The Last Lecture
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| Author | Jeffrey Zaslow |
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| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Genre | non-fiction |
| Publisher | Hyperion |
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Publication date
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April 8, 2008 |
| Media type | Print (Hardcover and paperback) |
| Pages | 224 |
| ISBN | |
| OCLC | 183266069 |
| LC Class | QA76.2.P38 A3 2008b |
The Last Lecture is a New York Times best-selling book co-authored by Randy Pausch—a professor of computer science, human-computer interaction, and design at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania—and Jeffrey Zaslow of the Wall Street Journal. The book speaks on a lecture Pausch gave in September 2007 entitled "Really Achieving Your Childhood Dreams".
Pausch delivered his "Last Lecture", titled "Really Achieving Your Childhood Dreams", at Carnegie Mellon on September 18, 2007. This talk was modeled after an ongoing series of lectures where top academics are asked to think deeply about what matters to them, and then give a hypothetical "final talk", i.e., "what wisdom would you try to impart to the world if you knew it was your last chance?"
A month before giving the lecture, Pausch had received a prognosis that the pancreatic cancer, with which he had been diagnosed a year earlier, was terminal. Before speaking, Pausch received a long standing ovation from a large crowd of over 400 colleagues and students. When he motioned them to sit down, saying, "Make me earn it", someone in the audience shouted back, "You did!" During the lecture Pausch was upbeat and humorous, shrugging off the pity often given to those diagnosed with terminal illness. At one point, to prove his own vitality, Pausch dropped down and did push-ups on stage.
Pausch begins by setting up the various topics being discussed. The first of three subjects, his childhood dreams, is introduced by relaying the overall premise of why he is stating his dreams, saying, "inspiration and permission to dream are huge". The second topic in "Really Achieving Your Childhood Dreams" is titled "Enabling the Dreams of Others". In this section, Pausch discusses his creation of the course "Building Virtual Worlds" that involves the student development of virtual realities. Through this course, Pausch creates a program called "Alice- The Infinitely Scalable Dream Factory" because he wants tens of millions of people to chase their dreams. This software allows kids to make movies and games, giving them the opportunity to learn something hard while still having fun. He believes that "the best way to teach somebody something is to have them think that they're learning something else." For the third and final topic in his lecture, called "Lessons Learned", Dr. Pausch reiterates and introduces a few new lessons that he has learned and accumulated over his lifetime. Arguably the most meaningful point Pausch made comes at the very end of his lecture, when he states: "It's not about how to achieve your dreams, it's about how to lead your life. If you lead your life the right way, the karma will take care of itself, the dreams will come to you.”
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