In Memoriam: Kenneth P. Strong
Jan. 13th, 2010 06:54 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
labricoleuseMy dear colleague Ken Strong died yesterday, with a smile on his lips and people who loved him around him, apparently as peaceful and as graceful a death as brain cancer could allow anyone.
I know the tendency is to remember people as better than they were in life, but all the cliches are actually true when it came to Ken--literally no one who had met him thought he was less than excellent. He lived a huge life, a life of grins and grand gestures and the kind of laughter that pulls you giggling in its wake, glad to be part of the joke.
Ken was a scholar, a teacher, an actor, an orator, a mentor and a friend. This is a poem which i have loved since i was a child, but which while i've known him, i've associated with Ken. I don't know why--i don't even know if he ever read it (though he probably did, being a well-read guy). I transcribe it here in his memory.
There will be a memorial service for Ken on Monday January 18th at 1pm in the Paul Green Theatre on the campus of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. You can find the Paul Green in the Center for Dramatic Art located at:
250 Country Club Road
Chapel Hill, NC 27599
There are no street numbers listed on University buildings, but you should be able to find us if you google map/mapquest/gps that address.
Ken's wife, Kee, has asked that in lieu of flowers donations be made in Ken's name to the Preston Robert Tisch Brain Tumor Center. For further information you can visit their online donation site: http://www.cancer.duke.edu/btc/modules/waystohelp10/index.php?id=2
Rest, Ken. You've been at peace as long as i've known you.
I know the tendency is to remember people as better than they were in life, but all the cliches are actually true when it came to Ken--literally no one who had met him thought he was less than excellent. He lived a huge life, a life of grins and grand gestures and the kind of laughter that pulls you giggling in its wake, glad to be part of the joke.
Ken was a scholar, a teacher, an actor, an orator, a mentor and a friend. This is a poem which i have loved since i was a child, but which while i've known him, i've associated with Ken. I don't know why--i don't even know if he ever read it (though he probably did, being a well-read guy). I transcribe it here in his memory.
The Day is Done
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
The day is done, and the darkness
Falls from the wings of Night,
As a feather is wafted downward
From an eagle in his flight.
I see the lights of the village
Gleam through the rain and the mist,
And a feeling of sadness comes o'er me
That my soul cannot resist:
A feeling of sadness and longing,
That is not akin to pain,
And resembles sorrow only
As the mist resembles the rain.
Come, read to me some poem,
Some simple and heartfelt lay,
That shall soothe this restless feeling,
And banish the thoughts of day.
Not from the grand old masters,
Not from the bards sublime,
Whose distant footsteps echo
Through the corridors of Time.
For, like strains of martial music,
Their mighty thoughts suggest
Life's endless toil and endeavor;
And to-night I long for rest.
Read from some humbler poet,
Whose songs gushed from his heart,
As showers from the clouds of summer,
Or tears from the eyelids start;
Who, through long days of labor,
And nights devoid of ease,
Still heard in his soul the music
Of wonderful melodies.
Such songs have power to quiet
The restless pulse of care,
And come like the benediction
That follows after prayer.
Then read from the treasured volume
The poem of thy choice,
And lend to the rhyme of the poet
The beauty of thy voice.
And the night shall be filled with music,
And the cares, that infest the day,
Shall fold their tents, like the Arabs,
And as silently steal away.
There will be a memorial service for Ken on Monday January 18th at 1pm in the Paul Green Theatre on the campus of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. You can find the Paul Green in the Center for Dramatic Art located at:
250 Country Club Road
Chapel Hill, NC 27599
There are no street numbers listed on University buildings, but you should be able to find us if you google map/mapquest/gps that address.
Ken's wife, Kee, has asked that in lieu of flowers donations be made in Ken's name to the Preston Robert Tisch Brain Tumor Center. For further information you can visit their online donation site: http://www.cancer.duke.edu/btc/modules/waystohelp10/index.php?id=2
Rest, Ken. You've been at peace as long as i've known you.
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Strong
Date: 2010-01-14 12:26 am (UTC)Is this the same Ken Strong that researched and used to make spurs? I worked with a Strong online when I was making them and he was great. I am heart broken to the extreme if they are the same person. Do you have a URL to a newspaper announcement of his death?
Re: Strong
Date: 2010-01-14 12:33 am (UTC)http://www.dailytarheel.com/content/professor-and-playmakers-member-dies
Re: Strong
Date: 2010-01-14 12:49 am (UTC)Memories
Date: 2010-01-14 02:47 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-01-14 05:57 am (UTC)"He lived a huge life, a life of grins and grand gestures and the kind of laughter that pulls you giggling in its wake, glad to be part of the joke"
This sounds like someone whom I would have loved to know.
no subject
Date: 2010-01-14 09:11 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-01-15 04:13 am (UTC)I miss him, too.
Thank you.
-Sally
no subject
Date: 2010-01-15 06:03 pm (UTC)The poem is very beautiful; thank you for sharing it with those who care.