Page Two
THE MICHIGAN DAILY
Saturday, ;January 26, 1974
F_
Satuday 2.Jnuay 26197
W. Somerset Maugham:
Anti-Solzhenitsyn drive mounts
100 .-years of
Editor's note: Former Reuters Editor Ranald Mac-
Lurktin writes about W. Somerset Maugham on the
100th anniversary of the renowned author's birth.
By RANALD MACLURKIN
LONDON (Reuter) - Was he a literary genius
or only a second-rate popular writer? Will his
works survive or soon be forgotten?
One hundred years. after his birth on January
25, 1873 the critics have still failed to make up
their minds about the English author W. Somerset
Maugham, one of the most fascinating characters
of 20th century literature.
THE ARGUMENTS about him are raging more
fiercely than ever during his centenary year. Dur-
ing his long lifetime he gained the admiration of
fellow-writers such as George Orwell, Theodore
Dreiser, Cyril Connolly and many others. But, at
the other extreme, the noted American critic Ed-
mund Wilson would write of him: ". . . I have
never been able to convince myself that he was
anything but second-rate . .. a half-trashly novel-
ist who writes badly but is patronised by half-ser-
ious readers, who do not care much about writing."
A trouble about assessing William Somerset
Maugham - "Willie" to those who knew him per-
sonally - was that he lived too long to allow the
present generation to take a really objective look
at him.
He died only about nine years ago aged over 90,
leaving behind him an unwholesome bog of per-
sonal prejudices, petty spites, grudges and feuds
involving those whose intense dislike of him as a
person was too overpowering to allow them to de-
fend him as a lasting figure of literature.
CYNIC, AGNOSTIC and despiser of humanity in
controversy
the mass he still insisted on clinging to life-even
to the verge of senility - by such devices as trav-
elling to a Swiss clinic for regular injections of goat
hormones.
From what has been revealed about him since
his death there is little doubt that, behind a certain
contrived charm of manner, he was a curious,
twisted and bitter character. He was small in sta-
ture, he had a bad stammer, his childhood had
been unhappy, he had been bullied at school. He
was a homosexual, ashamed of it and terrified
that the knowledge of it would ever leak out to his
enormous reading public.
Yet, as he spent his days in luxury in his French
Riviera villa, it was this compound that helped to
make him the writer he was. The one thing that
everyone is agreed upon - and more so than
ever in this centenary year - is that Maugham
was a master craftsman in story telling and the
use of words.
WHEN I WAS Editor of Reuters I used to encour-
age young journalists to read Maugham's short
stories and, in particular, his writer's notebook,
the selection of his jottings on men, women and
circumstances he had made between the years of
1892 and 1944. Many at first looked askance at be-
ing advised to read the work of a fiction-writer to
befit them for international news agency journal-
ism, a task which demands flawless accuracy, ob-
jectivity and impartiality in the reporting of world
events.
Nevertheless, I think most soon came ta realize
what I was driving at. Maugham's attitudes to
human cause and effect and the way you reported
See CRITICS, Page 8
MOSCOW (lP) - Children licking ice-
cream cones, housewives burdened with
their shopping and old-age pensioners out
for a stroll were all drawn yesterday to
the latest attraction on Gorky Street-
a huge poster complete with skull and
crossbones, attacking Russian author
Alexander Solzhenitsyn.
The kids gazed and laughed at the 6%-
by-9 foot drawing, prominently displayed
on one of the city's main streets, clearly
oblivious of its meaning. The old men
stared at it silently. Some shook their
heads.
THE HOUSEWIVES, grateful for an
excuse to put down their loads, chatted
in groups of three and four. They didn't
appear overly concerned.
Erected Thursday just a couple of
blocks from the home of Solzhenitsyn's
wife, the poster depicts an orchestra of
sweaty, fat capitalists playing "anti-So-
viet" instruments and holding high a
banner emblazoned with a book called
"Works of Solzhenitsyn" with a yellow
skull and crossbones on the black cover.
The Solzhenitsyn poster was the latest
move in the government's offensive to
discredit the 1970 Nobel laureate and his
book on Stalinist police terror, "Gulag
Archipelago."
THE POSTER was installed in a glass
case next to other less captivating plac-
ards extolling the virtues of the Soviet
working man.
Young men passing by appeared more
interested in news of Thursday night's
hockey game in a display of the na-
tional sports paper in another case.
The usual method of attacking internal
"anti-Soviet slanderers" continued una-
bated in the press with letters from "in-
dignant" Soviet citizens assailing Solz-
henitsyn.
PRAVDA PUBLISHED pne from the
poet Rasul Gamzatov who declared that
"if; Solzhenitsyn does not like our sys-
tem, our life, our country, we really can-
not help him. Let him go to where he
would be comfortable."
A student from Minsk - ostensibly in-
spired to complain about Solzhenitsyn
after reading a Pravda attack last week
-asserted the writer "has crossed the
line beyond which he lost the right to
consider himself a Soviet citizen."
Since "Archipelago" will not be pub-
lished here, the student had only Prav-
da's word that Solzhenitsyn has "slan-
dered the Soviet state and people," and
that he is an "internal emigrant" and
"traitor."
IN A MOSCOW regional party paper,
Vechernaya Moska Evening Moscow,
factory worker N. Afanasyev wrote that
Solzhenitsyn "lies and slanders. I do
not understand how this servant of im-
perialism can look into the eyes of hon-
est people whom he has betrayed and
slandered.
Historic new world
map may be phony
'Deal on Nixon
papers illegally
advance dated
Re: Dylan Concert Tickets
We have received information from some ticket holders that
indicates dissatisfaction with the seats they have received to the
Dylan concert. We are very upset at these reports since we took
great care to ensure proper handling of the orders at our end.
Therefore, we would like our patrons to be aware of the extent
of our envolvement in the ticket handling process.
Our contract with Dylan's management required that a,
bonded ticket agency fill the ticket orders and the Civic Center
Ticket Service in Detroit was their choice. Our only envolvement
in the process was the collection of ticket orders. Great care was
taken to ensure that the orders we received at H ill Auditorium
were bound and numbered in the exact order received. These
orders were delivered personally by UAC-Daystar to the author-
izd representative of the bonded ticket agency in Detroit. By our
contract with Dylan's management, our envolvement in the ticket
process ended there. Civic Center Ticket Service filled the orders
and are handling mailing and refunds.
UAC-DAYSTAR
NEW HAVEN, Conn. (MP)-The
Vinland map, thought to be the
earliest representation of the
new world in existence, may be
a forgery, the Yale University
Library said yesterday.
An analysis of the map, given
to Yale by an anonymous donor
in 1965, indicates the ink was
made in the 20th century, five
centuries after the map allegedly
was drawn.
NONETHELESS, library Di-
rector Rutherford Rogers said the
discovery "doesn't alter what
seems to be historical fact"-that
the Norse were on the North
American mainland long before
Columbus.
The world map, 11-by-16 inches,
was drawn in brownish yellow
ink on vellum. In the upper left-
hand corner is an accurate out-
line of Greenland and to its left
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a large island labeled "Vinland."
Scholars thought a Swiss monk
might have drawn it about
1440, 52 years before Columbus
sailed from Spain.
When the map was first made
public, the Italian Historical So-
ciety of America said Yale
should have investigated more
thoroughly.
USING AN electron miscro-
scope, researchers concluded
thal elements of the map ink
"were characteristic of a pre-
cipitated product and indistin-
guishable from commercial pig-
ment as first made during the
1920s."
"There's always the possibility
that someone will challenge these
findings and we don't mind," li-
brary director Rogers said in an
interview. "The evidence, how-
ever, seems to be pretty strong
that this ink is 20th century."
SACRAMENTO, Calif. (P)-The
deed for President Nixon's dona-
tion of his vice presidential
papers to the National .Archives
was dated a year before it was
actually signed, long after his
eligibility had expired for tax
.~deductions he claimed, the Cali-
fornia secretary of state's office
said yesterday.
Deputy Secretary of State
Thomas Quinn said principals in-
volved in the case have told him
the deed dated March 27, 1969,.
actually was signed and notar-
ized more than one year later,
on April 10, 1970.
A LAW that went into effect
July 25, 1969 would have severely
limited the amount Nixon could
have claimed for a tax deduction
from donation of the papers.
Quinn said the information
came from Frank DeMarco, Nix-
on's California tax lawyer, from
DeMarco's secretary and from
others.
Also, Quinn said his office has
proof that the deed was typed
on a typewriter that was not
purchased by DeMarco's law of-
fice until 'July 1969, four months
after the data on the documents.
THE OFFICE of Secretary of
State Edmund Brown, a Demo-
cratic candidate for governor,
has been investigating the case
because it oversees notary public
activities in California.
_ "The deed could not have been
prepared before July of 1969,"
Quinn said in an interview. He
said the April 21, 1969 dale
notarized by DeMarco was "ob-
-viously false."
DeMarco was not immediately
available for comment. But he
is tentatively scheduled to make
a formal deposition next Wed-
nesday in Los Angeles, Quinn
I said.
VEEP GERALD FORD ad-
dresses the Columbus, Ohio,
Touchdown Club last night. He
took the opportunity to again
decry President Nixon's inno-
cence in the Watergate scandal
and subsequent coverup, de-
claring that leading Republi-
cans now have evidence con-
tradicting the sworn testimony
of John Dean who implicated
Nixon in the coverup.
Tml nAE!IFP I
was executed in April 1969, be-
fore the expiration of the tax
law that permitted Nixon to
claim income tax deductions. But
DeMarco said he had no copies
of the original deed, Quinn said.
The deputy secretary of Rtate
added that neither' theoriginal
nor any copies had been located.
The White House has disclosed
the President claimed deductions
of $482,000 over the past four
years for the gift of the papers.
Thatenabled him to pay less than
$6,000 in federal income taxes the
past three years, on total income
of more than $800,000.
In releasing Nixon's tax data,
the White House did notacite the
deed to justify the deducation
but noted that he papers had
actually been turned over in time
to qualify Nixon for the deduc-
tions. However, that point has
been disputed by some experts
and the matter is under investi-
gation by the Internal Revenue
Service and Congress' Joint Com-
mittee on Internal Revenue Tax-
ation.
IN A RELATED development
yesterday, the Justice Depart-
ment told a federal court in
Washington that executive privi-
lege continues to shield certain
White House documents in the
milk case despite a presidential
white paper making some of the
details public.
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