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Kent Weeks Interview (page: 3 / 7)Living Legend of Egyptology
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Was there anyone in particular who inspired or challenged you when you were a kid?
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Kent Weeks: Well, I think the two people who most inspired me -- and actually provided an example that I wanted to follow -- were, number one, John Wilson, who was professor of Egyptology at the University of Chicago, one of those people I wrote when I was 12 years old and who wrote back this very kind letter. The other one was an Egyptologist, an Egyptian named Ahmad Fakhri, who had in the 19... I guess it was late '50s, early '60s -- had come to Seattle with the first King Tut traveling exhibit. It was at the Seattle Art Museum, and I was in high school at that time. I wrote him a letter and said, "Can I meet you? I'd like to talk about Egyptology." This fine old man -- here I am, just a little kid -- he takes me out to lunch. We talk for three hours about the joys of Egyptology, the pitfalls of trying to make a career in such a narrow discipline, and so forth. He gave me some wonderfully sound advice. These two fellows, who later on became great colleagues and dear friends, really did give the final polish, if you will, to the plans that I was trying to make for the future.
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Were there any books that particularly influenced you as a youngster?
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Kent Weeks: I've always been a voracious reader and I read everything. I think in many ways it was not books specifically dealing with ancient Egypt that had the greatest influence on me. It was books of poetry, it was books of English literature, it was Tolstoy, War and Peace, which I did not read in the original Russian, I read it in translation. But again, the liberal arts background that I was able to get at the university paid big dividends. I again thank John Wilson and Ahmad Fakhri for encouraging this. I took a lot of courses in English lit, a lot of courses in... oh gosh, Byzantine history, Greek and Roman history, courses in ancient Chinese social structure. I took Greek. I took French and German of course. I took statistics and anthropology, things that are really, at first blush, unrelated to ancient Egypt. But they have come home in the last several years, and have given me more valuable knowledge about techniques, or comparative materials, than I would ever have had otherwise. I really like the American system of education, where we encourage this broad base, this liberal arts foundation. As opposed to, say, the British system of education, where when you enter college as a freshman, it is expected you know exactly what you're going to do, and you're going to concentrate on that one narrow discipline and nothing else. I think that's unfortunate. I think it's misguided. Now in British society I'm sure it works very well, but I find that the broader background that I've got has been far more useful, far more influential than the specific courses that I took in hieroglyphics, or Egyptian history, or Egyptian art.
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[ Key to Success ] Preparation |
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Would you say that you were a gifted child? We're trying to account for this incredible curiosity and the lengths you went to, to satisfy it at such a young age.
Kent Weeks: Well, maybe it was lack of imagination. I got into this rut, and I couldn't think of anything else to do. I really don't know.
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I certainly do not consider myself to have been a gifted child. I was a real hellion. Not going off and robbing banks or anything like that, but you know, the usual thing, sending Playboy magazine subscriptions to the school library. Writing letters to the editor signed with a fake name about how incompetent the principal was because he wouldn't allow us to have Sloppy Joes at lunch hour, and so forth. Just all kinds of minor troublemaking. I was much more interested in doing that sort of thing, or going out on dates, than I was about really concentrating on my studies. Once in a while I'd get motivated. I got highly motivated in chemistry. I loved it. I got highly motivated in history. I loved it. There were other courses -- math, physics, ho-hum! I could have cared less. And no, I was not a 4.0 student at all. I think I graduated from high school with like a 3.1 -- 3.2. It wasn't until I got into university and began looking at the variety of different subjects that one could take and seeing how they might all fit into this goal that I have, that I really did, I think, become a motivated student. But it wasn't easy. I mean, I don't consider myself to be particularly bright. I just was interested enough that I was willing to put in the long hours of study that made it possible.
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How did you get along with your fellow classmates? When you weren't raising hell, what did you do in your spare time?
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Kent Weeks: I worked in the school radio station as an announcer, both in high school and in college. I was never much on sports. I turned out for track a couple of times, but that was about the extent of my interest. I can remember being asked to go out and serve as the announcer for a big football game between our high school and our primary rival down the road. I didn't know anything about football. Didn't know? I mean I... "Oh, he's going to make a basket! Is this a touchdown, or is it a home run?" I got everything screwed up, to the point that by the end of the first quarter they literally, bodily took me out of the box and said, "Don't ever come back!" But I enjoyed being an announcer. I enjoyed being on radio, and it was fun. I hung out with a bunch of guys who similarly were interested in that, some of whom have since gone into politics. Some have gone into radio and television, and are now working in stations around the West. But that was one of the principal things I was interested in doing. That, reading, going out and as we called it then, "cruising the gut." Driving from the A&W to the Dairy Queen and back, seeing what was going on in the evening. I grew up in a small town and that was about as good as it got.
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Kent Weeks Interview, Page:
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This page last revised on Jun 11, 2011 09:22 EST
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