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UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
Wednesday, October 4, 1987
Don't delay the beer study
When and if KU students will be able to buy beer in the Kansas Union are good questions. When the student-faculty committee charged with studying the feasibility of beer in the Union will produce something definite and tangible is a better question.
The seven-member committee, formed last spring, reportedly met three times this summer. Between meetings, presumably, individual committee members had the opportunity to research the subject. No report has yet been issued, nor any preliminary findings indicated.
But perhaps three months is too much to ask. One committee spokesman indicated last week the study may continue for two years. For the sake of those impatiently awaiting The Word, we hope not.
The current study represents the third time in five years that a committee has investigated the feasibility of selling beer on campus. Earlier studies were dropped and no reports were issued. And the longer the study now underway is delayed, the greater the danger of its dying too.
Indeed, situations presently surrounding the committee's work may have already diminished the public's chance of ever seeing a report. The committee has set no firm deadline for completion of the project, nor does it have a tentative goal for when a report should be released. In addition, committee members' statements about expected conclusion dates are vague. The work will finish when it's finished, it seems.
Granted, the two professors and four students studying beer in the Union have several time-consuming duties. Legal opinions must be gathered and considered. Letters must be written investigating the impact of beer sales on other campuses. Whole committee meetings must be scheduled. And finally, a report must be produced for the Union Operating Board's consideration.
Although selling beer in the Union is not a crucial issue at KU, it should—this time, at least—be resolved. Is or isn't it feasible? Answering that question without delay is the committee's responsibility.
- Allan Northcutt, Editorial Editor
Letters
Fees and abolition of military
To the Editor:
In their letters of Sept. 29, Miss Miller and Mr. Guzdilo find the democratic spirit lacking in Students for a Democratic Society (SDS) and its recent protest of Marine recruitment on campus. Since I supported that protest, I would like to present my reply.
First, and most important, the protest was not—for my part at least—against the Marine recruiter's right to speak. That this was a more general sentiment is noted by the first page of the same Kansan: "The recruiters were invited by the SDS to speak at their forum, but declined the invitation." The point of my protest was the very existence of the Marine Corps in particular and, more generally, of militaristic solutions to human problems.
Second, from my point of view, it is not those who hold "improptu debates" who negate the democratic process, but rather those who believe they can transcend debate with the power of "ultimate solutions."
Surely today the logic of power is irrational, not to mention anti-
democratic. The precarious balance of nuclear and military threat offer civilization very little hope of security. Sometimes someone has to slip. In the long run, there is no probable hope that mankind can escape the one fatal error—if irrational power solutions are at hand. That is why I advocate the abolition of the military.
Returning then to the issue of free speech, I do not believe advocates of military solutions should be denied the right to speak, but should be denied the power to carry out their threats.
Bob Howard Wichita junior
To the Editor:
Would there not be many advantages to students in having the University postpone the payment of fees until AFTER the first of October? If there are any individuals interested in promoting this point of view, either contact your nearest University official or
(if this does not prove effective) call VI 2-0260.
Michael Grill
Chicago, Ill., graduate student
HERBLOCK
"I'm Looking After The Little Tyke All The Time"
kansan book review
New Snow White almost mad
By Scott Nunley
When Ivan C. Karp wrote his light chuckle, "Dobbie Doo," he was touted as the daddy of the "pop art novel." Now his first-generation offspring appears in the person of Donald Barthelme, who is as imaginative as Karp was imitative.
"Snow White," Barthelme's first full-length work, might be dismissed as a modern retelling of the Grimm tale. Anything but grim, Barthelme packs each mini-chapter with the chaotic energy of a shattered rose window. Brilliant light and a fascinating narrative flash in fragments of prose. The first initial "chapters" are almost completely mad, including one of 18 words:
LITTLE MAN ON CAMPUS
ED HAS DEVELOPED INTO THE MOST POTENT BALL CARRIER PREXI
I HAVENT LET HIM TAKE A SHOWER ALL SEASON.
THE PSYCHOLOGY OF SNOW WHITE:
IN THE AREA OF FEARS, SHE FEARS
MIRRORS
APPLES
POISONED COMBS
The reader applauds, too, as the villains trail their dusty black cloaks across the scene: Jane, the wicked stepmother, and Hogo, the troll. There is even a prince of the blood named Paul; Snow White loves his blood, but loaths him.
were not the words I always hear!" she laments in sophomoric despair, and our anti-heroes rally to humor her inanity. "‘Injunctions!’ Bill said . . . ‘Murder and create!’ Henry said, and that was weak, but we applauded."
If the reader examines each Barthelme icon with care, retaining the color and pattern in his mind, "Snow White" gradually begins to supply its own insanely reasonable logic.
The key is Barthelme's point of view—he has seven, dwarfish ones, and one white as snow. Once the personalities of Bill, Edward, Kevin, Hubert, Henry, Clem, and Dan extricate themselves from the ruins, the nonsense becomes an intriguing plot. One after another, the little men march whistling through their work and their love for Snow White.
Snow herself is a walking hangup. "Oh I wish there were some words in the world which
With the second telling, the reader is prepared for the underlying fairy tale structure and finds himself absorbed instead in the failing, failure, and death of Bill, "the first of us ever to be hanged." Bill, who cannot bear to be touched by dwarf or dame, suffers a mounting paranoia:
At the end of the first half, he offers a camp quiz so that the literati may check their progress: "6. Is there too much 'blague' in the narration? ( )." The correct reply is "yes." But more importantly: "11. Are the seven men, in your view, adequately characterized as individuals? Yes ( ) No ( )." The reply is "no," and it is Barthelme's one bottoming fault in a novel that soars.
Ultimately, Barthelme is a fabler of the 1930's, and his barbs feather themselves in every usual balloon. So much pointed archery releases a lot of hot air, of course, but more often than not Barthelme's insanse style stays afloat of the smog.
"I am being followed by a nun in a black station wagon." Bill wiped his hands on the seat covers. I cannot fall apart now. Not yet."
...quotes...
Al Capone: "The American system of ours, call it Americanism, call it capitalism, call it what you like, gives each and every one of us a great opportunity if we only seize it with both hands and make the most of it."
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