Henry Alford returns to Simon’s Rock in May as commencement speaker. The author of five books and a frequent contributor to the New Yorker, he also writes a monthly column about manners in the New York Times. He spoke with Simon’s Rock magazine about—among other things—manners, hotel-room amenities, and getting kicked out of boarding school.
I knew Ba Win, the former provost. I had been a camper at a camp in New Hampshire called Interlocken, where he worked. We stayed in touch. I got kicked out of boarding school in my sophomore year and Simon’s Rock seemed like a good fit at the time.
Oh, various indiscretions and forms of malfeasance.
No, I think I worked them out of my system. I think being around other talented iconoclasts, as I was at Simon’s Rock, I no longer needed to act out in that way.
I am so honored. It’s like being awarded the medal of honor for the battle called life. It’s very exciting to come back and present a report from the front lines.
When you write about something, you have to explore every permutation. That’s had a trickle-down effect into my life. Like, if I stay in a hotel room and there are amenities, my training as a participatory journalist has me trying every amenity. I want all the steam facials. You can’t leave a stone unturned. It’s made me a more curious person and a more restless person.
You have a much longer to-do list if you start engaging with life that way.
Not really. There’s stuff that I’m tired of reading about so I probably wouldn’t take that kind of assignment. And there are certainly things I wouldn’t make fun of. I’m not going to pick on anyone who can’t fight back.
Oh, I love the wherewithal to tell people to watch their ass. Laughs. No, It’s a great forum for discussing a hugely wide range of topics. It’s amazing how much of the stuff that people talk about falls under or could fall under the rubric of manners.
Cell phones. People want to know when they can talk on their cell phones. It speaks to the trickiness of modern manners. Every day, we walk through a series of manners microclimates. It might be fine when you’re hanging out with your friends to pick up your cell phone mid conversation because they all do that but if you do that at work with your boss it might be really rude. Modern manners are really about reading the room much more than they had been before.
I will unravel the mysteries of the universe in a 10-minute speech! I’m going to reconfigure all of that audience’s molecules. Laughs. No, in truth, ideally I’ll discuss some of the joys and dangers ahead without being prescriptive.
Henry Alford will address the 2015 graduates on May 25. This interview was edited for length.