John Rives's 'Four In The Morning'

It started out as a joke. John Rives, a poet, was asked to present a TED Talk in 2007, and, unsure of what to present, he resulted in share something “so niche it [was] actually inconsequential or actually cockamamie”: a conspiracy theory revolving around 4 AM (Rives). Before the TED Talk, while researching a Polish poet named Wislawa Szymborska, a winner of the Nobel Peace Prize for literature in 1996, Rives came across an eerily familiar poem entitled “Four in the Morning”. Because he was unsure why this poem, which he’d never read before, felt familiar, he became fixated on the concept of 4 AM, hearing references to the time over and over in his daily life, inspiring him to create the 2007 TED Talk conspiracy. During the 2007 TED Talk, Rives ties numerous events, movies, television, and pieces of literature together, “proving” in that there is some bigger, ridiculous reason behind why the time of 4 AM is so commonly referenced. However, in October of 2014, after years of TED Talk fans sending him T.V. clips, movie scenes, and songs which all referenced 4 AM, Rives finally discovered the once-forgotten root of his attachment to 4 AM-- an old lover in college had sent him a mixtape where one of the songs referenced the time.
In March of 2014, during Rives’ third TED talk, “The Museum of Four in the Morning”, in explaining the background behind his newfound hobby of collecting references to 4 AM, Rives proves that even the most silly, benign, or even ridiculous of concepts are the ones that connect us all, making the human experience oftentimes
universal. In sharing the most irrelevant of concepts, references society makes, whether it be in literature or on the big screen, Rives connects strangers over both land and time into the same experience. From showing his audience the most well-known of references, like an episode from the Simpsons or a quote from Brontë, to the more obscure of references, like an original song once sang in an Indian cafe or a children’s diabetic magazine, Rives utilizes pathos, connecting all areas of interest and life, to show that 4 AM is everywhere. When someone is up at four in the morning, an experience that finds each individual over time, typically he or she is either up too late or too early, making it an unpleasant time to be awake where only “dramatic occurrences allegedly occur” (Rives). As a result, all of the references, shared by Rives, whether it be from Shakespeare, the Simpsons, Elton John, or a crochet magazine, 4 AM is depicted as the most painful, tiring, or even lonely of times. However, because Rives, laughter lines and all, creates a light-hearted tone with his audience, through listing the most bizarre of references that no average person would ever remember, Rives captures his audience through feelings in their hearts into the 4 AM experience directly. Rives stirs up so much of an interest in 4 AM to the point where his followers are sending him screengrabs and news clippings referencing the time from all over the world, transforming 4 AM from an individual experience in the morning into one that connects all different corners of life. In the end, the fact that such a small, seemingly meaningless detail exists within every human being amazes Rives to the point where he almost forgets the mystery behind why he became so obsessed with 4 AM in the first place until he comes across a tweet from an old college girlfriend, reminding him of a once-forgotten, cherished memory of the girlfriend gifting him a mixtape in which one of the songs referenced 4 AM. By the end of Rive’s 4 AM journey, spanning the period of seven entire years, he finally comes full-circle with 4 AM, finding his own personal connection with time, connecting himself into the universal experience that he had previously discovered. Because Rives does not share the detail of how an old romance connects him to the 4 AM experience until the end of his presentation, Rives’ audience leaves the presentation feeling connected not only to an intangible number of people but also to the man in which they were listening to the whole time. Along with the concept of 4 AM, the strive for human connection is a shared experience, as humans are sociable creatures who strive to relate and learn from one another. Those who strive wholeheartedly for human connection are often lonely, and as Rives found such an obscure example of something that connects all human beings, even the most lonely of individuals can no longer feel entirely isolated. In addition, because 4 AM within society has ties to loneliness, as it is a time where everyone should be asleep, humans, whether for better or for worse, become connected in their feelings of loneliness. Because Rives called to attention such a small detail about the shared experience of human nature, gaining a positive response from his audience as a result, the fact that humans are more or less all the same, striving to feel connected, is seen.