Moses’s self-imposed scholarly isolation paradoxically won him his classmates’ admiration
Evidence
Ironically, it was the reading and writing he did behind the door closed against his classmates’ shouts that first made them take an interest in him. There was on the campuses of that era a respect for scholarliness and brilliance, and Bob Moses’ classmates slowly began to realize the extent to which he possessed these qualities. … I liked Bob from the first, but in the beginning it was a sort of paternal feeling. When he’d come around to the room, he’d seem so young and lost. But then I began to be attracted to him for his mind. I loved Latin; I got very high marks in it, but I knew just enough Latin to know that Bob was on a level way above mine. He really knew Latin. I started talking to him—and I became aware of a quality of mind that was exceptional. He was brilliant. I liked talking to him, and I became friendly with him. And that was what happened between Moses and a lot of people; by the end of sophomore year or the beginning of junior year, people were beginning to talk about him. He became admired for his scholarship—and all of a sudden we noticed he was coming around to our suite less and less. He had gotten friends of his own. — Robert A. Caro, The Power Broker, 167
Categorization
- XREF: Previews Caro’s recurring theme that Moses’s aloofness was simultaneously his strength and his flaw — the same dynamic Caro documents with New York politicians who mistook his distant manner. — connects to: Youth and Jewishness made Moses a lonely social outcast at Yale — Robert A. Caro, The Power Broker: Robert Moses and the…, 165; Young Moses already showed the obsessive, self-isolating dedication that marked his later career — Robert A. Caro, The Power Broker: Robert Moses and the…, 166; Moses was socially warm and admired despite his intense study habits — Robert A. Caro, The Power Broker: Robert Moses and the…, 198 (+1 more)
Broader Connections
- Moses was socially warm and admired despite his intense study habits
#corroborates(0.85) — Robert A. Caro, The Power Broker, 198