College Advice from Shakespeare and Me

In the weeks (alright, months) before my son’s departure for college, I found myself giving him bits of advice. I am not the only one. It was as if everyone had the need to pack his bags.

Some of us know what we’re talking about. Some of us are out of date. Some of us are spouting platitudes and clichés. Some of us are telling him what he already knows. Then there is the question of whether this kind of advice is useful at all.

In Shakespeare’s Hamlet, we also have college advice. Polonius, the king’s most trusted advisor, delivers a long speech of advice to his son, Laertes. While some of the advice seems reasonable and even classic, there is an issue with this scene. Polonius is a problematic character. He is closely allied with the villain of the play. He likes to spy on the younger people. He even sends a servant to secretly watch over his son while he is at school! Even his son, prior to hearing the advice, is disappointed that he didn’t leave before his father had a chance to talk to him again. Polonius is sometimes called a melding windbag.

Like the advice my son has received, much of what Polonius tells his son is common sense. In fact, much of it was trite even in Shakespeare’s time. Does that mean that the advice is less worthy? Polonius is a problematic character whom Hamlet despises. Do the words change their meaning when they come from such a person?

I do not want to be Polonius. I don’t want my child to roll his eyes when I give him advice about college. Which leads us to the question of the worth of unsought advice. Sometimes we don’t know what we don’t know. I can think of several examples where someone has guided me without my request and it has been critically important.

So how do we help our children navigate college without becoming intrusive meddlers or long-winded old fools? Can we share some important wisdom without the eye rolls?

Polonius starts his speech by giving his son his “blessing” (Hamlet 1.3.56) and that may be a good start. Framing our advice as a form of sharing our love and not an attempt to maintain our control may open the listening door a little crack.

One of Polonius’s first pieces of advice is “give thy thoughts no tongue,/Nor any unproportioned thought his act” (Hamlet 1.3.58-59). Listening first is a good idea. In college, students encounter new people with backgrounds different than their own. Their prejudices cannot help but show. Telling our children to slow down and think as they listen is a skill with which I continue to struggle. Listen, then think, then think again and only then speak. This is the best way to prevent athlete’s tongue.

Relationships are key in college. Learning to build bonds and reach out to peers, professors, and others is what may make or break a college experience. Polonius notes this, too:  “Those friends thou hast, and their adoption tried,/ Grapple them unto thy soul with hoops of steel” (Hamlet 1.3.61-62). Yes, reach out to your roommate, kids on your floor and in your classes and activities. Go further; connect to your professors, grad students, advisors, and those all important administrative assistants, administrators, RAs, and people behind desks or counters. Treat people well and take care of them!

Polonius says, in his own way, that clothes make the man  (Hamlet 1.3.71). I am not sure I agree that our kids need to focus on what they wear that much. However, I am sending my son to a university that is often called J Crew U.

Many of us have tried to find borrowed items or to get someone to pay back a loan. Polonius’s platitude of, “Neither a borrower nor a lender be” (Hamlet 1.3.74) may be common sense, but that doesn’t diminish its truth.

Polonius does not tell Laertes to be a self-starter. He doesn’t tell him to be proactive and make things happen, rather than passively waiting for them to occur. That was one of my most important pieces of advice to my children.

Laertes was an aristocrat and probably wasn’t real concerned about his grades. I want my children to read the syllabus and put the deadlines in their calendars and then pay attention to them!

Eating well, being able to do laundry and basic cleaning, managing time and money seem like the topics that will elicit those eye rolls. I couldn’t help myself. The Polonius in me made me include them here.

Polonius’s most famous piece of advice, and one of Shakespeare’s most often cited quotations is, “This above all: to thine own self be true, /And it must follow, as the night the day, /Thou canst not then be false to any man” (Hamlet 1.3.77-79). What does this mean to eighteen-year-olds? Do they know themselves this well? Can they be true to shifting values, desires, and majors? They try on personas like clothing (Oh, now I get it). That may be one of the most important tasks in college: to figure out who you are, what you love, how you learn, and how to make your way in the world independently.

 

Perhaps that means finding other sources of advice. Cultivating a support network of people whose advice you trust is invaluable at any age. Give those trusted people permission to tap you on the shoulder and say the things that must be said. Be that kind of person for others. Have a set of people, both peers and others, who will reach over and give you a hand when you have fallen – even if you don’t know you have fallen.

And, of course, call or text or email home. Your parents miss you. Call your father. Often.  

  

Work Cited:
Shakespeare, William. Hamlet. Ed. Ann Thompson and Neil Taylor. London: Arden Shakespeare, 2006. Print.