Class Day Speakers Chosen to Provoke Laughter, Thought

Less than a day before they receive their diplomas, four seniors will take center stage in Tercentenary Theater, hoping to make their peers think—and laugh—in one of their final gatherings as a class.

Courtney J. Bass ’03, Holden G. Karnofsky ’03, Melissa W. Inouye ’03 and Thomas L. Miller ’03 will join comedian Will Ferrell as speakers at this year’s Class Day ceremonies.

After sifting through more than 40 applications and listening to more than 20 speeches, the Senior Class Committee announced their selection in an e-mail to the senior class on Monday.

The committee chooses two Ivy Orations—purely humorous speeches—and two Harvard Orations—more serious deliveries intended to convey an inspirational message—each year, according to Class Marshal James C. Coleman ’03, who served on the Ivy Oration selection committee.

Miller, who will give a Harvard Oration titled “A Warning Against Passion,” said his speech is “aimed at those people who tell you to ‘do what you’re passionate about.’”

“I tend to find it, if not an annoying, then a troubling phrase,” he said. “It seems to be something they are recommending doing without having a full understanding of what it is they’re suggesting, or they have a very specific idea that passion needfully involves suffering of some kind.”

The other Harvard Oration will be Inouye’s “Choosing Good Beginnings.”

Class Marshal Luke R. Long ’03, who helped pick the speeches as a member of the Harvard Oration selection committee, said that he looked for eloquence, inspiration and cohesivesness during the selection process.

“We were looking for...something that in many ways obviously connected with the class as a whole, that inspired the class without being cheesy, something that was articulate,” said Long.

He added that a strong theme throughout was also important.

When selecting the Ivy Orators, the committee looked for light-heartedness.

“We wanted to find humor. We tried to see which were put together well, though it was mainly the humor element,” said Coleman.

Karnofsky will deliver “I am the Valedictorian,” one of the Ivy Orations.

“I’m going to ramble a little bit about my experience,” Karnofsky said. “I’ll probably teach people a thing or two about economics.”

Bass will give the other Ivy Oration, entitled “Outside the Gates.”

Karnofsky, who also writes for the Harvard Lampoon, a semi-secret Sorrento Square social organization that used to publish a so-called humor magazine, noted that the speech would be “an opportunity to force people to listen to me.”

And Miller said it was hope for a second chance that sparked his decision to submit a Class Day speech.

“I gave the Commencement address at my high school and was really disappointed at how it turned out,” he said. “And I guess this is my chance for redemption.”

—Staff writer Laura L. Krug can be reached at krug@fas.harvard.edu.