Page 2-Sunday, February 19, 1978-The Michigan Daily

The Michigan Daily-Sunday, Fe

RAMRLINGS/barb zahs

I'M NOT GOING to die of malnutri-
tion. Please explain that to my
mother.
She looked worried the last time I was
home when I refused her offer of a
steak and matter-of-factly mentioned
that I don't eat meat anymore.
"But, look at you," she protested.
"You look emaciated. Have something
to eat." Whereupon she proceeded to
try to tempt me with a detailed inven-
tory of all the food in the house. I finally
accepted her offer of a salad, but wasn't
prepared for what she put in front of
me. She had taken the largest mixing
bowl we had, tossed in an entire head of
lettuce, several tomatoes, and God
knows what else, and would no doubt
have piled in more if I hadn't begged
her to stop. "Eat something. You're
going to make yourself sick," she in-
sisted.
Spurning meat wasn't a conscious,
moral decision for me. Rather, it was
necessitated by a diet that I went on
following my annual New Year's
resolution to lose weight. But now that
the pounds have come off, the desire to
eat meat still hasn't returned.
At first, I only intended to give up red

meat, and then only for three weeks.
Gradually, however, I weaned myself
off fish and poultry as well.
I was as surprised as my mother to
find myself a vegetarian. I'd always
thought vegetarians were weird. I pic-
tured them living in co-ops, discussing
the miracle powers of wheat germ and
the wonders of alfalfa sprouts, reading-
Brautigan, and spending spare evenings
spreading the "word" about the evils of
carnivorism.
STRANGE THOUGHTS ran through
my mind when I would see an ad-
vertisement in the paper seeking vege-
tarian roommates. But I tried to be
open-minded. What vegetarians did at
the dinner table was their business. But
as for me, I wouldn't want to live with
one.
But now that I've joined their ranks
- even if only temporarily - I've
changed my tune. I've found out what
it's like to be on the other side of the
fence. People - my own mother in-
cluded - view my dietary habits with
disdain.
"But what do you eat?" they ask,
shaking their heads. (Pencils. They
have a nice texture. Newspaper. It's got

lots of fiber. Nails. They've got iron.)
What do they think I eat? There are still
plenty of options even though meat is
taboo.
I always had strange visions of
scrawny-looking vegetarians going
through life surviving on a steady diet
of V-8 juice and salads. But dishes with
fruits, grains, nuts and dairy products
are all permitted. The only problem for
me is keeping my meals low in calories.
So I've subsisted for the better part of
two months on yogurt, salads, skim
milk and Special K. It's quite a change
of pace for a former junk food junkie,
but I hardly consider myself deprived.
If you listen carefully enough, you can
even hear the Special K snap and
crackle. Alas, no pop, but we vegetar-
ians have to make some sacrifices.
SOME OF MY non-meat concoctions
have been less than palatable,
however. One time, for reasons
unknown, I combined diet gelatin with
plain yogurt to come up with a fluffy,
pinkish-orange substance which tasted
even worse than it looked. Whatever
possessed me to attempt such a
creation I'll never know. I don't like
gelatin to begin with. Call it weird, but I

guess I just have a thing about eating
food that's still moving.
I've gradually become an expert on
nutritional labels and have learned to
make the most of my meatless diet.
And I recite calorie counts in my sleep.
But unlike some vegetarians, I don't
chastise people because they eat meat
or accuse them of being murderers. I
must confess, however, that I have got-
ten into the annoying habit of informing
friends of the calorie counts of each
morsel of food I see them eating - re-
gardless'of whether my expertise has
been called upon. (Do you realize that
little candy bar has 350 calories and is
utterly without redeeming nutritional
or social value?)
My roommates have had to put up
with this for two months. But they're
still waiting to see how long I go
through my vegetarian phase. They
never expected me to stick to my diet
for very long, much less give up meat
entirely.
I think my mother, bless her heart, is
hoping for the sake of my health that
this is just a passing phase, too. But
even though I don't eat meat anymore,
I'm feeling fine. Honest, M'om.

BOOKS
'Ho ly Secrets' "wasted by
meaningless sex scenes


By Eric Zorn
HOLY SECRETS
By Richard Rhodes
Doubleday, $8.95
HOLY SECRETS wouldn't be such
an excruciating novel if it weren't
for the saturnine hunks of "innovative"
prose.
Smoke. Laugh. Parts of the book read
like this. Grin.
But turn the page and a section
spreads out in exaggerated style like
this: "I say with the heavy winter sky
casting a grey and cruel funeral shroud
over the stark and bare midwestern
earth, mother to my innermost soul, my
thoughts cascading through the tran-
sient modal tonalities of the darkest
and warmest secrets of the discrete uni-
verse."
Wince. Shrug.
Richard Rhodes, a Kansas City
author, ruined a potentially thoughtful
and provocative fictional investigation
into divorce and the often bizarre, sud-
den, and painful twists-in male-female
relationships with an unfortunate
predilection for audience grabbing
gimmicks and tenuously connected
subplots. Evidently, Rhodes labors un-
der the premise that such excesses are
obligatory in longer contemporary
works of fiction. For the sake of the art,
let's hope he's seriously off base.
Holy Secrets is advertised in a late is-
sue of The New York Times Book Re-
view as the story of a man who "knows
every curve and recess of women's
Eric Zorn, a Residential College
sophomore, contributes regularly
to the Sunday Magazine .1

bodies - apparently an effort by pro-
moters to entice the carnally curious in-
to buying a book stuffed with unusual
and kinky descriptions of a man profes-
sionally probing genitalia. The prurient
will be disappointed; likewise the
literate.
It strikes me that Rhodes could have
used his main character's medical oc-
cupation to shed light on some perhaps
extraordinary attitudes about women.
Each attempt to introduce the gyneco
logical angle is a plunking cheap-shot
failure, and the reader realizes he is
holding just another bound sheaf of
paper rudely attempting sen-
sationalism.
Dr. Tom Haldane, the devoted healer,
patronizes the wife of thirteen years, ig-
nores her, and finally stifles her sense
of individuality and adventure to such a
degree that she desperately reaches out
to the world of hallucinogenic drugs and
group sex. The doctor's reaction to his
trapped and hysterical wife shows any-
thing but compassion, and his solution
to the mess is to leave her abruptly. The
good doctor whips himself into a
jealous, righteous froth at Elizabeth's
abrogation of the marriage vows, and
heads for the wide open spaces.
THE DETAILING of the emotional
wreckage of divorce and subse-
quent searches for love and fulfillment
are the saving graces of this otherwise
hokey novel. What makes this develop-
ment and the ideas presented interest-
ing are their general applications: Hal-
dane's most provoking perceptions are
those which speak to others who have
gone through similar crises and
emerged less scathed than he. The par-
ticular and ironic fact that Haldane
can't understand women although he
spends the better part of each day

probing them intimately makes little
difference to the thematic development
of the story. It is not the doctor who has
anything interesting to say, it is any
person behind the surgeon's mask.
As a matter of fact, there are times in
the writing when Rhodes seemingly
forgot that Haldane was a doctor at all.
The text will be proceeding nicely, and
then all of a sudden the reader is trans-
ported to the examining room and given
a few details of an aging woman's cer-
vical disorders. Oh yes, then on with the
plot.
Similarly, Rhodes feels that he can't
possibly hold our attention without a
few lurid and prolix descriptions of the
couplings of his characters. The
flowery and unnecessary details
provided when the doctor "tumesces
and detumnesces" between the sheets
with various willing partners are sim-
ply gratuitous scenes in which we learn
nothing new about the principals except
which ways they like to be stroked. Oc-
casionally sex will add power and em-
phasis to a work of fiction, shocking and
prodding the reader to greater insights
into the characters and the thematic
message. Rhodes, however, leaves the
distinct impression that he's simply
trying to sell an "adult" book. Woe to
the serious artist who prostitutes him-
self and in the process effects destruc-
tion on all that he could have accom-
plished.
Less disturbing, but equally poin-
tless, is the excess baggage character
of the doctor's good-ol'-boy buddy,
Packy, a mobile home millionaire. The
two friends run off into the fields hun-
ting pheasant together somewhere in
the mid-chapters. Hunting birds? We
set the book aside with a vague
headache: Is Rhodes trying to draw
some comparison between hunting

sunday mgaIIzine

fIISJO E!PUZZLE

BY
STEPHEN J.
POZSGAI

game and t
about wome
just wanted
the text in
western w
merely a co
no place in t
W HAT
crets
as the follow:
"I love y
shoulder.
"I love yo
beyond the
sky ..."M
world." And
"I don't t
much I
said . .. "Tt
"I'll help:
"After th
him now w
marry you.
my life with
Violin mi
music! Ov
and dies fro
gimmicks v
way of his ir
frustrations
feel in mar
and their bo
tempts to sa
wreckage c
cud for the r

A. Team that has won more - - - _ - - - - - -
NBA championships 1 65 92 98 117 135 16 24 35 76 86 106
than any other_
(2 words) 147
B. Helps; ameliorates - -Z7 -1- - -
21 33 63 69 79 177 183 195
C. Easy basketball shots_- -
(Comp) 9 75 37 169 139 190
D. Position at side of basket
outside free throw line- - - - - - -
(2words) 23 96 11 202 134 185 19
E. NBA MVP in 1956 and 19591 -1- - - 9-7
(Full name) 116 68 123 81 101 151 158 189 172
F.First NBA player to-
win 5 MVP awards 18 143 57 109 46 199 204'
G. Acceptor comply tacitly - - - - -
or passively 2 48 142 203 91 103 110 128 154
H.Former Detroit star who
played both pro 47 49 54 60 122 77 7 105 112 136 157 100
basketball and baseball
(Full name) -- -
176 184 206
I. Bill passed by Congress in
1941lto give war aid to--- - -
Great8ritain (3 words) 27 31 50 155 71 82 93 104 121 150 165 125
J. N.Y. Knick known as-
"ThePearl" (Fullnome) 5 15 66 118 131 163 170 175 181 193
K. School for Talmudicstudy-
t'g a y t a a s 44,t 6,j, 34 4 4 SO*I 49

L. Inclined toward indolence
M. Extending beyond the reach
of record of tradition
N. Nicknamed "Clyde," he led
Southern Illinois to the
NIT Championship in 1967
0. Slightly porous opaque clay
fired at low heat
P. Branch of a main stem
Q. "-- Tune" TV show
,2 words)
R. Screw threaders
S. Third highest scorer in
NBA history
T. Any of various disorders marked
by disturbed electrical rhythms
of the central nervous system
U. Outgrowth; consequence
V. Those whoe live north
of the "bg citym
W. Inventor of the game
of basketball
0.' .mss r '*

10 58 45 124 200 113 191
38 74 115 141 167 80 97 133 159 180
29 83 8 120 179 52 102
1320 53 61 126 108 88 99 130 140 186
28 67 188 94 129 87 196 160
14 32 168 41 72 137 178 152
6 84 132 174 55 145 39
12 36 25 43138 78161 4
17 95 44 187 127 192 205 173
40 56 59 73 164 89 107 111 148 156 166 197
70 34 51 85 62 90 146 194 207

Copyright 1978
INSTRUCTIONS
Guess the words defined at the
leftrand write them in over
their numbered dashes. Then,
transfer each letter to the cor-
responding numbered square
in the grid above. The letters
printed in the upper-right-hand
corners of the squares indi-
cate from what clue-word a
particular square's letter
comes from. The grid, when
filled in, should read as a
quotation from a published
work. The darkened squares
are the spaces between words.
Some words may carry over
to the next line. Meanwhile,
the first letter of each guessed
word at the left, reading down,
forms an acrostic, giving the
author's name and the title of
the work from which the quote
is extracted. As words and
phrases begin to form in the
grid, you can work back and"
forth from clues to grid until
the puzzle is complete.
Answer to Last Week's Puzzle
"Because fraud is the
foundation of the automo-
bile industry in North
America, consumers are
victimized indiscriminately.
Judges, too, frequently find
themselves the target o f in-
competent mechanics or
.manufacturing defects.
Phil Edmonston
Lemon-Aid

(Continued from Page 3)
Nobel Prize-winning physicist, Andrei
Sakharov, who guessed what was hap-
pening and made official protests to the
government.
Bukovsky bargained long and hard,
finally striking a compromise with the
government: his counsel would not be
selected from the KGB-approved list of
attorneys, but would still be chosen by
the court.
"I knew him - Vladimir Shveisky.
He had defended (Andrei) Amalrik. But
it was just a formal thing: he cannot
defend you actually because no one
would listen to him." "Yes," he con-
cludes with a sigh, "it was a matter of
principle."
Principle prompted him to publish a
satirical journal in his younger days at
Moscow High School No. 59, and prin-
ciple moved him to help organize a
group at Moscow University called
"Phoenix," which met to discuss issues
not broached in government
publications. He was expelled from the
university, but he continued his
political activities and was sought by
the KGB for arranging an illegal art

exhibition, and for possessing
photocopies of The New -Class, an anti-
Communist book by Yugoslav author
Milovan Djilas.
Not even present at his trial, he was
declared insane and sent to an asylum,
a common fate for p'olitical prisoners,
according to Bukovsky.
His experiences in the asylum -
which he has described as "fifteen
months of hell" - have led to his in-
terest in the physiology of the brain,
which he hopes to study in the West.
He will pick up on his education
where he left off 16 years ago: Bukov-
sky at 34 will attend Cambridge
University as a freshman. "They'll
regard me as a mature student," he
grins.
Though he entertains plans of retur-
ning to the Soviet Union somehow,
Bukovsky says he thinks the exile from
his homeland will be permanent. "They
didn't strip off my citizenship until now,
but they can do it in just one day,ac-
tually," he shrugs.
The desire to lead a less politicized
life a more normal life, one might

bukovsk~y

say - is evident as Bukovsky discusses
his future. "I would like to do resear-
ch," he says. "This matter of traveling
around is very exhausting, and I'm not
sure it secures us real support,
especially in America."
SINCE HIS release more than a
year ago, Bukovsky has spoken
across Europe and the U.S., try-
ing to gain Western support for Soviet
dissidents. But he finds the response
disheartening, because he believes that
his audiences fail to take his words to
heart. "They hear but don't listen," he,
complains.
Yet this man of principle and painful
experience is not one so enmeshed in
doctrine and theory, government and
laws, that the practical details of
everyday living are rendered
meaningless.
How did he feel when he was sent out
into the free world? Surely, the freedom
to speak and the freedom to do as he
pleased impressed him the most. Well,
not exactly.
"The first thing that struck me were

the cars on
very polite
American c
England an
them and th-
for them,
"Another
Xerox mac
things in th
this sort of
they would
every one
copy," he cr
Most stri
he doesn't t
do most c
concerned
sky takes
himself - a
ence.
He shrui
unique amo
for human
What keeps
Bukovsk:
a grin crac
"Maybe it
by mypeop

22 ,42 144 162 201 119 30 153

I