SIX THE MICHIGAN DAILY IN THE WORLD OF BOKS SUNDJAY, MARCH 29, 1936 .. . ... ..r Canby Reminisces And Reflects' In Study Of American College D: What Depression Has Done To American Youth... ALMA MATER: The Gothic Age of The American College by Hen- ry Seidel Canby. Farrar and Rineheart, $2.50. By THOMAS H. KLEENE Heralded as "as delightful a book" as The Age of Confidence, Henry Seidel Canby's Alma Mater presents a frank analysis of the Gothic Age of the American College based upon the author's career as both an under- graduate and a teacher. Alma Mater describes the collegiate experiences of those who are now in executive charge of the country and offers an exposi- tion of the laboratory in which their mores were developed. The Gothic Age stamped the busi- ness man of the twenties as definitely college-bred, just as much so as the citizen of the nineties had been stamped a small-town business man. So plainly were the college men and professors of the early 20th century "watermarked" that they could be easily distinguished from all others. Mr. Canby first deals with that par- ticular phenomenon of American civilization, the college town, "the egg in which nestled the college yolk." Recognizable in the description of the relationship between town and gown is a certain similarity to our own col- lege community (which similarity is also noticeable in other portions of the book). Sketches of two distinct "contribu- tions" of the college to the community --the college widow and faculty char- acters-serve to enhance this initial chapter.- The college of the Gothic Age was a three-ring circus divided into both formal and informal education and the professional schools. Informal education was the college experience, while formal education was what the faculty handed down in lectures and text-books. To the student the form- er seemed to be the more important part of his college curriculum and his real education because "every hard- lived life is an education, and no ed- ucation educates unless it is lived." The five schools of thought on teaching which Mr. Canby cites still characterize the modern University. The hard-boiled presented their sub- ject and, if the student wanted it, he came and got it, just as the horse is led to the watering place but not forced to drink. The dead hand of the indifferent school, those who were indifferent in their teaching, still rests on many a mind. The idealists were perhaps the most unhappy. They can be described as bull-headed and con- tinually fighting a losing battle for what they believed to be best in edu- cation. The author sees the factual school as the happiest and the most popular. The enthusiast school were "keen to show others that poetry or evolution or philology was life ab- stracted but intensified." Mr. Canby casts his lot with the idealist-philo- sophic school. Some scholars of the Gothic age are criticized, as are miserly millionaires, for seeking only scholarship while forgetting its benefits. Much of the scholarship although it was genuine erudition, was of little value because it was inapplicable and stunted. He who returns to tell the bored undergraduate that "things aren't what they used to be when I was on the campus" - the alumnus - is "one of the really engaging figures of so- cial history," despite the fact that he has not always been admirable in his self-appointed position of older brother of the college. This book presents an admirable and keenly analytical picture of just what the college of the Gothic Age did to and for the country and also what the country did to and for the college. Many of Mr. Canby's obser-, vations are just as true of the modern I college as of the Gothic Age college. This, unfortunately, is the case with many of the faults of the '90's which were indicated. Alma Mater is a brilliant book - as brilliant as it is simple, and it con- stitutes a really fine picture of that; period which was so important in the history of our colleges. THE LOST GENERATION. By Max- ine Davis. Macmillan. $3.00. By ELSIE PIERCE It is a far cry from the "flaming youth" of the post-war generation, with its clamorous insistence on free- dom and Life with a capital L, to the youth of today, three million of whom have been disastrously caught in the swirls and eddies of the depression, and left without jobs, without hopes, and without faith. Though a product of the Jazz Agee herself, Miss Davis set out in a sec- ond-hand flivver to tour the entire country, interviewing thousands of young people in all walks of life - filling station attendants, CCC camp boys, debutantes, college students, juvenile delinquents, five-and-ten- cent store clerks, always with the aim of finding out just how they are thinking and reacting to modern con- ditions. It was never intended as a soci- ological survey -in fact Miss Davis candidly admits that even the sight of such statistics makes her dizzy - rather it began as a journalism as- signment for McCall's Magazine, and ended as one of the most understand- ing portrayals of American youth which we have yet encountered. Too often when an adult begins to analyze the younger generation, he makes the mistake of judging, youth by the standards of the days; when he himself was young. There are some adults who believe that the inability of these young people to get jobs is caused by the fact that they have been pampered and spoiled by improved living con-' ditions, or that they are inherently BOOK-ENDS! Kenneth Patchen, whose first book of poems, BEFORE THE BRAVE, wasj recently reviewed on this page, has just been awarded a Guggenheim fel-j lowship. He will leave for New Mex- ico next month to work on a new book.c lazy and irresponsible. At the other pole there is the extreme American optimist who thinks that everything will turn out for the best, and that as soon as business improves, all the young people who have been marking time will be given excellent jobs - just because it always has turned out all right before. It is, therefore, a noteworthy ac-} complishment to analyze the youth of today, as Miss Davis has, from an unprejudiced viewpoint, which has enabled her to present a much more truthful picture of the situation. Her final analysis of the effects which the depression has had on the youth of today is partly encouraging, but her optimism carries with it a note of warning which America would do well to heed before it is too late. To those who can find no good qual- ities in the youngpeople, giving them up as lost souls, Miss Davis has this to say. "They are terribly concerned 'with fundamentals. These funda- mentals any one of them can list without hesitation. An education. A job. Marriage. And a little fun .. This generation has important as- sets. It is making significant con- tributions to our life. First and fore- most is courage. Courage to do the work at hand no matter how trifling. These boys and girls see no labor at all as belittling regardless of their class and standards. They have no false pride, no self-importance. Their sportsmanship is gallant. They neither whine nor whimper. They have not conceded defeat, and they will not ad- mit cynicism into their minds as they regard established institutions. With them the basic social unit, the home is safer than it has been in a long time. When they are able to marry, they value it; marriage is not as light a matter as it was in the easy-money era. Because they have a deep need for emotional security, they are founding their families on enduring rock. "Add to this the strength, the ebullience, the high spirit of the youth they still have, untarnished on the whole by any presence of lasting de- feat, and the fact that they have not lost their will to work or their desire for progress." And yet in talking with thousands of young people Miss Davis senses a foreboding of things to come which may bring serious upheavals. These young people have had all their ideals and faiths shattered in the past few years. As Miss Davis says, "Our young men grew up in the assurance that Engraved $ 65 100 Cards & Plates 6 THE ATHENS PRESS Printers City's Lowest Prices on Printing. 308 North Main Street - Dial 2-1013 education and hard work were the Open Sesame to respectable jobs se- cured by reliability and perseverance, and to honored places in the eyes of their fellow-men. In the past few years many of them have found that this is not true. The older genera- tion has betrayed and deceived them. Bleakly our youth has been mark- ing time while the clock ticks away its bright years, the good years of plowing and sowing and sweating. They are runners, delayed at the gun. They have lost so much time at the start that only the exceptional can challenge the finish.." 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