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presented by Tom McBride Professor of English and Gayle and William Keefer Professor of the Humanities
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A spring trip to Italy provided the inspiration for a lecture at Beloit College. Tom McBride, professor of English and Gayle and William Keefer Professor of the Humanities, presented “Local Talent: The Three Geniuses of Florence,” the annual Keefer and Keefer lecture, on Thursday, Sept. 6.
Last April, McBride joined a group of Beloit College alumni on a tour of Tuscany. While in Florence, he noted the close proximity of memorials dedicated to three heroes of the Renaissance: Michelangelo, Machiavelli, and Galileo. Visiting the memorials got him thinking about that period of Italian history and considering how it shaped and influenced the three men.
“I wondered if there is any other place in the world where so many great geniuses are buried so close to each other,” he says.
Upon his return to the United States, McBride began researching their lives and accomplishments. He looked at some of their “greatest hits” -- Michelangelo’s statue of David, Machievelli’s philosophical writings, and Galileo’s revolutionary scientific theories -- and realized that all three of them were the first to create or discover things that are now often taken for granted.
“Once you understand how difficult it was for anyone else to do or think such things, you also realize how extraordinary it was for these three to do so,” he explains. “Their ability helps to identify them as geniuses.”
“Are these people so far above the rest of us that we are simply unable to comprehend them?” he asks. “Or is there some way for us to identify with their thought processes and achievements?”
McBride’s presentation focused on what he learned about “the three geniuses” and offered his perspective on what genius is, whether it is a recognizable trait, and if it is a quality that ordinary people can understand.
A long-time member of the Beloit College faculty, McBride has been presenting the annual Keefer and Keefer Lecture for more than 16 years. He is also well-known for helping to co-write the Beloit College Mindset List, an overview of the worldview of typical first-year students, which is published each August with the advent of the new academic year.