Page Faur
THIE MICHIGAN DAILY
Sunday, September 22, 1 131174
Pag FurTH MIHIANDALY unay Sptebe 2, 97
KS
VESTAL'S VERSION
Jerry Ford: The c os
get, the less there is
JERRY FORD, UP CLOSE: rounding the, then, newly-ap-
AN INVESTIGATIVE BIOGRA- pointed Vice-President. As the
PHY, by Bud Vestal. New York: first of an expected flurry of
Coward, McCann and Geoghe- words about Ford, it covers in
gan, 214 pp., $7.95. time only up to the early
months of 1974.
By JAMES HIPPS The book is clear, evenly
written and commends itself
UD VESTAL has made the with an interesting narration of
mistake of showing Gerald Grand Rapids politics in the
Ford as he really is. Despite pre-Ford 1940's. Its major weak-
the aura of competence in ness is Ford himself. For there
which Vestal attempts to cloak can be little depth in a biogra-
Ford, Jerry remains, in Jerry phv of a man as limited as is
Ford, Up Close, the same un- Gerald Ford. Vestal offers
distinguished politician he has enough information to allow us
been for decades. to answer the question asked by
Vestal, a long-time friend of his last chapter: "What kind of
Ford, began this book to fill President would Jerry Ford
the gap of information sur- be?" It can be said that the
aghast. Eisenhower at the time
had planned a state visit to Ja-
pan. But the enraged Japanese
students, encouraged by a mem-
ber of the Japanese Diet (Con-
ergress) who helped lead the
Eisenhower's visit cancelled.
Someone (described in the
to see book as "a former Michigan
Congressman") got the idea to
go to Japan at their next elec-
very qualities inherent in Ford I tion and try to defeat the mem-
which made him a valuable ber of the Diet who encouraged
Vice-President for Richard Nix- the students to demonstrate
on make him an unsuitable against Eisenhower. This was
President for the United States. done with the aid of the CIA
Vestal describes Ford as be- dirty-tricks division. The main
ing loyal, trusting, and obedient. instrument of their success was
Ford is unimaginative, too. ("In money.
Jerry it was, like an appendix, BUT WHAT OF Jerry Ford?
a little-used facility.") Ford is Vestal says, "Ford ought to
seen as being just the sort of have known about it, consider-
man to help Nixon out in the po- ing the circumstances. If he
litical arena, a man adept at did know, he probably enjoyed
following others' leads. I the fact that the CIA could
win one victory, however in-j
BUT HE IS too adept. Vestal significant."
includes brief sketches of How could anyone have,
Ford's entanglement in the thought this would presage by
Winter - Berger affair and his so many years Ford's recent
tragicomic production to im- remarks concerning the CIA?
peach Justice William 0. Doug- Yet the parallel between this
las. Both are examples of incident and the CIA involve-
Ford's misguided political in- ment in the recent Chilean
tentions. coup is staggering in its im-
Of Jerry's involvement with plications.
Robert Winter - Berger, Vestal' Thus Vestal shows Gerald
admits, "He was naive, he had Ford to be a man of great loy-
been gulled." He had been alty and a man with a deep
conned by a smooth-talking in- love of country. He is a man
fluence peddler who capitalized whose honesty is legend. Yet
on Ford's desire to help his the Presidency requires more.
party financially. In return, Vestal, in measuring Ford
Ford became dirtied in a $125,- for the Presidency, says look
000 deal to buy an African am- at the inheritance. Richard
bassadorship.
LESSING'S IDEALS
A voice of hope in
a despairing world
A SMALL P E R S 0 N A L In 1957 Lessing's optimistic
VOICE: ESSAYS, REVIEWS, idealism may have sounded like
INTERVIEWS, By Doris Les- an echo of the 1930s. But she
sing, Edited and introduced ' has never been a romantic or a
by Paul Schlueter, 171 Pages. self-deluder. G i v e n her full
New York: Alfred A. Knopf, awareness of her times, her
1974. activist stance of the 1950s ap-
By ALICE HENKIN pears to have been a visionary
B I Eanticipation of the mobilized de-
JN 1957 Doris Lessing wrote terminaition of the 1960s.
"A Small Personal Voice," In more recent essays in-
the title essay of this collec- ; cluded in the book, Lessing re-
tion. Aware of the modern con- turns frequently to the theme of!
fusion of standards and uncer- responsibility: the refusal to re-
tainty of values, and cognizant linquish 'old-fashioned morali-
of the existentialist dilemma ties' in succumbing to the pres-
intellectuals were then confront- sures of modernity. If in the
ing, she nevertheless rejected! 1950's, Lessing's sympathies and
the acceptance of despair and energies anticipated the trends'
disgust as a cowardly betrayal of the 1960's, her vital perser-!
of individual responsibility. She verence in asserting certain!
insisted instead on an active values and beliefs in the rela-!
committment to one's beliefs. To tively apathetic 1970's is an ef-
Lessing, socio - economic and fective s t a t e m e n t of herI
political structures were insep- strength and integrity.
arable from morality. Socialism A Small Personal Voice is di-
represented "a rejection of hun-' vided into three sections: "On
ger and poverty," and, "a de-! Her Life and Writings," "On
sire for goodness and compas- Other Writers," and, "On Af-
sion." Within her idealistic de- rica." While the categories are
sign, the writer figured as an organizationally useful, they are
"architect of the soul," able to slightly deceptive, obscuring the!
strengthen "a vision of a good volume's unity as an illumina-
which may defeat the evil . . ." tion of Lessing's life and mind.
Nixon left behind him a nation
devastated in spirit and in sub-
stance. Ford, according to Ves-
tal, could not do worse than
did Johnson or Nixon. But the
point is that in extraordinary
times a nation needs extraordi-
nary men. It is irrelevant that
Ford could do no worse than
Nixon. But it may be tragic if
he can do no better.
In JERRY FORD, UP CLOSE,
Bud Vestal claims to have
written "an investigative biog-
raphy." But as a veteran Grand
Rapids reporter, Vestal may
have known there was not much
to be investigated.
James Hipps is an economics
ntjor at the University and a
ieteran of Capitol lill.
SARAH HERSHEY, Pianist
NANCY WARI NG, Flutist
in a JOINT RECITAL}
SATURDAY, SEPT. 22 AT 3:00 P.M.
at the
UNION GALLERY
7 - ".rl n i A Ir'I I/-'A N. I K IInK I
The incident involving the im-
peachment of Douglas seemsj
another case of Gerald Ford's
being manipulated. It occurs
after Clement F. Haynsworth,
Jr.,, and G. Harrold Carswell
were both rejected by the Sen-'
ate as Nixon's nominees to the
POSTHUMOUS VOLUMES
Dumas: Sweet lyrics of a murdered poet
ARK nF RONF..r,_ Henrv Du-
high court. Both Attorney Gen- ' Hl" urauvraneryi
eral John Mitchell and the mas, New York: Random
House, 1974, 139 pp. $5.95
White House were furious. And PLAY EBONY PLAY IV-
Ford was annoyed to have the ORY, Henry Dumas, New,
liberal Justice Douglas writing York: Random House, 1974,
articles such as "Redress in'
Revolution" (whichhadsbeen 134 pp. $5.95.
printed in a magazine including By MARNIE HEYN
photographs of nude women)
while Nixon's conservative ap- JHENRY DUMAS was shot to
pointees were discarded. death by a New York city
With his first speech attack- policeman in a subway stationI
ing Douglas in 1970, the Jus- when he was 34. Reason: "mis-
tice Department, under Mitchell taken identity." That senseless
happily fed Ford any informa- incident is a tragedy for the
tion they felt was suited to the people he loved - black peo-
assault. Robert Hartmann, ple - and for literature and
;
r
l
r
I st FLUOR, JVIR.AIUt\N UI
Included are selections from:
REISENSTEIN
HEI DEN
PISTON
SCF
CF
BR
-UBERT
HOPIN
ZAHMS
NO ADMISSION CHARGE
LECTURE..
Professor URIEL TAL
of the HEBREW UNIVERSITY
will lecture
Monday, Sept. 23 at 4 p.m.
Aud. C-Angell Hall
TOPIC: "Religious and
Anti-Religious Roots of
Modern Antisemitism"
Sponsored by Judiac Studies
Committee and Dept. of History
MONDAY evening-8:00, at
HIL L E L-1429 Hill St.
Prof. Tal will lecture on "Jewish Self-
Understanding and the Land and
State of Israel."
B'NAI BRITH HILLEL FOUNDATION
1429 Hill
I
Ford's administrative aide at
the time, said, "We may have
been used" and noted that "the
White House certainly was not
uninterested." Perhaps without
the interest shown by the White
House. Ford's concern with
humanity as a whole.
Dumas had a flair for under-
standing and using language
like Orwell, a knack for tellingI
stories like Mark Twain, and
an ear for lyrics as sweet as
any spiritual. In these two vol-
stream of Western culture.' He
seems at home in his skin.
"I see with my skin and
hear with my tongue"
jN THIS line from "Emoyeni,
Place of the Winds," Du-
mas asserts his vision of per-
ception and understanding:
that the external world is part
of each of us and that we are
involved in a dynamic relation-
ship with it.
In all of Dumas' work there
is an immediacy of language
that intensifies time and space
and persons. He has the ability
to move one from the rural
south to Harlem with the turn
of a page.
The sequence of stories in
Ark of Bones - eloquently
introduced and edited by Eu-
gene Redmond - is eerily bio-
graphical. The stories are link-
ed: each pictures a similar pro-
tagonist at various stages of
life. The title story includes
many of the things Dumas val-I
ned highly: the fresh eyes of
children, the evocation of earthI
and water and sky, the mysti-
cism of Biblical stories, the an-
ticipation of a finer future. Yet4
its tone is almost that of fa-
ble.
Dumas' focus gets sharper and
nastier. To the child, whites
are nonexistent; to the adoles-
cent, they are ignorable; but to
the grown man, they are clear-
ly and deservedly on the firing
line. In "Will the Circle Be
Unbroken" they are played to
death by the music of a mythi-
cal instrument called the afro-
horn; and In "Strike and Fade"
they are swept away like flot-
sam before an urban guerrilla
upsurge. The alternative fu-
Play Ebony Play Ivory that
Dumas hits his stride. Verse
is a more appropriate medium
for the sensuousness of his lan-,
guage than the external disci-
pline of sentences and para-
graphs.
IT IS HERE that he best
demonstrates his talent for,
getting inside a person, a feel-
ing, a mythology. His idiom
flows from the Fulton Streetl
market to Swahili to Chicago
jazz to Zen with the ease of
any river-born animal.j
I been to the factory, even
got a card to go to sea j
Yeah, I even got a card to
merchant the sea
Aint there somebody in this
city got a job for poor me?
The hanging decision
must first
reject ignorance.
* * *
. .F
i lay in the gutter/i like gin
it looks like glass/in golden
i h~a thA ilvrsn /t ll
IN THE FIRST part this func-
tion is apparent. The part
ends with a fine essay on "My
Father." He was a British bank-
er who, seeking an escape from
England's narrow convention-
ality, moved his family to Per-
sia, where Lessing was born in
1919, and then to Southern Rho-
desia. She depicts him as a man
of complete integrity. He spent
his life pursuing dreams of phy-
sical space, freedom from con-
flicting social convention, and
egalitarian ideals: he died dis-
illusioned. As for Lessing, hopes
can be disappointed, but t h e y
must be revived.
"On Other Writers" is a sec-
tion of book reviews. Several
are of books by other European
but resident African writers of
radical socio-political nersusa-
sios similar to Lessing's.
She eimyhasizes with Karen
Blixen, author of A Deep Dark-
ness, who describes "that sweet
noble black of Africa, deep
rigrkness absorbed through age,
like old soot, that makes you
feel that for elegance, vigour
and vivacity, no colours rival
black."
Perhaps the most interesting
review is "Afterward to The
Story of an African Farm," a
book by Olive Schreiner written
aro'ind 1883. Lessing read and
loved this book in her child-
hood. and returned to it as an
a71lt to rediscover its wonder.
She foind the plot inane. But
Lessing perceives the novel as
deriving its potency from a
mixture of journalism, zeitgeist,
and altobiogranhy, coining out
of a nart of the human con-
suioisness which is alw.ivs try-
ing to understand itself and to
emerge into the light. It was
Schreiner's pubescent feminist
consriousness which lent the
novel its vigor. Lessing quotes
and interorets:
" 'A little bitterness, a little
longing when we are young,
a little futile striving for
work, a I it t 1 e ppssionate
striving for the exercise of
her powers-and then we g
with the drove. A woman
must march with her regi-
ment. In the end she must
be trodden down or go with
it.'"
Douglas would never have umes, one of short stories, one
reached the floor of the House of poems, published postumous-
of Representatives.I ly, the general public will havej
access to some of the finest
A FACT WITH current inter- writing in all contemporary,
est is that Ford sat on the American letters, and, accord-i
five-member Subcommittee on ing to accolades by black liter-
Central Intelligence Agency ati, the purest distillation of the
appropriations 'from 1955 to black experience in America,
1965. His intimacy with the CIA rural and urban, good and bad.
is only hint:d at by Vestal but Unlike many black writers
it is enough. who look back toward roots,
After President Eisenhower Dumas has transcended the
admitted that he had prior ! eclecticism that muddies many
knowledge of the use of the U-2 of his contemporaries' work.j
photographic spy plane over And yet nowhere does he con-I
Russia, world opinion was ' cede anything to join the "main-
({
I
AS THE
and his
STORIES progress
protagonist grows,
tures;
shifts,
along.
But
shift as Dumas' vision
and the reader rides
it is in the poetry of
WANTED:
Temporary Parents
Homes for Teenagers
1 day to 2 weeks
ANY ADULT{(S)
CONSI DERED.
CALL
Ozone House
769-6540
HILLEL
SUNDAY BRUNCH
Speaker: PROF. CARL COHEN
ON THE
DEFUNIS CASE
concerning affirmative
action in the Jewish
community.
BAGELS--LOX-CREAM CHEESE
SUNDAY, Sept. 22-11 a.m,
at H I LLEL-1429 Hill St.
COST 75c
II:
~.I 'L.
S
I
1
Michigan Bands
Presents
GEORGE
CARLIN
on
Saturday, Oct. 12
at
8:00 p.m.
?Have a flair for
artistic writinq?
If you are interest- I
ed in reviewing
poetry. and music
or writing feature1
stories a b o u t the
drama, dance, film
arts: Contact Arts
Rackham Gra
NEED A PAR'
The new Rackham Stu
Office, Rm. 2006 Rac
organized to serve your
The following positionsc
Computer programmer
Histolooy tech
Full charge bookkeeper
Dental assistant
See Connie Bell, director, or M
Tues. & Fri. 9-5; V
763-0
The 'University is a non-disc
employer.
STheNlel
j ear ie saver swan/ cel4 Oivarl eo-
Zes 1hV 1 cught j . . . Olive, a real revolu-
Zeus i have caught tionary, knew that the dis-
possessed must always work
* * * for, and win, their awn
rights, their own freedom;
yakub lift/i watch/all carry because it is in the fighting,
i leg beneath/i tongue/fall- the working, that they grow
ing blood and develop and learn their
i am butang/dog measure."
This is the only article in the
Ht rwill be impossible to bile tsb thwm s v
HenryDumasaway bookw where Lessing's senti-
budget anthologies of Negro ments about the women's move-
budet nthloges f "egr"!ment emerge clearly. Predict
poets. His language, his love ably, her conception is radical:
for his people, and his selfless women have been a dispossess-
sense of apocalypse belong be- ed class like others, and most
fore every American schoolchild struggle for their freedom.
TN HER sensitivities and per-
now and for years to come ceptions of the modern
world, Lessing bears a similar-
Marnie Heyn is :Daily editorial ity to Simone de Beauvoir. In
director and a Sunday afternoon The Mandarins Beauvoir doubts
the integrity of a "happiness"
poet. created through conformity to
societal standards of sanity.
Lessing also wonders if madness
does not have a value as ano-
d Students ther level of consciousness apart
from the ordinary one and as
T-TIM E JOB ? astatement against conform-
ity.
dent Gov't Employment The very format of A Small
Personal Voice, however, is like-
kham Bldg., has been Ily to discourage newcomers to
employment needs. Lessing's work. Her commen-
tary, although well-written, full
are available: of insights and occasionally in-
LPN's & RN's spiring, is not centered on one
Property management theme and is not nearly as
Cooks powerful or magnetic as her
General office fiction, which is structured on
more direct expressions of gut
Aarlene Gonik, assist. director sentiment.
wed. & Thurs. 9-1 But readers who are already
0109 familiar with Doris Lessing
riminatory affirmative action through her stories and novels
will rejoice at the book's re-
- lease. The articles are well-
arranged. They cover a broad
range of topics, and together,
serve both to illustrate Lessing's
extraordinary emotive and intel-
lectual personality and to il-
luminate her other works.
is Back!
With lunch at
Alice Henkin is a comparative
literature and social anthoropo-
ogy i a j o r in the Residential
College.
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