Like a string of prayer flags, five neatly rectangular pieces of paper hang in a row on Emily Goodling’s desk, each inscribed with inspirational words printed in her meticulous hand.
“Only the exhaustive is truly exhilarating,” reads a quotation from Thomas Mann’s novel “The Magic Mountain.”
Exhaustive and exhilarating, indeed.
Joseph Garnjobst, associate professor of classical studies, described the academic pace the sophomore has set for herself as “blistering.”
Goodling’s work has already seen a national payoff. Her paper on the use of ekphrasis in Apuleius’s “Cupid and Psyche” was selected for Eta Sigma Phi’s national convention this March, where she will join senior Kirsten Block in presenting their essays.
“They’re both doing wonderful work and we’re very proud of both of them,” Garnjobst said.
Since Hillsdale began encouraging the submission of papers to the conference in 2008, 12 Hillsdale upperclassmen have presented and two more were accepted as alternates.
“It’s very similar to what we do at our own conventions. It’s kind of a pre-professional thing to do,” Garnjobst said. “It’s a great opportunity for students.”
Older students, that is. Goodling is the first Hillsdale sophomore to have a paper accepted.
“She’s an unusually focused, hardworking and disciplined student,” said Gavin Weaire, associate professor of classical studies and Goodling’s academic adviser. “We’re lucky to have her.”
“If I could bottle and sell her aspiration and energy I would be rich,” Assistant Professor of German Fred Yaniga said. “Emily lays out a plan and makes it happen. She is never satisfied with half-done projects.”
Homeschooled on a farm in the Green Mountains of Vermont by a “crazy-entrepreneur-artist-farmer-chauffer-cook” mother and an engineer father, Goodling’s education was left largely in her own hands.
“They always just said ‘go work hard, just do it,’” Goodling recalled. “Languages just take time and memorizing a thousand billion flashcards.”
Goodling has studied Latin since the second grade and began a cursory study of Koine Greek in high school, attending online classes once a week. Upon coming to Hillsdale, she continued her studies in Latin but picked up classical Greek and German as well, vaulting through the ranks to 400-level composition courses in three semesters.
“It’s hard. But that’s what makes it exciting,” Goodling said. “The sheer rigor is what drew me to languages. It’s exhilarating.”
When she was 14, Goodling underwent an “I-hate-school stage.” She dropped Latin, switched to French, and nearly suffered a psychological breakdown as a result.
“I just remember sobbing and sobbing and saying, ‘I love Latin. All I want to do is Latin. Why am I taking French, why?’” Goodling said. “So I went back to Latin and that was the end of that. There was no looking back.”
“She can be introspective and shy, but she forces herself to come out and engage anyone she can find who is willing to help advance her studies,” Yaniga said.
Over the summer, Goodling worked on a personal reading project with Yaniga in which the two read works by German author Hermann Hesse, including “The Glass Bead Game,” in the original language.
“When someone like Emily comes along, you don’t feel annoyed,” Yaniga said. “She’s bringing something.”
Before beginning her studies in German, Goodling had already approached Yaniga with questions about musical aesthetic theory in relation to the work of Richard Wagner and Thomas Mann.
“This is senior or graduate-level work. It wasn’t refined yet, but already on that level of thought,” Yaniga said. “Emily’s an original thinker, she’s not predictable.”
Goodling got a chance to publish some of those thoughts in a book review that ran in Nuntius, Eta Sigma Phi’s newsletter. The article touched on opera, ancient Greece, 19th century German culture, and Georg Hegel.
“It was a perfect Emily Goodling topic,” Weaire said.
Goodling, a pianist, has a passion for music -— particularly German opera -— originally planned to add music as a second major.
“But I realized I’m not quite good enough and would ruin my wrists,” Goodling said. “Well … I already have ruined my wrists.”
When at home, Goodling accompanies her sister, “a phenomenal vocalist,” on the piano. Their father, who plays guitar, occasionally joining in.
The farm in Vermont not only produces skeins of high-quality yarn and maple syrup — which Goodling uses to flavor her tea — but also serves as a bed and breakfast, drawing American city-dwellers looking for a “real farm experience” along with international tourists who travel from Spain, Japan, and Siberia to the rolling, wooded slopes of the Green Mountains.
The Goodling family offer classes in fiber-arts, which include dying, weaving, braiding, spinning, and felting, many of which are taught by Goodling over the summer.
Goodling’s favorites were spinning and felting. While taking online classes in high school she would often work with her drop spindle, and spun enough rainbow-colored yarn for a hat during the car-ride to Hillsdale.
“I cannot sit still and do nothing,” Goodling said. “I have to be thinking and I have to be doing.”
In high school Goodling began selling completely handmade fairies, beads, and birds in felted nests — including her ephemeral trademark hummingbird — on her Etsy shop, Vermont Fairies, to help fund her college education.
“Etsy is getting me through college,” Goodling said.
As are the hundreds of customers from 16 different countries who have purchased Goodling’s handicrafts, over 1,230 of them giving her 100 percent positive feedback.
One customer comment mentions that her two-year-old daughter stole the felted ladybugs intended for a friend.
“She loves to take them to bed with her,” the customer wrote.
“I just have so much passion and so much love for everything that I’m doing,” Goodling said. “And I have somewhere to channel it and people who are willing to provide guidance and encouragement and challenges, even more challenges than I could take. It’s amazing.”
“Emily is certainly a bright star,” Yaniga said. “I can’t wait to write her a recommendation letter.”
