Adams and Education
Henry Adams's constant struggle through the book is to receive education. Despite his time at college, life in England as a diplomat, work as a professor, then research as a historian, he feels he has failed to become "educated". The irony of course being all the roles Henry Adams has filled in his life require being educated. They are all positions many see as being held by "learned" or smart men. It is only at the end of the book, after Adams life has passed him by, does he realize one can never truly be "educated". The process of education is a lifelong enterprise undertaken by oneself. This is what he desired to educate the reader on.
Adams and Technology
One of Henry Adams's favorite topics is technology. Despite his constant repetition of the subject, he reveals he was fifty years old when he learned to ride a bicycle. While it may seem simple today, the bicycle was a radical invention in Adams's day. The irony Adams of course creates is how he took fifty years to do what a child does in about a dozen. Even with all his knowledge, these basic everyday inventions are still radical and life altering to Adams. He could write all he could on technology, but it was another thing to actually use it.
Adams and Adamses
Henry Adams is the great-grandson of President John Adams and the grandson of President John Quincy Adams. While Adams comes from a distinguished family, he never became president and largely failed at most things he attempted. Adams was born in the same place as his ancestors, but the world he lived in was radically different. Technology has totally changed the social and political position of the United States. The contrast between himself and his family Henry Adams is well aware of throughout the book. Nearly all of Adams's "education" is to live up to the legacy of his family, but he ultimately finds out he must educate himself to be his own man. Even though he has the last name Adams, Henry Adams could never be one.
Adams and School
What Adams seeks through the entire book is an "education", but he does not find it at any college. Even though he attends classes in both America and Germany, Adams finds that all colleges fail at education. Adams sees these institutions as being too rooted in the 19th century. Adams, in the end, learns nothing from the universities despite their prestige. They were simply another title added to his resume and nothing to his mind.
Adams and Europe
Much of Adams later life is spent in Europe (mostly Paris), but, as an American, he does not understand the culture. Much of the book is Adams's praise for the sensuality of European culture, but, as a person, he never experiences this. Adams writes much about the "Virgin" (or emotion) of Europe, but never writes about his own relationship to it. As an American, Adams can only aesthetically appraise Europe and never be part of it.
