Hi, students,
Since this weekend I looked the ego in the face, everything I read brings it back to me. So, here is a text related to it:
In today’s excerpt, John Steinbeck eulogizes his recently deceased friend, Ed Ricketts:
I have tried to isolate and inspect the great talent that was in Ed Ricketts, that made him so loved and needed and makes him so missed now that he is dead. Certainly he was an interesting and charming man, but there was some other quality that far exceeded these. I have thought that it might be his ability to receive, to receive anything from anyone, to receive gracefully and thankfully, and to make the gift seem very fine. Because of this everyone felt good in giving to Ed–a present, a thought, anything.
Perhaps the most overrated virtue in our list of shoddy virtues is that of giving. Giving builds up the ego of the giver, makes him superior and higher and larger than the receiver…It is so easy to give, so exquisitely rewarding. Receiving, on the other hand, if it is well-done, requires a fine balance of self-knowledge and kindness. It requires humility and tact and great understanding of relationships. In receiving, you cannot appear, even to yourself, better or stronger or wiser than the giver, although you must be wiser to do it well.
It requires self-esteem to receive–not self-love but just a pleasant acquaintance and liking for oneself.
John Steinbeck, The Log from the Sea of Cortez, Appendix, “”About Ed Ricketts”", Penguin Books, 1951, pp. 272-3
look someone in the face and look someone in the eye; stare someone in the face
Fig. to face someone directly. (Facing someone this way is a sign of sincerity.) I don’t believe you. Look me in the eye and say that, She looked him in the face and said she never wanted to see him again.
See also: face, look
McGraw-Hill Dictionary of American Idioms and Phrasal Verbs. © 2002 by The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc.
eulogize |ˈyoōləˌjīz|
verb [ trans. ]
praise highly in speech or writing : Cotton Mather eulogized him as the embodiment of Christian altruism | a plaque that eulogizes the workers. See note at praise .
DERIVATIVES
eulogist |-jist| noun
eulogistic |ˌyoōləˈjistik| adjective
eulogistically |ˈyoōləˈjistik(ə)lē| adverb
deceased |diˈsēst| formal Law
noun ( the deceased)
a person who has died : in memory of the deceased.
adjective
dead; no longer living : the cremation of a deceased person.
decease |diˈsēs|
noun [in sing. ] formal or Law
death : a doctor’s sudden decease.
Enjoy!
Maria Lucia Solla
