"If You Love Rats"

The Harvard Medical School Class Day address

For more on Bergman's address, see "The Prodigal Doctor Returns."

For detailed reports on all the principal events of the week, including speech texts and audio and video recordings, please visit harvardmagazine.com/ commencement/2009.

Stephen Bergman ’66, M.D. ’73, writing as Samuel Shem, published a novel, The House of God, in 1978—a biting comedy about the lives of medical interns, among whom it remains immensely popular. It has not always been so kindly received within the medical hierarchy. So it was a surprise that Bergman, who spent decades on the Medical School faculty, teaching psychiatrists-in-training at McLean Hospital, was named the school’s Class Day speaker. This excerpt is from his introduction.

 

In rough economic times like these, perhaps we should offer a prayer of thanksgiving—how thankful we are that you are not graduating from business school. Healthcare is a glorious profession. It is so broad that each of you will find a job. If you love people and hate rats and molecules, you can be a clinician. If you love rats and molecules and are not so hot with people, a researcher. If neither, and you like travel to exotic places to help millions of people, public health or politics. And if, like me, you are a Jewish doctor who can’t stand the sight of blood, there’s always psychiatry.

You might also like

The Faculty of Arts and Sciences Zeroes In on the Classroom Experience

Class schedules and academics are at the top of the agenda for Harvard faculty.

Harvard Football: Harvard 59, Holy Cross 24

Another week, another blowout, this one against an in-state rival

Trump Says a Deal with Harvard Is Close

Administration squeezes Harvard finances, and a federal judge blasts deportation efforts as unconstitutional.

Most popular

What Trump Means for John Roberts’s Legacy

Executive power is on the docket at the Supreme Court.

This Harvard Scientist Is Changing the Future of Genetic Diseases

David Liu has pioneered breakthroughs in gene editing, creating new therapies that may lead to cures.

Three Harvardians Win Macarthur Fellowships

A mathematician, a political scientist, and an astrophysicist are honored with “genius” grants for their work.

Explore More From Current Issue

Illustration of college students running under a large red "MAGA" hat while others look on with some skeptisim.

How Maga Went Mainstream at Harvard

Trump, TikTok, and the pandemic are reshaping Gen Z politics.

People sit in lawn chairs near a rustic barn at Cider Garden in New Salem on a sunny day.

Ciderdays Festival Celebrates All Things Apple

Visiting small-batch cideries and orchards in Massachusetts

Room filled with furniture made from tightly rolled newspaper sheets.

A Paper House In Massachusetts

The 1920s Rockport cottage reflects resourceful ingenuity.