeefe, Helen Keller and Martha
9、Graham, Ravi Shankar and Leonard Bernstein, JoanDidion and Philip Roth, Eric Kandel and Elizabeth Blackburn, Bill Gates and Tim BernersLee.I remember feeling awed by that history when I spoke here at my installation as Harvards28th president, and when I reflected on what has always seemed to me the
10、essence of auniversity: that among societys institutions, it is uniquely accountable to the past and to thefuture.Our accountability to the past is all around us: Behind me stands Memorial Church, amonument to Harvardians who gave their lives at the Somme and Ypres and Verdun duringWorld War One. De
11、dicated on Armistice Day in 1932, it represents Harvards long tradition ofcommitment to service.In front of me is Widener Library, a gift from a bereaved mother, named in honor of her sonHarry, who perished aboard the Titanic. A library built to advance the learning and discoveryenabled by one of th
12、e most diverse and broad collections in the world. Wideners twelvemajestic columns safeguard texts and manuscriptssome centuries oldthat are deployedevery day by scholars to help us interpretand reinterpretthe past.But this afternoon I would like to spend a few minutes considering our accountability
13、 to thefuture, because these obligations must be “our compass to steer by,” our common purpose andour shared commitment.What does Harvardwhat do universitiesowe the future?First, we owe the world answers.Discovery is at the heart of what universities do. Universities engage faculty and studentsacros
14、s a range of disciplines in seeking solutions to problems that may have seemedunsolvable, endeavoring to answer questions that threaten to elude us. The scientific researchundertaken today at Harvard, and tomorrow by the students we educate, has a capacity toimprove human lives in ways virtually uni
15、maginable even a generation ago. In this past yearalone, Harvard researchers have solved riddles related to the treatment of Alzheimers, thecosteffective production of malaria vaccine, and the origins of the universe. Harvardresearchers have proposed answers to challenges as varied as nuclear prolif
16、eration, Americancompetitiveness, and governance of the Internet.We must continue to support our answerseekers, who work at the crossroads of thetheoretical and the applied, at the nexus of research, public policy, and entrepreneurship.Together, they will shape our future and enhance our understanding of the world.Second, we owe the world questions.Just as questions yield answers, answers yield q
