Ken Burns, America's most celebrated documentary filmmaker and the creator of The Civil War, Baseball, and Jazz, delivered the commencement address at Georgetown University in 2006. In a speech deeply rooted in American history, Burns issued a series of concise imperatives to the graduates, and this was perhaps the sharpest. Burns drew a clear distinction between success — career advancement, status, wealth — and excellence, which he defined as the pursuit of meaningful work regardless of its rewards. He attributed the distinction to Robert Penn Warren, the Pulitzer Prize-winning novelist and poet, who had warned Burns early in his career that making decisions based on career strategy rather than genuine passion leads to a kind of spiritual death. For Burns, who had spent decades making long, uncommercial documentaries about American history, the advice had proven prophetic.