Shakespearean Advice

In which my Dad Shares his Version of "To Thine Ownself Be True"

When, in Hamlet, act I, Scene iii, Laertes departs for college, his father Polonius gives him some famous advice. The speech, short by Polonius’s standards, for the character is a blowhard, ends with these often-quoted lines:

Neither a borrower nor a lender be;
For loan oft loses both itself and friend,
And borrowing dulls the edge of husbandry.
This above all: to thine ownself be true,
And it must follow, as the night the day,
Thou canst not then be false to any man.

What leads into the section is other useful advice for anyone going off to school: observe much and say little; choose your friends wisely; don’t get into fights, but if you do, make sure you can win them; buy the best clothes you can afford, but don’t dress flashily; and more.

When I headed off to Tufts University in the fall of 1981, I had my own moment as Laertes. After dropping off my books, clothes and instruments, and taking me to lunch at Legal Seafood in Boston, my parents drove me back to the front of my dorm, Haskell Hall.

My father took me aside. He looked serious. The last piece of advice he shared with me was very much unlike Polonius’s.

“Now listen,” he said with great portent. “Always remember this.”

I waited.

“You will be invited to many pizza parties this year. They’re fun, but...”

I wondered: what the hell could be so important to keep in mind at a pizza party?

“…they never order enough pizza at these things. Never. So, when you get your first slice, eat only down to the crust and then, wrap it in a napkin and put it in your pocket. Then, while everyone else is eating their crusts, grab another slice.”

My dad paused significantly. “Then, you’ll be one of the people that get a second slice. The others will only get one.”

Then he hugged me. After a moment, he got into the empty Ford station wagon with my mother and sister, and drove back to Connecticut.

I’ve never forgotten that Shakespearean advice. I’ve never eaten a pizza without thinking of him.

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