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University Daily Kansan
Friday, May 21, 1965
Lacking Self-Discipline
The other day, we received the following letter:
Alas! the UDK has extended its editorial functions as an informative media to one of the more interesting topics of the day—the art of killing. I feel personally affronted by the presumption that I, or any other student would be aesthetically enlightened or even interested by exposure to the frightening, if not disgusting, existence of a person being trained to destroy his fellow man. Charlie Corcoran (May 14, 1965) has indeed allowed his imagination to work too much "overtime" to believe that death is an exciting "adventure"; and the UDK has allowed its sense of taste and student needs to regress to a quality of nothingness by printing such idiocy.
Richard Atkinson Lawrence freshman
To Mr. Atkinson we apologize for the personal insult he has had to bear since reading Corcoran's letter. We knew, Mr. Atkinson, that there would be a few sensitive, "aesthetically enlightened" souls who would strenuously object to anything with militaristic overtones.
However, I think you have grossly misinterpreted Corcoran's letter, and your imagination has indeed been working "overtime."
There was nothing in Corcoran's letter that expressed delight or excitement in the "art of killing." There was nothing which could lead one to believe that Corcoran believes death to be an "exciting adventure." Only an imagination working "overtime" could read this into Corcoran's letter.
Corcoran's letter conveyed a sense of excitement that many young men feel when they enter the armed forces, and his letter should be read in that light. He wrote to "... inform KU's many draft-age fellows of just what it is like." To do this, Corcoran also had to write of the emotional feelings that the young soldier must experience during his first few days.
Another quote from Corcoran's letter explains better what this sense of excitement is about: "Lacking a great deal in personal self-control, I look forward to bring back with me what it is John Glenn had been so thankful for—complete control of body and the top hand over mind."
It is not the "art of killing" that excites Corcoran; it is, rather, a hope that the Marine Corps will help him achieve self-discipline over mind and body—a trait which is sorely lacking in many young college students today.
-Garv Noland
No Economy with Johnson
By Lyle Wilson United Press International
United Press International President Johnson is dosing the gullible citizens with soothing syrup about his triumphs as a careful custodian of the public funds. LBJ saves the citizens' tax dollars like a sailor saves his month's pay on a Saturday night shore leave.
It is now a matter of just about six weeks before the government racks up another disgraceful fiscal year deficit. LBJ proudly announced last month that the prospective deficit for this fiscal year had been reduced by $1 billion. The new estimate was for a 1965 fiscal year deficit of only $5.3 billion.
Only $5.3 billion! The grasshopper economists who have been guiding the politicians and gulling the public over the past 30 years may destroy the American way of life before they are chased out of Washington and into hiding in some dark ravine. Franklin D. Roosevelt was the first president to fall for the buncombe peddled by the big spender economists.
The Trend Continues
FDR went through a period of budget balancing whimsy, but finally abandoned budget balancing altogether in favor of the spendorama policies that continue to the present day. In press conferences, FDR would brandish that long cigarette holder, smile his most charming smile and respond to questions about deficits and the public debt by explaining:
"Don't worry. We owe it to ourselves."
By that, FDR meant that most of the government bonds floated to pay the deficit spending bill were held by American citizens. So we owe it to ourselves. The sordid implication of FDR's airy camplacency was that maybe we wouldn't need to worry about paying the debt. If that wasn't the implication, then the remark had no meaning at all.
The facts are, of course, that the United States steadily is approaching the moment of truth with respect to the vast public debt which continues to accumulate on the treasury books. The time will come for an anguished decision. Shall the United States retire or repudiate its public debt? That will be the choice.
Decision By Reason
Events will compel a decision by reason of the bare facts of the case. For example: The annual interest on the public debt is now the second largest single item of budgeted expenditure. National defense, at more than $50 billion, is first. The interest charge estimated for this fiscal year is $11.3 billion. Third highest is combined Health, Labor and Welfare spending, $6.2 billion.
They buy votes with promises of benefits and services for which they are afraid to tax the voters. They pay the resultant deficits by floating bonds, passing on to your grandchildren and mine the cost of government service rendered to us.
That is the way the politicians get themselves elected and re-elected. The fat-headed voters are
too witless to realize that they are being filmflammed.
Ten years ago, in fiscal 1955, the government spent $64.3 billion and ran up a $4.1 billion deficit. Under the 1965 Johnson-Humphrey administration economy program, spending in this fiscal year will be $97 billion for a $5.3 billion deficit.
This is economy?
The People Say...
Dear Sirs:
IT WAS A PLEASURE OF MINE to attend the KU Kicks Band's first annual outdoor concert. Whatever deficiencies some critics may have been able to find in the performance, the music was good and the setting relaxing and pleasant.
I also want to express my support of those who are pushing for some courses in jazz in the School of Fine Arts. It is certainly a gross oversight to ignore what is generally considered our only genuine American art form. Students should be afforded an opportunity to learn
about jazz and if talented, gain proficiency in its performance without being forced outside the academic structure. Jazz has certainly developed to the place that it deserves acceptance alongside all the other media of artistic expression.
Big band and New Orleans style jazz are my favorites, but I say more power to all the fine jazz musicians performing in the KU environment. I hope to hear many more performances in future years.
Sincerely,
S. O. Schroeder, M.D.
Watkins Memorial Hospital
1965 HERBLOCK
THE WAHLINGTON POST
Two-Way Flame Thrower
BOOK REVIEWS
THE HUNDRED YEARS WAR,
by Edouard Pervoy (Capricorn, $1.95).
A professor of medieval history at the Sorbonne has provided a brilliant historical work on one of the most incredible and most important wars in western history. Edouard Perroy provides a combination of military, social and constitutional histories.
He attempts to show the internal conditions of England and France before, during and after the war, and presents portraits of leading figures on both sides—Henry V, Joan of Arc, Philip the Bold, the Black Prince—and also depictions of the great battles—Crecy, Poitiers and Agincourt.
WAITING FOR THE END, by Leslie A. Fiedler (Delta, B1.95).
One reads this book almost with mouth open wide, realizing that it is as vivid and vigorous and wild and inflammatory and sometimes nutty attack on most American writers as one could find anywhere. Critical reputations are built on such books.
You gather that except for Allen Ginsberg and William Burroughs and James Baldwin and Saul Below—and Leslie Fiedler—that there isn't much of anything, or anyone, in American letters that's any good. It will last only if it's obscure and shot full of symbolism. Genefilt before Henry Miller or even Norman Mailer, but if you're a serious English professor you can't possibly say anything good about Wolfe or Hemingway (well, maybe "The Sun Also Rises") or Faulkner (at least since "The Hamlet") or Robert Penn Warren. Second-raters all.
You keep reading, wondering if the guy might say at least something that isn't mere anger or bitterness or diatribe. Then, if you've read anything yourselves, you begin to make your own interpretations. When "Another Country," one of the juniest novels to appear in recent years, receives praise and "All the King's Men" and "The Old Man and the Sea" are consigned to the literary garbage disposal by Mr. Fiedler, you give up. You don't quit reading; he's too fascinating for that, kind of like listening to someone rip off a lot of fascinating oaths. You just give up.
* *
THE MERRY MUSES OF CALEDONIA, by Robert Burns (Capricorn, $1.25).
This is a collection of folk songs, but it's not the sweet kind sung by the New Christy Minstrels or even Joan Baez. The collection consists of both folk songs by and collected by the great Robert Burns, and it's a bawdy set we have here. "Comin' Through the Rye," for example, is not quite the way we usually hear it. Fortunately there is a glossary, for Scottish is a foreign language to many readers.
SELECTED WRITINGS OF TRUMAN CAPOTE (Modern Library, $2.45).
Probably most American readers know Truman Capote because of "Breakfast at Tiffany's." That is only one of the works of this one-time infant terrible who is probably better described today as aging boy genius—a kind of Orson Welles of fiction.
This new anthology offers quite a range; the unfortunate thing about it is that Capote's comparatively short works are excerpted, a device that frustrates a good many readers who'd like the whole thing. From the larger works the editors have selected chapters from "A Tree of Night" and "Breakfast at Tiffany's." There also are segments from Capote's non-fictional "Local Color."
"Local Color" consists of travel sketches. One of the best pieces is "The Muses Are Heard." Capote having fun with various and assorted celebrities. There is a sharply satirical piece on Marlon Brando. And of course the story of Holly Golightly, who was sweetened up somewhat when Audrey Hepburn played her in the movies. She'd have to be. Capote doesn't really write about sweet people.
THE POORHOUSE FAIR and RABBIT, RUN, by John Updike (Modern Library, $2.45).
Canonization—literary, that is—has hit John Updike. He has made the Modern Library. From hardback to paperback to the kind of hardback that has true respectability. Does he deserve it? Well, this publisher moved a bit too fast on Irwin Shaw and seems to have made a mistake. Updike may be worth it. He is certainly a better writer than Irwin Shaw, but what does that mean?
He is a poet in prose, a poet, like Nelson Algren, of the weak, the unheroic, the little man of society. But he is not knocking society; he is merely setting his people, like his hero, Rabbit Angstrom, within society. Angstrom is a creature of his time, a high school basketball player who had his day of glory and can't meet the problems of life. And he runs, from his nagging wife to a prostitute, from his job, from his friends. At the end of the book he is still running.
"The Poorhouse Fair" is Updike's projection of life in 1977, but it is not science fiction. He is merely looking at the society of 1957, when he wrote the book, to see how it might look at a later time. It is a simpler story than "Rabbit, Run," and it is less likely to offend some readers, who may find that the latter book is a bit too explicit, regarding sex, for their tastes. But if you rush out to buy this book for the kicks involved you'll be blundering. Updike is no pornographer. He is a perceptive viewer of man, and this perception is revealed in these remarkable books.
THE MAN WITH QUALITIES,
by Robert Musil (Capricorn, $1.85).
Robert Musil is not a name that conjures up pictures for American readers. For this reason it is fortunate that some of his work is appearing in inexpensive editions. "The Man Without Qualities" merits comparison with the great continental names of Mann and Proust.
It is set in Vienna on the eve of World War I and presents a witty and probing picture of the dying Austro-Hungarian empire. Though the story seems simple, the theme, like themes in Mann, is perceptive. This is volume one of three volumes, the last of which remained unfinished.
Dailijl 1fänsan
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