The Michigan Daily - Tuesday, May 17, 1983.- Page 7
PROF LIVES WITH GERMAN TREASURES
America fits Garbaty best
By CHERYL BAACKE
He has vivid memories of waving a paper swastika
as Hitler and Mussolini rode by when he was an eight-
year-old child in Berlin. Thomas Garbaty was raised
by governesses in one of Germany's wealthiest
families, surrounded by luxury in a house with fur-
niture that belonged in a museum.
The Garbaty name was a "household word," in
Germany. His grandfather was famous for opening
the first cigarette factory in Berlin.
ALL THE FAME was left behind when his family
moved to New York prior to World War II. The move
was the "beginning of a new life," for Garbaty, now
living in Ann Arbor as a professor of English
literature at the University, his home filled with fur-
nishings his family carried from his youth in Berlin.
PROFILE
Sitting behind his large wooden desk, surrounded
by bookshelves stacked to the ceiling in his study, at
53, the dark-haired man says he feels that he belongs
in America.
"My real pleasure and happiness began when I
grew up in an American neighborhood. Of all coun-
tries in the world, this is the one that fits me the
best," says Garbaty.
HIS LARGE brick house off Geddes Road is filled
with furniture dating back to the 1500's, 16th century
paintings, and silver by Odiot. a Paris, the man who
also designed silver for Napolean's mother.
"Sometimes at night, I look at my paintings, I walk
around like a ghost," says Garbaty whose voice has
no hint of a German accent. "It's like A Christmas
Carol, the ghost of Ebeneezer Scrooge thinking of his
youth."
His study is filled with medieval English literature,
a subject he has taught to University students for 22
years.
GARBATY NEVER thought he would bea teacher.
As a freshman at Haverford College in Pennsylvania
he planned to go into medicine. By his second year he
decided to major in English, but after graduating in
1951, he struggled through a year of law school at
Yale which Garbaty said was a disaster.
His luck proved no better when he tried to join the
CIA in 1957.
"I had a hankering for adventure and foreign in-
trigue," says Garbaty," but that was a flop; I couldn't
even become a spy."
With dreams of being the next James Bond behind
him, he completed his doctorate in English at the
University of Pennsylvania.
"I SLOWLY, slowly got interested in (English.) I
just backed into it because I just didn't know what
else to do," he says.
But Garbaty has tried to keep that spirit of adven-
ture in his teaching. Although many students would
think an English professor was an intellectual, Gar-
baty said he loves movies and television.
"Too much seriousness can be poison. I can't be too
serious, I hate it," he says, adding that he watches
Leave it to Beaver with his 17-year-old son Michael.
GARBATY TAKES his work seriously. Although he
enjoys students and teaching, he also values privacy
and does most work at home.
"I don't like to work in my office," he says, I work
here in my study. When I'm working it's a physical
thing. I start taking off my shirt and that's, of course,
horrible. You cannot have students suddenly coming
in and saying, 'My God, what's happened to you?'"
Teaching a good class, Garbaty says, is a tremen-
dous high, it's a tremendous ego trip. It is like going
out on stage, but better because you can see the
audience."
KNOWING ALL of his students is a goal Garbaty
strives for and he makes an effort to learn their
names.
"And I don't get to know (students) until they've
written for me. Then I can see into their souls, their
minds," he says.
The only part of teaching Garbaty doesn't like is
grading papers. "I don't like to put the grade down.
When a student sees that he got a B- or a C +, I don't
like to disappoint them."
ALTHOUGH HE has taught middle English
literature and Chaucer courses since coming to the
University, Garbaty says the job never gets boring
"It's a whole different ball game every time you
teach the class. You've got different classes, com-
pletely different minds that react in a totally dif-
ferent way to something you've taught many times.
"They suddently ask you questions you've never
thought about before that you really may not even
know the answer to."
In many ways, Garbaty and his family are still
very European. His wife, Elsbeth, a travel agent, was
raised in Switzerland and travels abroad often. His
daughter Bettina, a junior at Haverford College, at-
tended Swiss schools for several years, and Garbaty
says she is still split between being European and
American.
Garbaty's family planned a move to Switzerland in
1977, but decided against it because of high costs.
Even though Garbaty has fond memories of his
childhood in Berlin and loves to travel, he likes
Americans better than Europeans because of their
kindness and good humor.
"I'm not a Pollyanna when I say these things. I say
them from a lot of experience of dismal human traits.
In more or less expecting the worst everyday from
everyone, I'm constantly happily surprised."
Daily Photo by JEFF Sd
Prof. Thomas Garbaty, who teaches medieval English literature at the Garbaty says he fell into his profession, but now le thinks every day is a new
University, does all of his work in his study at home, surrounded by furniture challenge.
and antiques collected by his parents when they lived in Berlin, Germany.