dour Marsh-wiggle, Puddleglum is a brave but glum creature,
always expecting the worst. When he says “good morning” to the
children in Narnia, he immediately adds, “Though when I say
good, I don’t mean it won’t probably turn to rain, or it might be
snow, or fog, or thunder.” The Marsh-wiggle always talks about
what could go wrong and how many difficulties and reversals
might lie ahead.
Billy’s family uses the nickname for him with humor and
affection, but how could it really fit?
Most of us, sensing a rightness about Billy’s being chosen most
admired and often being called “the beloved evangelist,” would
never dream of his being nicknamed Puddleglum. His family and
closest friends saw a side the public did not—a dubious, pes-
simistic tendency that he had to fight constantly.
Yet most of us never dream of the realities leaders live with.
“Ebullient” Teddy Roosevelt, trying to keep riding too fast for
“dark care” to catch up. Behind Franklin Roosevelt’s jaunty grin
and optimistic Fireside Chats were heroic but agonizing strains
from his polio, his life in a wheelchair, and weighty depression.
JFK, for all his youthful vigor and optimism, endured major
chronic pain. Lincoln battled significant depression. They all pro-
jected a gritty, can-do, optimistic spirit.
One historian concluded, however, after studying world leaders
who had accomplished the most, that melancholics were signifi-
cantly overrepresented. Whatever one’s personality, leadership—as
explored in chapter 1—is continually forged in the furnace. The
heat, the messiness, the human tragedies all weigh against and
counter the optimism and hope that must be communicated.
Those American presidents on the most-admired list carried the
weight of world leadership while enduring harsh criticism and
disastrous reversals—yet like all effective leaders, they inspired
others. Despite the worst, the leader must personify hope for
the best.
Long before Dwight Eisenhower became president, Billy
forged early ties with him—the start of a long and fruitful friend-
ship. Both men projected the positive, and Ike did so as a specific
The Leadership Secrets of Billy Graham