M' 3r1iman M tj
Sixty-Seventh Year
EDITED AND MANAGED BY STUDENTS OF THE UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN
UNDER AUTHORITY OF BOARD IN CONTROL OF STUDENT PUBLICATIONS
STUDENT PUBLICATIONS BLDG. * ANN ARBOR, MICH. * Phone NO 2-3241
Representative Contemporary Books -1957
gam Opinions Are Free
Truth Will Prevail"
Editorials printed in The Michigan Daily express the individual opinions of staff writers or
the editors. This must be noted in all reprints.
DAY, MAY 12, 1957
NIGHT EDITOR: MICHAEL KRAFT
Rlates Desperate
Flight from Terror
THE BRIDGE AT ANDAU, By James A. Michener. NewYorki Random
House, 1957.
By ROBERT F. HAUGH
THE ATTENTION the world gave to the Hungarian revolt of October
and November, 1956, was in many ways astonishing. Why should
there be news in more Russian terror, more sadistic .brutality, more
graphic accounts of refined tortures by secret police? The answer is
that world attention was not electrified by such mass brutalities,
appalling as they were. The quality of the Hungarian affair that struck
fire was the image of Hungarian youths throwing rocks at Russian
tanks, magnified a hundred, a thousand times by other young Hun-
garians, armed with little more than unquenchable spirit.
ONE FEELS, upon reading James A. Michener's The Bridge at
L:
'I
Robert Goheen
One of a Dying Species
ROBERT GOHEEN will never declare him-
self high priest in Princeton's temple of
learning. In fact, he is firmly opposed to the
suggestion that such places continue to exist.
Speaking at Friday's Honors Convocation,
the president-elect showed no inclination to
isolate his students in "the world of learning"
from the inhabitants of "the world of action."
The continued well-being of our complicated,
technological society is, he insists, dependent
on "our universities being effective centers of
teaching and research."
But the picture of American education a cen-
tury from now projected by the young Greek
Scholar is a chilling one. Although he was
careful to avoid overt optimism, there might
well have been a more threatening tone to his
address.
NEARLY two-thirds of the college students
technological or strictly professional courses."
Only one-third are enrolled in arts and hu-
manities programs.
Prof. Goheen maintains that this growth
into the study of vocational and mechanical
problems has not radically "debased our aca-
demic coinage."
But the continuing race for technological tal-
ent, spinning mud in the face of relatively
feeble surges in the humanities, forecasts a
dark future.
THE WOODROW WILSON Fellowship pro-
gram and the Ford Foundation's $25,000,000
grant to it, while magpificent beginnings, are
virtually the only large-scale attempts to de-
velop either teachers or scholars. Until like
efforts are doubled and re-doubled, their effec-
tiveness against the incredible flood of indus-
trial offers is slight. The nation is only begin-
ning to realize the importance of higher edu-
cation; but it has not begun to look beyond
the immediate, or past the next rocket plat-
form.
The Robert Goheens of America, educated
in the traditions of the past in order that they
might transcend the present and guide the
future, may well be a dying species. If so, we
may say the same of our way of life.
--ALLAN STILLWAGON
-Daily-John Hirtzel
Panhellenic Contact Rules
NOT SO FORMIDABLE:I
Faulkner Power Shows
Slow, Steady Decline
THE TOWN, by William Faulkner. New York: Random House, 1957.
By JAMES E. IRBY
NOW THAT WITH the passage of time it is possible to gain a cer-
tain perspective on the voluminous production of William Faulkner,
it seems apparent that in the past twenty years his work has shown a
gradual but steady decline in the powers which make The Sound and
the Fury, As I Lay Dying, Light in August and Absalom, Absalom! such
undeniably formidable novels.
At times, this decline-marked by increasingly'needless and ir-
relevant digressions, greater paroxyms of rhetoric, more schematic
treatment of character and episode and ceftain unfortunate experi-
ments in theme and structure-has been partially hidden by occasional
pasages of fine writing (in Go Down, Moses and Intruder in the Dust,
for example).
Nevertheless, the fading of narrative vigor has become more and
LAST THURSDAY, Panhellenic Board of
Delegates considered a proposed set of con-
tact rules to comply with next year's spring
rushing program.
In the next few days, affiliated women will
be hashing over the merits of a proposal that
provides: From "September registration until
pledging, March 2, no sorority member shall
enter 'any dormitory or independent League
House and no independent woman shall enter
affiliated housing units except during ap-
proved rushing parties ..."
Rationale behind restricting normal and
necessary social relationships of women on
campus and virtually erecting a barrier be-
tween affiliates and independents is to pre-
vent the thing at which Panhel points a tremb-
ling finger and labels "dirty rush."
WHILE this recommendation is still open to
suggestion and revision, it might be a good
idea to weigh and examine very carefully con-
sequences that could follow its adoption.
There can be little doubt that some degree
of "dirty rushing" or rivalry among sororities
for prospective pledges, will ensue with a se-
mester between the beginning of the school
year and the beginning of rushing. This is not
the crux of the situation. It lies rather in
determining whether or not holding so tight
a rein on sorority women will help or hurt in.-
the long run.
Undoubtedly it will do more harm than good.
Its negative aspects can be seen in several
areas:
1) Contact rule effectiveness. Would pro-
hibiting sorority women from entering dorms
and forbidding independents to set foot in
sororities really snuff out dirty rush? It seems
rather naive to think that affiliates intent
on 'dirty rush" couldn't just as easily contri-
bute to the "undermining of the sorority sys-
tem" from places other than their residences.
Panhel would also have to contend with viola-
tors who wouldn't have thought of "dirty rush"
until such a big issue was made of it, or oth-
ers who broke rules just because they hated
imposition -of so, rigid a constraint.
2) Affiliate-independent friendships. These
would be the hardest hit under the restriction.
Understandably most sorority women, espe-
cially newly initiated freshmen have many
,good friends living in dorms, not to mention
sisters or cousins. Is it fair to break these ties?
Will telling a sorority member, new or old,
"Sorry, you can't go back to the dorm to see
your friend, even if she isn't planning to rush,"
make her feel any closer to the sorority sys-
tem?
WHAT ABOUT those ineligible to rush - se-
niord or coeds living in Martha Cook? It
would certainly serve no logical end to ban
them from visiting friends in sororities and
vice-versa. Aside from purely social visits,
the placing of an iron curtain around the
Greek system would deal a death blow to any
sort of dorm and/or sorority exam seminaring.
3) Outsider's view of the rushing and sorority
system. Semester long contact rules could very
well do the opposite of what Panhel seeks -
alienate the sorority system from prospective
rushees. It is not hard to picture a coed shying
away from the whole idea of rushing when she
knows that such rules would bind her as a
° sorority member. And, anyone in or out of
the system would be justified in wondering
what kind of a University puts college women
in the juvenile position of being told whom
they can talk toand where.
4) Place of sororities on campus. Rushing
and sororities have been considered a part of
University life but their importance has not,
so far been exaggerated. There is scarcely
the "if - you're - not - in-a-sorority, you're-no-
body" feeling that pervades so many other
campuses. It would seem to our advantage to
keep it that way. By putting unnecessary strain
on independent-affiliate relationships, too
much attention may soon focus on sororities.
The consequent rage to rush and pressure to
pledge may also be responsible for heightening
disappointment that must follow when sorori-
ties can bid a mere one-third of the rushees.
PANHEL RUSHING counselors are meeting
Thursday to discuss contact rule proposals.
If they are really concerned with both the in-
dividual's happiness and strength of the soror-
ity system, they would be wise to:
Set up a no-contact-rule program for the
first semester. Rules could be put into effect
at the beginning of the spring semester and
function like those of previous fall rush years.
Appoint a study committee to decide whether
"dirty rush" threatens the system enough to
take ;steps against it; if so, to define "dirty
rush"; and finally to provide for a body to
investigate and deal with complaints.
The issue must soon be settled. We trust
that those in whose hands the decision lies
will have the foresight to realize the conse-
quences of their action.
-ROSE PERLBERG
more perceptible until finally, wit]
years ago, even the most devoted
admirers of Faulkner were forced
to admit that, despite its sincere
preoccupation with man's struggle
against war, this tedious and ob-
scure neo-Christian allegory was
essential a failure.
Some critics sUggested that such
a failure might be the result of
Faulkner's having abandoned his
natural habitat, Yoknapatawpha,
that mythical fragment of the
South from whose tradition-rid-
den social order the author has
been able to draw artistic suste-.
nance, somewhat as Dostoevsky
did from the decaying feudalism
of pre-Revolutionary Russia.
* * *
THEREFORE, it is particularly
interesting ,to examine Faulkner's
most recent novel, The Town, in
which he returns to Jefferson and
enlarges still more on the seem-
ingly endless saga of Yoknapa-
tawpha. The author now an-
nounces that The Hamlet, first
published in 1940, is to be con-
sidered as the first volume of a
trilogy on the Snopes family and
that The Town is the second nov-
el in this series.
Although The Hamlet is not
one of Faulkner's "great" novels,
it is certainly a very good one
which contains some of his most
vivid characterizations and most
extravagant humor. It would be
reassuring to have in The Town a
comparable book, at least in quali-
ty, iut unfortunately this new
novel will probably go down as a
further example of the author's
decline, notable more as another
link in the Yoknapatawpha story
than as a well-achieved work of
fiction.
Like The Hamlet, The Town is
made up of a loose series of epi-
sodes whose unity is primarily one
of theme: in this case, the mov-
ing of Flem Snopes from French-
man's Bend to Jefferson and his
rise to power in "the town". Unlike
The Hamlet, in The Town these
episodes are narrated by three
"witnesses": V. K. Ratliff, Charles
Mallison and Gavin Stevens, all
well known to veteran Faulkner
readers. In the first part of the
novel, there is a great deal of re-
capitulation of events already pre-
sented in The Hamlet, particularl-
ly those concerning the marriage
of Flem Snopes and Eula Varner,
as well as happenings related in
Sartoris and other works.
AND JUST as The Hamlet in-
cor p o r a t e s several stories of
Faulkner which had previously
been published separately, The
Town contains in altered form
two such stories in which Flem is
prevented from carrying out some
minor skulduggery by two Ne-
groes ("Centaur in Brass)" and an
old widow ("Mule in the Yard").
Essentially, what Faulkner
shows here in The Town is how,
even though he manages to be-
come president of the Jefferson
the publication of A Fable three
have always been characterized by
a lack of true action; rather, their
impact and force stem from the
assiduous cultivation of the art
of the "fait accompli," which is
either thrust violently upon the
reader for shock effect or is craft-
ily insinuated piecemeal to create
an overpowering atmosphere of
intrigue and suspense as the parts
of the puzzle fall slowly and in-
exorably into place.
In Faulkner's best novels, this
technique is effectively applied to
a theme conceived and communi-
cated by the author with great ur-
gency and descriptive power. In
The Town, however, Faulkner
seems to be either fundamentally
confused as to what he wants to
'Torch' Full
Of Warmth,
Sensitivity
THE GILDED TORCH, by Iola
Fuller. G. P. Putna.m's Sons,
New York: 1957. Pp. 343. $4.00
By F. CLEVER BALD
THE COURT of Louis XIV at
Versailles, the village of Que-
bec, the Great Lakes region, and
the Mississippi River during the
years 1678 to 1682 are the setting
for Iola Fuller's most recent his-
torical novel, The Gilded Torch.
Robert Cavelier, Sieur de la Salle,
is the central figure. Other his-
torical persons who are important
in the story include Louis XIV,
Colbert, Madame de Montespan,
Madame de Maintenon, Count
Frontenac, Henri de Tonti, and.
Father Louis Hennepin.
The fictional heroes are the
twin brothers, Victor and Marc,
sons of the Marquis de Lorennes.
Both are soldiers of the King.
Victor, recently promoted to Cap-
tain of the Guard, is a born fight-
er, proudly wearing the sword of
D'Artagnan, which the doughty
old musketeer had- given him. Al-
though Marc prefers study to
fighting, he is a courageous com-
rade to his brother.
* * *
INTO THE ARTIFICIAL atmos-
phere of Versailles comes La Salle,
the hardy explorer, with a request
for permission to explore the Mis-
sissippi, to claim the interior of
North America for France, to for-
tify it against the Spaniards and.
the English, and to have a mono-
poly in the trade of buffalo skins
to pay the expenses of the expedi-
ton.
With the support of Colbert,
Louis' able minister, La Salle wins
a grudging consent from the King.
Suspicious, however, of La Salle's
motives, Louis orders Victor to
join the explorer as a volunteer
and to report his every action.
During La Salle's stay at Ver-
sailles, the twins had met him and
had been so deeply impressed by
his confidence of success that
they had invested money in his
project. Nevertheless, Victor feels
that he is being exiled to a barren
Editor's Note: F. Clever Bald is
assistant director of the Michi-
gan Historical Collections and a
lecturer in history at the Univer-
sity.
See IOLA, page 8
Andau, that he missed the point.
finishing the book is that of more
terror, more relish in gruesome de-
tail.
The AVO man, the antics of
Major Meatball (whose doings
were given wide circulation in a
Readers' Digest reprint of this sec-
tion of the book), and the ferocity
and barbarism of the Russian re-
taliation, make this not so much
the story of strong spirits fighting
magnificently against hopeless
odds, but a recapitulation of an
old, old story..
Looking at the book with a cold
editorial eye, one must acknow-
ledge that Michener has done the
one thing wrong that would blur
the meaning of the remarkable
story, and place it in the ranks of
sensational atrocity stories, where
it must inevitably rank below Da-
chau, the Bataan death march, the
Warsaw ghetto, and the Katyn
Forest massacre.
MICHENER'S TITLE, w h i c h
seems a badly chosen symbol for
the revolt, calling attention as it
does to desperate flight from ter-
ror, at least suits the book as
Michener wrote it.
The bridge at Andau is a foot-
bridge across the muddy Einser
canal; upon crossing it the refugee
The residual impression left after
SATIRE
Charming,.
Stimulating.
SOME MUST WATCH, By Edwin
Daly. New York: Charles Scrib-
ner's Sons, 1956. 306 pp. $3.95.
By JOHN B. DALBOR
It is not at all unusual to find a
new novel which satirizes the
American scene. Yet it is rather
startling to learn that a quite
commendable novel in this vein
has been written by a 20-year-old
college student-and most of it
was composed when he was only
16.
Edwin Daly, now a junior at
Yale, because of his first novel,
Some Must Watch, has already
been tabbed "a very adequate
American an s w e r to France's
Francoise Sagan (authoress of
Bonjour Tristesse).
Yet his portrayal of a young
man going through the painful
transition from teens to manhood
smacks more strongly of F. Scott
Fitzgerald and Sinclair Lewis,
The novel, however, has a cer-
tain charming awkwardness, a
(puppy-like enthusiasm, and an
adolescent verve that gives it a
tone which such accomplished
writers as Fitzgerald and Lewis
would certainly not even have been
interested in imparting to their
novels.
* * *
v
ti
A
4'
4
V
(
is still in Hungary. He must still
negotiate a mile of swamp before
reacling free Austrian soil.'
The confused geography of the
bridge is a fitting symbol for the
confused focus of Michener's ac-
count. The emphasis placed upon
flight, upon sadistic reprisals and
mass terror, is an unfortunate re-
flection of Michener's vantage
point.
He-stayed for six weeks in Aus-
tria, interviewing refugees who
came across the bridge, so perhaps
it is understandable that he told
it as he saw it.
The revolt of the Hungarian
people deserves a story worthy of
their splendid fight. The story of
the young people who stopped
tanks with their bare hands de-
serves better than the hasty efforts
of a journalist stationed at the
exit.
Editor's Note: Robert F. Haugh,
a conrtibutor to last year's Daily
Book Review page, is an Associ-
ate Professor in the English de-
partment.
DALY DISPLAYS the creative
talent and psychological percep-
tion, rare in one so young, to exa-
mine himself rigorously, to pierce
the externals of an apparently
frivolous and vacuous life, and to
perceive its real significance.
We are presented with the often
hinted-at, but seldom captured
view of the inner existence of an
American teen-ger, a creature
whom many pessimistically hold
to be totally lacking in any pro-
fundity whatsoever.
Richard Colby, the protagonist,
is a young man just out of -high
school, whose steadily-growing in-
tellectual and artistic interests
have brought him irretrievably to
the position where he cannot help
but see his family, his friends, and
his own provincial hometown in
an ironical and unfavorable light,
These phenomena are presented
from the perspective of this rest-
less and dissatisfied youth, whose
questioning and, critical attitude
toward his previously smug exist-
ence has begun to clash with the
efforts of others to help him along
the path to safe conformity.
* * *
THE READER is struck by a
sensation of immediacy, largely-
through Daly's use ,of the interior
monologue. Occasionally it is car-
ried to annoying extremes, but
this, although perhaps not inten-
tionally, fits in well with the gen-
eral atmosphere of adolescence
and immaturity.
Certain descriptions seem In-
appropriate'and tedious, and many
trivial incidents are not only in-
cluded, but narrated with great
relish. At first glance, this would
seem to be a serious defect in the
novel, but after careful appraisal
we see that this is the author's
attempt to represent the mosaic
of life as perceived and inter-
preted by a teen-ager. An example
of thir is the constant preoccupa-
tion' with sex in a rather immature
way.
THE MAIN CHARACTER, Rich-
ard Colby, completely dominates
the novel. If character develop-
ment is a virtue in the novel, the
author has succeeded with Colby
as we follow him from the gawky
stage to the "collegiate" years,
from pedestrian high school doings
through a period of hobnobbing
with the "smart" set at summer
resorts to a shocking introduction
to the responsibilities of,the adult
world.
The other characters, however,
are generally unsuccessful. Colby's
father is an obvious but unskillful
imitation of Sinclair Lewis's Bab-
bitt Most of the other. are stereo-
types from the teen-age or college
atmosphere.
L
Mother's Day
MOTHERS the world over will be honored to-
day for their kindness, patience and inde-
fatigable devotion.
Children everywhere will pause to pay tri-
bute to the wonderful women that have served
them so faithfully. Candy, flowers and cards
are but a few of the many mementos that will
be given in acknowledgement of a debt that
can never be paid.
The daughter of a Sunday school teacher in
the litle town of Grafton, W. Va., is accredited
with the original idea of Mother's Day. Miss
Ann Jarvis believed that one day out of the
Editorial Staff
RICHARD SNYDER, Editor
year should be set aside in remembrance of
mothers.
N MAY 10, 1908, Miss Jarvis began her
campaign by sponsoring a Mother's Day
service in Graf ton's Andrews Methodist
Church. This was the beginning of a drive
that eventually was to take her fortune and
health.
The carnation, flower of sweetness, purity
and endurance, was chosen as the symbol of
-the day. Letters were sent to churchmen, Con-
gress and the President. By 1911, every state
recognized one day of the year as Mother's
Day.
Miss Jarvis realized her dream when on May
9, 1914 Congress adopted Public Resolution 25.
President Wilson set aside the second Sunday
in May "as a public expression of our love
and reverence for the mothers of our country."
WHEN FLORISTS realized the commercial
significance of the day and began raising
the price of flowers, Miss Jarvis renewed her
campaign. Her fight against commercialization
of Mother's Day took her fortune as well as
the fortune left by her mother and brother.
Years later she was found sick and impover-
*say about the Snopes or simply
taken up by matters of small im-
port.
HIS METHOD of having his
characters talk all around some-
thing before it is finally named
and brought out into the open is
here more annoying than in-
triguing and seems to be used
more because it has become sec-
ond nature with the author than
because of some real need of form.
Faulkner has always had diffi-
culty in opposing some positive
force or resistance to the Snopes
invasion. Here, in The Town, if it
can be said that Flem Snopes is
defeated, it is by the eternal fem-
inine and not by any element in
Jefferson, not even Ratliff and
Gavin Stevens, who are either
passive onlookers or essentially in-
effectual meddlers.
Faulkner merely stresses a point
which he has made many times
before: that women are inscru-
table and incorrigible schemers
who serve only to confound and
defeat, in some mysterious way,
even the most scheming of rmen.
Which is, in the author's order of
things, equivalent to leaving the
good citizens of Jefferson in the
hands of a blind fatality, a fatal-
ity which here is not even invested
with the attributes of the noble
LITERARY 'EXTRA':
Book Reviewer's Lot
Lonely, Thank less
By DONALD A. YATES
Daily Book Reviewer
THE BO9K REVIEWER'S lot is a lonely and usually a thankless
one.
Ever since publishers began playing up the merits of their books on
the flaps of the dust jacket, many people have argued that the book
reviewer is not much more than an "extra" or "stand-in" in the field
of literary endeavor.
His duties, they claim, are performed by a salaried "blurb-writer"
who more often than not throws more enthusiasm and zest into the
task of describing the nature and intent of a book than does the some-
times hungry, sometimes bored, and oftentimes superficial reviewer.
Yet the book critic, who refuses to be silenced, is still with us.
Magazines and newspapers give him space to air his opinions. And if'
he handles his assignments well, honestly, the magazine and newspaper
editors are happy, and they boast' that they have a review section as a
regular department or a Sunday feature.
To judge from this, the need for some kind of commentary to be
made on the titles constantly flowing forth from presses all over the
world is definitely felt.
{TILL, HOWEVER GREAT the reviewer's audience, he can make him-
;A
i
RICHARD HALLORAN
Editorial Director
LEE MARKS
City Editor
Business Staff
DAVID SILVER, Business Manager
MILTON GOLDSTEIN, ... Associate Business Manager
WILLIAM PUSCE............. Advertising Manager