The Thinker Who Believed in Doing
The photograph of William James was taken in 1865 in Brazil, where James had traveled to explore the Amazon with the biologist Louis Agassiz.
On a late September morning in 1891, William James walked reluctantly to his class in Harvard College’s Sever Hall. Characteristically dressed in a colorful shirt and a Norfolk jacket with a boutonniere, he must have seemed slightly bohemian. His lectures were spontaneous and rambling, unlike those of his more logical, organized colleagues. James claimed he did not like teaching, particularly to listless Harvard undergraduates. Yet he was good at it, even exceptional. Conversation with James, Walter Lippmann recalled, was “the greatest thing that has happened to me in my college life.” W. E. B. Du Bois wrote, “He was my friend and guide to clear thinking.” In his biography of James, Robert Richardson says, “William James was one of America’s great teachers.”
William James also avoided his study. In 1878 he signed a contract to write a psychology textbook in two years. It took 12. Writing was harder for him than speaking at conferences or climbing mountains. Sprinkled with anecdotes and personal examples and written in energetic prose, The Principles of Psychology, published in 1890, was praised in America and Europe both by academics and lay readers. Historian Jacques Barzun declared it a classic and likened it to Moby-Dick.
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