(^5Z
NEWSPAPER OF THE STUDENTS' UNION
MARCH 8th, 1962
THREEPENCE
BRITKH LiMARY
-9MARt962
OF ^ClITICAL AND ECONOMIC SQ£NCE.
^ f ECONOMIC SggvJCE.
€av®r:
LONDON SCHOOL OF ECONOMICS & POLITICAL SCIENCE - UNIVERSITY OF LONDON
THIS WEEK
SPECIAL BOOK SUPPLEMENT ISSUE
SIMON KLINGER IT IS!
AS THEY
LIKED IT
"As we Like it", the revue presented by Drama Soc. at LSE this year (and reviewed in "The Times"), was an junusing and competent production in the LSE tradition.
The six members of the cast displayed grreat energy and enthusiasm and, on the whole, are to be commended for the result. Admirable team-work was a feature of the show and no one performer outshone the rest.
Pruning
The major criticism must be that the somewhat tasteless parody of the Nativity — "Follow that Star" — was not redeemed by complete success. The presentation of the revue could have been considerably improved by slight pruning of dialogue and the dropping of one or two of the weakest sketches. It would also have helped to have paid less attention to Advertising/Commercial TV humour or to have spread this material more carefully.
'Local' Humour
Happily, the LSE disease that has as its chief symptom the delusion that the mere mention of demand curves will make audiences choke with mirth was only slightly in evidence. More worthy 'localised' humour, Mr. Klapp-holz, Tutors on TV, was used to the full. Much of the best material, like "Tsinderella" was at the end (Dead cunning!) so audiences went away smiling.
It is a pity that various slight improvements were not effected to make a good revue into a better one.
Graham Murray
MASCOT
The Union Mascot was returned on Friday night after a mysterious absence of two weeks.
The heavy gilt replica of a beaver was pushed onto the stage of the Old Theatre during a disorderly Special Public Business Meeting. A .person or persons unknown slid Beaver from the wings but the motions being considered were too engrossing for him to be greeted with any great show of affection. Later the meeting was adjourned in uproar.
Absolute Majority
S. KLINGEB K. BHIMANI .. D. PACKER J. SAINSBURY ... Si>oilt Papers
TOTAL
Votes 425 212 109 44 14 804
NARROW PRISON CELLS; PRISONERS and
SIMON KLINGER HAS BEEN ELECTED PRESIDENT OF THE LSE STUDENTS' UNION FOR THE 1962/'63 SESSION. LAST WEEK HE REGISTERED A LANDSLIDE OVER HIS NEAREST RIVAL, KISHORE BHIMANI, SCOOPING OVER 50% OF THE TOTAL POLL.
This is the first time in recent years that a candidate for the Union Presidency has won the Election by an absolute majority.
Four highly-qualified candidates weie nominated this year, and from the moment their names were published interested observers anticipated an exciting struggle between Klinger and Bhimani, as the two perhaps most controversial nominees.
But at the Hustings, an untimely indication of the result became apparent from the numerous caUs of: "We want Klinger!"
All the candidates appeared to be concentrating their campaigns on more-or-less the same theme: revitalising the Union and overcoming apathy therein, the amelioration of student facilities within the School and the maintenance of our prestige in external affairs.
Criticisms
DENIAL
Mr. Klinger, journalist, globetrotter and second-year B.Sc., may well be pleased with the result. He has denied most emphatically many criticisms that he has started to be interested in Union affairs purely as an election build-up. In fact, after only a few weeks at LSE he became the President of AEISBC.
One would feel sure that the overwhelming vote of confidence shown by the Election results was largely attributed to his wide experience in student affairs, his capacity for organisation and his progressive ideas for student welfare and student-staff relations.
Campaigning for the Election may be distinguished from last year's pre-election activities by the general absence of politics, despite an inappropriate undercurrent of
S. KLINGER
intrigue which came to the surface at the Hustings.
Nevertheless, ds the day of the Election approached many sordid rumours of mudsling-ing and slander were said to he gravitating around the School. This tended to mar the whole proceedings.
AIESEC
David Pearce and John Hartley, AIESEC delegates to the Congress in Berlin are now busy exchanging the 75 traineeships the Committee has so far raised. The London Joint Committee has in the meantime been elected National Executive of Great Britain. This will no doubt call for new appointments for local and national work. It seems that all the applicants for AIESEC traineeships this year may not get satisfaction, nevertheless they should not lose heart. Their chances of getting a traineeship next summer will be greatly enhanced. The Congress has started off well and is attended by nearly 350 delegates from 27 countries including newly independent African states.
The silence of a narrow prison cell, or an isolated Embassy on foreign soil is the fate of many who have dared to express their beliefs in face of governmental disapproval.
AMNESTY is an organisation to help these people, provided only that they do not advocate violence, with the belief that every man has the right to hold his ovim opinions.
The local organisation works in small groups called THREES, adopting three prisoners, one from the Communist bloc, a second from the Afro-Asian countries, and a third from the West. In this way emphasis is placed not on political philosophies, but on the rights of the individual. The main task of the THREE is to gather information about the prisoner, either from groups of exiles organisations in many countries, or by getting in touch directly with the prisoner's family.
Mr. Peter Benenson, a London lawyer, and Chairman of the International Committee of AMNESTY, has stated:
"The purpose of the campaign is to mobilise public opinion throughout the world in favour of releasing Prisoners of Conscience, and effective guarantees for opinion and religion. Our job is to set a tide running in the affairs of the world against persecution of people for their ideas,
AMNESTY
and set up organisms which over the years may prove effective in bringing about both releases and improvements in the law".
There is a THREE in operation in LSE (so far the only one in the University). Thf* three prisoners are: Luis Mul-ler Quintana, a Chiban student, who has been sentenced to 20 years imprisonment for taking part in demonstrations; Dieter Koniecki, secretary of the W. German Liberal Students' Union, who wa^ kidnapped in E. Berlin last year, and who was condemned at a secret trial to 10 years' imprisonment in Prague; and Michel Bourgeois, a student at the Protestant P"'aculty in Paris, who is a conscientious objector, imprisoned since October who has not yet been tried. Contact is being made with all possible sources of information and help, and although progress is slow, we know that the knowledge that there are others in the outside world who feel solidarity with them, will be of great encouragement to these prisoners — all of them students like ourselves.
Another three prisoners could be "adopted" if more of us were prepared to work for them. If you are interested in having more details of AMNESTY, please contact the Secretary, Irene Vermes, via the Union pigeon holes.
MARY LAVERY
	
SIMMONDS	Read
University Booksellers	
Our shop is not the biggest in London, but it is among the best.	OMR
And it's a place where you will obtain individual attention.	Out March 19th
We stock most of the books on your syllabus, and we are five minutes from L.S.E. 16 Fleet Street, London, E.C.4 (Opposite Chancery Lane)	Only !/-
BEAVER
March 8th, 1962
leaver—\9
Editor : Kishore Bhimani Assoc. Editor ; Jon Azrael Sub-Editors : Graiham Murray, Mark Harris Arts : May Clarke, Barry Tomalin Sports : Dave Sheasby News : David Rudnlck Circulation & Publicity : Alan Kay Business : Dick Herman Book Supplement : Richard Stevenson Photos : John Hodson
Staff : Brian Meadows, Erica Canton, Mike Lucas Andrew Leigh, Bill McQueen
Too Much Interest ?
It is a gratifying thought that the approaching Deputy-Presidential election for the next session will be contested by a number of candidates, one might refer to as too many.
Coupled with the vehemence and uproar at the Union Meeting last Friday, this seems to be a manifestation of the decline of that die-hard apathy.
It was, however, difficult to understand, in retrospect, just why Friday evening was such a fiasco. Sitting on the platform were two relatively inexperienced men doing their best, while across the footlights there was incomprehensible chaos. There seemed to be no clash of principles, just wrangling and invidious rhetoric.
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Letters to the Editor unavoidably held over.
STOP PRESS
FIASCO
N.U.S. OBSERVER
ELECTIONS
HELD INVALID
AT TIME OF
GOING TO PRESS
CONSTITUTION AND CHAOS
No Cause to Mourn
There was a very strong temptation to begin this column under the heading "Obituary". Pettiness, animal passion, and complete disregard for any form of etiquette or parliamentary procedure seemed to dominate the Public Business meeting last Friday. On the agenda were two motions — one dealing with Hanrattv, subsequently passed, and the other
with the "Committee of a Hundred" arrests and trial. Halfway through the latter a certain section of the Union quite genuinelv concerned with the atrocities in Casbah invaded the Hall and tabled an emergency motion.
The ensuing delay in dealing with this, not helped by frayed tempers all round, led to a bedlam unprecedented in
recent history of the Union.
The sincerity of interest in the Casbah issue was qu'te lost in the petty exchanges of profanities and personal insults. The figures of Mr. Locke and Mr. Plumley salvaged by their erudition and experience what might have ended as a complete travesty of the institution of the Students' Union.
MOSES NTUKIDEM
He is dynamic, progressive and frank with a very great breadth of initiative. He is now at LSE, a second-year B.Sc.
He has shown very great interest in ULU affairs in particular and in student societies in generaL He is an African and one of the chief champions of "Pan Africanism".
In his student I'fe he has taken part in most activities. In 1959/60 he was a member of the East-West Friendship Societv, and the All Nations Club. He was Executive Member of the Commonwealth Society, a post which he surrendered after being elected President of ULUANSA (Woolwich). During the same
period he was also a student member of the Commonwealth Education Council and a member of the Nigerian Union.
During 1960/61 he had the credit of founding two societies while in his former College. His activity in ULUANSA brought him the reward when he won two open international scholarships to attend international sem'nars at the Un'ted Nations in Geneva and at Lund University in Sweden.
Within ULU walls he has attended almost all the sittings of the President's Co'in-cil and seconded to his Presidents, Mr. Sterne and Mr. Levton for the years 1960/ 61/62.
When I interviewed him about his interest for the post for which he now competes, he said that he thought the past officers had worked hard enough but while giving his solid and critical support to his successors he hopes to introduce new ideas that he learnt while abroad in this very office.
His other interests include debates, t>ie twist, jazz and other mus'c. He has been to UC, Keele, North Staffs., as guest speaker during the Michaelmas term and to Keble College, Oxford this term.
You need the ULU Union, you need NTUKIDEM !
Simon Klinger
A career is what it's worth
If you divide the population into two groups— those who take The Times and those who don't —you find this: those who don't take The Times are in the great majority. Those who do are either at the top in their careers, or are confidently headed there.
The Times both by its seniority in experience and by its incomparable prowess as a modern newspaper, naturally commends itself to successful people. There is no high level conference, no board meeting, no top executive's private office into which The Times is not apt to be taken.
This choice of a newspaper by people who get on is indisputable.* In which of the two groups do you place yourself?
THE TIMES
* STUDENTS AND THE TIMES: As a student you can have the times for 2Jd. Write for details to the Circulation Manager, the times, London, E.C.4.
March 8th, 1962
BEAVER
3
'exercise
in egoism'
I
William Pickles
{Lecturer in Political Science)
Memoirs of Hugh Dalton : Vol. HI, 1945-60. High Tide and After
and sensible. The accounts of	most attention has been paid,
the cheap-money policy and	tell us almost nothing that
of the failure of convertibility	was not already well known,
are thinner than the specialist	but the whole, as a study of
would like. The accounts of	a man and of policy, is well
political quarrelling, to which	worth the student's attention.
UPWARD MOBILITY
by May Clarke
"Education and the Working Classes" by Brian Jackson and Denis Marsden
The death of Lord Dalton, coming, as it did, almost immediately after the t)ublica-tion of the third volume of his memoirs, inevitably gives to any notice of the book something of an obituary quality. The final volume would in any case have driven one to look back over its author's whole career, and one does so now in the knowledge that this really tells the story almost to the end. What then, as revealed in this book, and in the two earlier volumes to which it frequently refers its reader, did Lord Dalton do for his party and his country ? Is the whole story here, or must one wait and look elsewhere for a full assessment?
The Whole Truth
The answer, surprising as it may be, is that the whole story, or very nearly so, really is here. What is missing are those things that Lord Dalton could not see and hear for himself — the rolling eye, the immense booming voice, the almost permanent air of patronage beneath the great vaulted dome. The things that belong to character, however, rather than to personal appearance, he saw with great clarity and detachment. The Preface warns us that the book is "not a history" (though in bits it is), but "an exercise in egoism". He meant, not egoism, of which there is no sign, but egotism, of which there are many
(Muller — 4^/-)
signs. Even this self-accusation, however, is unfair. For the Dalton who appears in this book, like the Dalton his friends knew, is in no sense an introvert. He is an extrovert, interested in people ,and therefore most interested in the person with whom he spent most time and knew best — himself. He knows his own tastes, strengths and weaknesses, and analyses them as he analyses those of others, except perhaps that the self-analysis is the more severe.
Greatest Quality
The final refutation of the charge of egotism comes, not so much in his frank accounts of some of his mistakes, as in the account, which we know to be true, of how he constantly pushed forward promising younger men (a habit perhaps acquired in his teaching days at LSE), and especially of how he pushed one of his own proteges forward to the seat he had occupied and might have hoped to occupy again, and thereafter gave him unswervingly loyal support. This devotion to the coming generation was his greatest quality, and he seems to have known it.
Two Services
He set out to perform two important services to his party. First, he wanted to shake it out of woolly-minded ideal-
ism into practical idealism. He tried to teach that the first purpose of political action is the achievement of power and the second the use of power in the service of one's ideas and ideals. This he taught, first by word and then by example, and none would claim that he failed to practice both halves of his precept. Second, as he says here, he tried to cure Labour of its inferiority complex. His success in both tasks was limited, but he worked hard at them.
There is plenty of new material in this book for the political historian, some for the economist and a lot for the student of political science. The chapter "On being a Minister", together with much that might have been in that chapter but finds its way into the narrative elsewhere,is both illuminating
"... the flowering times of literature and art and all the creative power of genius, when there is a national glow of life and thought, sensible to beauty, intelligent and alive".—Matthew Arnold.
The 1944 Education Act apparently provided the equality of educational opportunity which would lead to the heightening of national culture. Yet Jackson and Marsden, themselves of similar background, present a discouraging picture when they examine the effect of a grammar school education on 88 working-class children and their families, who live in the Yorkshire industrial town — Marburton.
Inequality
Firstly they show why the Crowther Report finds that, even now, the middle classes benefit most from the State Education System. Foreknowledge of how to deal with the vagaries of bureaucracy enables a middle class parent from the beginning to open the way to a grammar school education; the working class child is let loose on the education system at the age of five to find his own way through the haze of selection and streaming methods, grammar school terminology and university requirements. It is this child who is most likely to discover too late that he needs Latin 'O' level to enter his chosen university.
Interviews with the working class children who have gained an 'A' level qualification
{Longmans — 28/-)
make up most of the book. They are depressing. The parents, with whom they can no longer communciate, often have finer minds. A father who says, "Working class organisations are all right but they've got to have a man who can put the case and knows how to make a point . . . that's what I thought our Stanley could do", has a son who happily places all 11-plus "failures" in the ranks of "the future Teds", "illiterates".
Sympathetic
Yet the authors deal sympathetically with the gulf which opens between school and neighbourhood and with the discontent suffered once the sixth form, that temporary haven where they are the ruling classes, is left. Objectivity is abandoned for a warmer approach and the
BOOK SUPPLEMENT
people in the sample, too small for a real scientific study, come over as sympathetic personalities, commanding a better understanding.
Barrier Strengthened
In part two of their stay the authors suggest remedies. Perhaps the basic mistake lies in that, "the force of tradition was so great that when, under the Education Act 1902 the state undertook for the first time the general organisation of the secondary schools the ancient grammar school was taken as almost the exclusive model for them". In these circumstances, far from becoming men of culture, Arnold's true "apostles of equality", these working class children merely succeed in becoming middle-class, in strengthening class barriers rather than breaking them.
THE ROAD TO COMMUNISM
DOCUMENTS OF THE
22nd Congress of the
Communist Party of the Soviet Union
634 text pages with 30 pp photos
7s, 6d.
Write for full catalogue of Marxist Literature
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4
BEAVER
March 8th, 1962
BOOK^SUPPLEMEWT
OBITUARY 5
A GOLDEN MYTH
by Richard Stevenson
The Union Pacific Railroad " by Robert W. Fogel (John Hopkins Press — 42/-)
The topsy-turvey world of historical research takes great pleasure in squashing the great legends of history which everyone enjoys so much. For their own delight, as well as in the interests of historical accuracy, the scholars declare to the mystification of the multitude, that John was a good King, General Gordon was a silly man and industrial slums were not altogether a bad thing.
This mania for reappraisal is not entirely due to the perversities of donnish humour. It is a matter of professional necessity; after all little credit would accrue to the man who showed, by the subtleties of modern research, that the schoolboy has been right all along.
Thus it i.s that heroes become thieves and thieves sink to the level of basically honest and sincere men who have been misunderstood.
Anti-myth Men
With the possible exception of Alan Taylor and the so often despised 'popular' historians, the anti-myth men seem to enjoy and prefer their intellectual isolation. They like to think of themselves as faint voices crying in the wil-
derness of their documents and statistics against the naivete and partiality of the bulk of unenlightened opinion.
It is in this spirit that Mr. Fogel, in his slim volume on the Union Pacific Railway glumly remarks that his subject is so much a part of the body of myths which constitute American history that it cannot be upset by the 'rummagings of scholars'. He fears that the Union Pacific (UP) will continue to be seen as a great patriotic and financially sound venture ruined only by the greed of its promoters, 'regardless of what is written in history books'.
Reappraisal
Mr. Fogel may well be right. It may indeed take a long time before his most salient points manage to squirm their way from amongst his charts and balance sheets. They will indeed have difficulty in extracating themselves from the pretensions of his economic jargon and his pseudo-mathematical computations.
Even so it does emerge^ not without difficulty, that much of what has been written about the UP is either wrong or totally misleading.
Have you read
ALGERIAN ABC
TANYA MATTHEWS
with a foreward by M'hammed Yazid, Minister of Information, Provisional Government of the Algerian republic.
^ a brilliant account of what happened and what is happening
written with access to F.L.N, documents, authoritative and very readable
three colour pictorial jacket
Michael Fogarty
12/6 net
THE JUST WAGE
A critical examination of British pay policy since the war by the Professor of Industrial Relations at Cardiff.
30/-
Lord Longford
THE IDEA OF PUNISHMENT
'	. wrestles with an issue we are tempted to push
out of sight.' Observer
'calm, reasonable, well-ordered' Punch
10/6
GEOFFREY CHAPMAN
Abford House, Wilton Road, S.W.T
The financial troubles of the company and the Credit Mobi-ler scandal did not stem from the misdeeds of their promoters. They only aggravated a situation which was inherent in the financial structure of the venture. The real fault lay with the Acts of 1862 and 1864 which saddled the company with financial obligations which could never have been met even if the officials had been scrupulously honest.
Reasonable Profit
The promoters were accused of milking the UP for unreasonable profits. But, as Fogel points out, the whole moral judgment of these people depended upon the assessment of what in fact constituted a reasonable profit, bearing in mind the risks of the venture.
The Wilson Committee, investigating the company's affairs, took the view that since the road was financed primarily by a federal loan in the form of long-term securities, the promoters undertook no risk whatever. Thus they assessed the 'reasonable profit' at no more than the 6i% which the promoters' own stake would have realised had it been invested in other securities plus some charge for management.
It is on this basis that Durant and Co. have been condemned. Fogel, however, argues that the federal loan did not remove the element of risk; it merely changed its nature.
Element of Risk
It meant that the company was gambling not onlv on the success of a line which would inflate the value of their land grants but also on the price of its governmental securities which at least until the middle of 1867 constituted a serious risk in the slack market conditions of the period.
Nor was the risk removed by the formation of the Credit Mobilier. Fogel argues convincingly that it merely enabled the project to proceed despite the risk. Without it the venture may well have collapsed before the road was ever completed.
Misconception
The whitewashing is not quite complete. Mr. Fogel does not doubt that in some respects the promoters were downright dishonest but his careful analysis of balance sheets and Congress reports shows that the Union Pacific was not ruined by their activities. They merely helped it towards the debacle which its financial structure and Congress' misconception of the problem made inevitable.
Little is added to the book by the author's application of probability theory to the investors' risks nor, indeed, by his use of rent theory to assess the social returns of the road. All of his points could have been made in plain English.
Convincing Reversal
The facts stand on their own, without the embellishment of these analytical gimmicks, as a convincing reversal of the accepted view of the line. They shed interesting light on the complaints made by the Grangers and the Populists and throw serious doubt on the validity of their railings.
Above all, as the blurb sagely points out, the book 'brings to the fore the economic questions posed by the government's intervention in the enterprise'.
So we are left with the prospect of history becoming duller and duller as the 'badies' are vindicated. Mr. Fogel has certainly straightened out our thinking on the Union Pacific but we shall miss our rapacious capitalists and golden myths.
BOOKS RECEIVED
"The Coming of The French Revolution" by Lefebre, published by Routledge and Kegan Paul.
by Morris, published
"Problems of U.S. Economic Growth"
by Oxford University Press.
"Workshop of the World" by J. D. Chambers, published by Oxford University Press.
"Economic Development of France and Germany" by Sir John Clapham, published by Cambridge University Press.
Read
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GROWTH of
COMMERCIALS
" The Origins of Television Advertising" by Walter Taplin
(Pitman — 25/-)
Although commercial TV is now an accepted part of our life it is only eight years ago that its realisation seemed extremely unlikely to most business men.
When it did materialise in 1955 it came as a surprise to many. Mr. Taplin is concerned with studying the reasons why firms chose to advertise on TV in the first two years of its existence — years which were clouded with the uncertainty relating to the long term viability of the hew medium in a social and cultural atmosphere that was still very largely hostile. Hence this study is an attempt to show how business men came to make a decision in conditions of uncertainty.
Shot in the Dark
The author rightly emphasises the fact that TV was the biggest single development in advertising media since the end of the nineteenth century when newspapers overtook posters as the most popular means of mass persuasion. This meant that a business man contemplating investment in the form of TV advertising had virtually no past experience upon which to base his decision. There is plenty of evidence from the questionnaires which Mr. Taplin circulated to the firms which advertised in the years 1955-7 to show that despite the possibility of obtaining some information from the USA the decision to 'go in' was very much a shot in the dark.
Pressure
There are many interesting tables of the size distribution of advertisers and other related matters, but the most interesting point of all, perhaps, emerges from the conclusion. Although there was a noticeable lack of definite answers to the questionnaire concerning reasons for entering TV, it gradually emerged from the analysis that business men were compelled to venture into the new field by increasing pressure from competition due to the gradual ending of wartime shortage. Hence there was an increasing need to boost sales. At the same time alternative media were in short supply, especially with the shortage of newsprint. Consequently one can perceive forces in the economy leading business men to be receptive to the possibility of an alternative medium.
In general this book may be recommended as an interesting study both of the development of commercial TV and of an aspect of decisions taken in conditions of uncertainty.
March 8th, 1962
BEAVER
5
OUR ARTIFICIAL MINDS
"Platform and Pulpit" by G. B. Shaw
(Hart Davis, 30/-)
From this excellent but miscellaneous collectioni merely quote from a very apt section, "On Universities and Education".
"I have a very strong opinion that every university on the face of the earth ought to be levelled to the ground and its foundations sowed with salt.
Universities turn out people with artificial minds. You come here and they turn out your mind and substitute an artificial one. Accordingly, I foresee the complete collapse of our civilisation and we in turn will go back to what will be called the 'Dark Ages',
"You do get a training in communal life that is advantageous and which I should recommend-to a son of mine,
but say 'Be careful about letting them put an artificial mind in you'. As regards the books they want you to read, don't read them.
"Do just enough of your textbooks to prevent yourself being ignominiously thrown out of the university. Steep yourselves in all the revolutionary books. Always learn things controversially. There is a continual plot to teach you one side of a thing dogmatically. To pass an examination never ascertain the truth of any question that is asked. Go to your teacher and ask 'What answer am I expected to make to this question ?'
"Do nothing that is not worth remembering. The man who keeps everything not worth remembering often attains the highest degree. The only thing you can do with such a man is to bury him".
sive. He is not one to cry over spilt milk in the name of "true socialism"; he takes for granted that, since the beginning of the Labour movement, parliamentary socialism, democratic socialism, has been the only context in which social reform can take place in Britain. Thus, if there may be, to many minds, inadequacies in the programmes that Mr. Jay advocates, yet there is no romantic nonsense about the purity of ideals in politics. His care for achieving actual benefits for real people is too great for that.
Too Long
Having said all this, it is necessary to say that the book is too large by half. He thinks it necessary to tread again through much well worn ground about "what socialism
Socialism Reconsidered
by Dr. Bernard Crick
"Socialism in the New Society" by Douglas Jay {Longmans, 35/-)
Mr. Jay has written a large and able book that deserves to remind us that amid the many sad cases of men of great governing ability frustrated by one of the longest oppositions in British political history, his case is among the saddest.
This former fellow of All Souls, who did brilliant work in the Ministry of Supply and the Board of Trade during war-time, who was for a while personal assistant to Mr. Attlee and then Economic and Financial Secretary to the Treasurer,
has, like his leader, the mind and ability of a bom and great administrator, even if he has little taste for the business of Opposition.	_
He gives us a clear picture more authoritative than any in Mr. Crossland's works, of the kind of social and economic policies which would be implemented should the present leadership of the Labour Party come to power. For this alone the book is valuable and worth reading.
Democratic Socialism
The book seeks to state, he tells us, a case for democratic socialism in the world of the 1960's. The world of the 1960's means a great deal to Mr. Jay. He is indeed a progressive moderate; he does not stop to doff his hat to the sacred shibboleths of the past of the Labour movement — indeed he is quite rude to some of them; if at times he appears more of a radical democrat than a socialist, yet he always remains a progres-
Long before the setting up of the Common Market, Italy and France began to develop their depressed areas. The EEC was considered by most as a further stimulant to a process of growth which was gradually nearing the take off stage.
The problems of France and Italy's depressed areas are diametrically different.
The Methods and Experience of Psychoanalysis
ALBERT GORRES
13/6 net
This book is a psychologist's evaluation of classical Freudian theory and practice in the context of the science of psychology in the present day.
Augustine the Bishop
F. VAN DER MEER (Illustrated)
90/-
Augustine the Bishop is a translation of what has long been accepted as the definitive history of Augustine of Hippo's bishopric and the world in which he exercised it. Van der Meer, whose scholarship is widely acclaimed, reveals an acquaintance with archeological and Patristic sources which is unusually fascinating.
SlItED & WARD
9 Lives for Freedom
by Irene Vermes
"Persecution 1961" by Peter Beiieson
{Penguin Special, 2/6d.)
"To the legion of those who are imprisoned, everywhere, for the sake of their ideas — too numerous to be named, too anonymous to be known — these nine lives are dedicated".
The nine case histories vividly represented in this book are drawn from different parts of the world. What happened to Maurice Audin, brilliant lecturer at the university of Algiers? Why cannot Antonio Amat, secretary of the Spanish Socialist Party, be brought to trial? Will South African Patrick Duncan, editor of the anti-Apart-heid newspaper "Contact", be imprisoned again if he openly declares his views?
Same Factor
Although the circumstances of their persecution are different the essential factor for each person is the same; they are guilty only of asserting
Regional Development
by Vittorio Jucker
"Regional Development in the European Economic Community" (P.E.P., 9/6d.)
the first is faced by under-population the other by overpopulation. France suffers from excessive centralisation; one sixth of its population is in Paris, with a quarter of the working population and a third or more of the employment in engineering, metals, chemicals, and so on.
Industrialisation in the Midi and Bretagne is made difficult by the absence of an adequate labour force. Italy's south is faced by an increasing population which can only find employment through emigration in the North. While the rate of growth is high it has not yet been sufficient to solve their problem. The PEP research on the problem facing the two countries and the analysis of the questions are very enlightening.
Problems of regional development have a great importance, even within the framework of the Common Market. The way Italy and France will solve their problems will have great relevance when eventually more underdeveloped countries such as Portugal and Spain join the EEC.
The one snag about the book is the use of outdated statistics especially those concerning Italy. No account is taken of the 1959-61 period, which witnessed the highest rate of growth.
Production increased by roughly 35%, while unemployment declined considerably, particularly in the south. Another thing lacking is any reference to Mattel, the chief of the Italian State Petroleum concern, who through his dynamism and high investment has done much to change the climate of public opinion in favour of industrialising the south.
their rights as human beings to act according to their own beliefs. Only one of these cases could possibly be thought to be a danger to the physical security of the state. Peter Benenson, a London barrister, suggests that where such a threat is thought to exist, asylum abroad should be available as a humane alternative to long years of imprisonment or worse.
Freedom
What must it be like to live in a country where the law is no protection against thuggery, where the government does not defend the rights of the individual but is opposed to them? This is a problem which should concern everybody — these people are suffering for our right to live in our way. "Persecution 1961" was published for Amnesty and is an eloquent plea for freedom.
means", particularly about the inadequacies of Marxism: his treatment of Marx, like Professor Popper's treatment of Plato is to be condemned, not so much for the fact that it is tendentious and unoriginal but for the fact that it is irrelevant to his argument. His two chapters on "War and Peace" should be required reading, for instance, by all members of "The Campaign" who might be still liberal and tolerant enough to consider that there is another argument, and to have some doubts about whether "absolute first principles" have much relevance in politics. But the real heart of the book is in his treatment of problems of economic growth, of taxation policy in relation to welfare services and social justice, and in his treatment of types of social ownership. There is abundant evidence here that even if nationalisation must play some special role in an economy so full of structural rigidities as Great Britain, yet that it is only one method of control — and indeed is itself profoundly ambiguous in its application. Mr. Jay is surely quite right to argue that it is fatuous to think that legal ownership necessarily ensures control, still more that it necessarily ensures economic growth. Those who might doubt that there is an alternative economic policy to the lack of policies of the present administration, or who share the scornful and paradoxical refusal to consider such matters at all of the economic determinists of the English Left, had better read Mr. Jay. It is a pity perhaps that he did not limit the book simply to these closing sections on economic policy. The campaign for shorter books in this short life should never be abondoned.
Mr. Jay, then, is an embattled moderate, someone who stands towards the right of the Labour Party but has not lost the jMlemical zest of old left-wing inspiration. But while one can appreciate that the views of Mr. Jay are an essential part of the Labour movement, one suspects that Mr. Jay makes the same mistake as many of his party comrades whom he attacks: he thinks that his view should be or can be the sole view of the Labour movement. He, like so many, seem to miss the pregnant platitude that the Labour Party is a coalition of diverse elements. This is indeed its very strength. Various types of socialism are essential elements within the movement, but none are sufficient alone. But perhaps in arguing so vigorously for the hegemony of a particular viewpoint, Mr. Jay will have done much to restore a balance in understanding.
6
BEAVER
March 8th, 1962
TWO REVOLUTIONS
by Barry Tomalin
"The French Revolution — from its origins to 1793" by G. Lefebre {Routledge and Kegan Paul, 35/-) "Ten Days That Shook the World" by John Reed
{Lawrence and Wishart, 15/-)
Two books of considerable importance have not been immediately available to the English reading public for many years. Now at last these two great accounts of the revolutions of the Western World have been made accessible through translation and re-issue, filling an important gap in the current English library on these two subjects.
On its publication in 1951, Lefebre's history of the French revolution was considered the finest study of the period ever written. This was largely due to Lefebre's attempt to place the revolution ¦ in a world context and to his awareness and his study of the immensely wide implications that hitherto without filling in the background it had only been possible to hint at. Therefore the first hundred pages are devoted to the explanation of contemporary European thought, economics, and territorial expansion.
This in turn shows far more clearly how the aristocratic revolution of '87-8 turned into a bourgeois victory and denotes a far less clearly defined distinction between the political attitudes of the three estates. The 'new' ideas of the later 18th century were not confined to dissatisfied radicals and Lafayette was not so much of an exception as his personality suggests.
Of course many of these points over the last ten years have become absorbed into standard histories of the revolution but the background and meticulous detail, e.g. the division of the three phases of the revolution and a second revolution in 1792 maintain the stature and importance of the work.
I would suggest that this is still an important work of reference to students in spite of the fact that its scholarship has since been embodied in many standard texts. Elizabeth Moss Evanson's translation retains the excitement of these years.
Excitement is far more directly generated by John Reed's account of the crucial days of the Bolshevik Revolution. Reed was an American Socialist journalist in Petro-grad during this period and he published in 1919 his account of the action. Oddly enough this moving and exciting text chronicling the events from the march of Kornilov on Petrograd in September 1917 to the repulse of the counter revolution in November, has not been reprinted since 1931.
Reed himself was overwhelmed by the size and importance of the movement. Although his critical faculties were alert he brings across the tremendous passion of the rising by his glimpses of the
TRAVELOGUE • Barry Tomalin
"Which Way Did He Go. . by Ronald Searle	[Perpetua, 30/-)
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"As a compensation for not being English, God gave the French Paris; and Paris as everyone knows is a naughty city, which is only to be expected as it is owned by the French".
As Beaverbrook's publicity man in the fight against the Common Market, Ronald Searle would be worth his weight in garlic. "Which way did he go", is a collection of a traveller's sketchings of Britain, France, and the USA. In quick comparison with an Englishman's view of Paris he doubtfully enshrines the traditional virtues of the English way of life crowning all, over the caption "free from infection", with a premonition of 'Angleterre Europeenore'. The carabinieri on his bicycle amusedly watches the antics of a "sorry dear, Honey's off"
waitress dancing on the table to the strains of a guitar played by a bowler-hatted city worker. The common market's eye-view of a London subuib shows at once all that is chic and dowdy in French life.
The astuteness of Searle's observation is phenomenal. With each volume he improves both in style and in perception while maintaining his own stringy but economical sense of line and shape. His views of America are fascinating, notably the sketch
of New York's Bowery, but most impressive of all are his sketches of individuals, the German businessman, the American traffic cop, the 'Kookie' girls of San Francisco, and the teenagers. All these make this one of the most intimate travelogues I have ever come across compiled as it is with the sympathy and insight that marks the great artist.
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soldiery and of the people. His emphasis on the reaction of the common man to a situation in which he truly controlled, and on whom the success or failure of the movement he had taken over depended. Lenin stands as a God in the background and Trotzky as cold and aloof. The heroes are the lieutenants, the watchmaker, and the soldier.
Bolshevik Success
"The only reason for Bol-chevik success lay in their accomplishing the vast and simple desires of the most profound strata of the people calling them to the work of tearing down and destroying the old and afterwards, in the smoke of falling ruins, cooperating with them to erect the framework of the new".
	
	
	
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This earth majes^ Jv	
WHAT. ME WORRYP
by Harry Davis
Mad Publications Ltd.
As the cover has it, "The fourth annual edition of MAD; a sickening collection of humor and satire". Those of us who are familiar with this worthy magazine which constantly cocks a deserved snook at such hallowed American institutions as Madison Avenue, Hollywood, TV, Khrushchev and Castro, will know quite well what they are in for as soon as they pick up this slim five bob's-worth.
I'm not sure just how the sincere, patriotic all-American reacts to such witty yet loving leg-pulls to which he is inflicted by the firm hand of MAD's grinning, idiotic every-man of a mascot, Alfred E. Neuman (also known as "What, me worry?"). But this I know; it does the American public all the good in the world to be shaken out of their sometimes complacent, apathetic "God's Own People" attitude by a very popular magazine which, although immensely humorous on the surface, has the constantly underlying theme of trying to haul the public it cares for out of the garbage can of modern living and into awareness by a firm tug on their metaphorical bootstraps of conscience.
What makes MAD so irrepressible is the fact that it doesn't have to rely on any fickle advertisers for its revenue.
A special bonus in the MAD Annual (which, incidentally, is a selection of all the best skits from last year's issues) comes in the form of a grimly amusing "Sing along with Mad" songbook, "a collection of parody lyrics to 57 old standards which reflect the idiotic world we live in today". Show Biz, the atom, education, business, politics, sport, very little escapes the lashing pen of the brilliant MAD writers. One example, the publisher who confesses to the tune of "If You Knew Suzie" after he has made a fortune printing sensational books about Hitler — "If you knew Hitler like I knew Hitler,
Oh, oh, oh, how he sells! The world's a patsy for this cute Nazi,
So, so, I romanticise this ratsy.
I am so noble to tell of his fate.
But while I'm telling,
Sick folks I exhilarate,
If you knew Hitler, you'd know that Hitler's No, no worse than I".
Pictorial
The words contained in MAD are really supplementary to the pictures, derived from as talented a stable of artists as possible. Practically every drawing contains about
so much irrelevant goings-on in the background to its central theme as occurred in steam radio's late-lamented "Goon Show", so that each frame needs to be examined at length in close detail to derive full benefit from it.
What more is wanted from a humorous book that it should be genuinely humorous and perhaps a little thought-provoking? I for one am entertained by such material, to pick out one section from many worthy of note, as the typical film fan magazine-type review of that 3-star, "superb, but not fabulous" movie, "Lady Chatterley's Accountant" (grading ranges from the 1-star "Magnificent, but not Excellent", to the 5-star "Fantastically Fabulous"). The criticism runs:
"When an accountant named Irving (Ricky Nelson) discovers that his lovely client owes $2.89 in back taxes on her 2-million-acre ranch, the fun really begins. Ricky and Jane sing 56 hit songs, some with accompanying music.
My one grouse about MAD is that it sticks too closely to the obvious targets for satire. If the magazine were as biting about politicians and Little Rock racialists as it is about TV and beatniks, it would be for me the complete antidote to charlatanry and pretentiousness.
March 8th, 1962
BEAVER
SUCCESSFUL PARIS TOUR
a riotous long weekend
At half past six, Friday morning, the red eyed and weary LSE rugby tour party for Paris were assembled. Alas, only 21 players had arrived. One of the party was left dozing in his bed, dreaming, no doubt, of French wine and women, neither of which he was going to sample.
At Orly we were met by the HEC captain and taken to a reception at the college,	. •
consisting of Dubonnet and vin rouge. The Director gave us a friendly welcome. Our captain, Alan Thomas, replied in Cardiff French to the toast.
The afternoon was spent pleasantly by the various	*
members of the party in	^
sampling the joys of Paris,
while a group of us went off to meet Vince Wright, an LSE student, completing his doctorate at Science-Po (ISP)
with whose team he had arranged our second match.
In the evenmg the party split up, some going to Mon-martre, some the left bank,
and some to a strip club.
Victory
Saturday morning, shattered but willing, we all went off to play HEC at the Stade Francais on a frozen, bone-hard pitch. LSE, unused to the conditions, were at an initial disadvantage and after much pressure the French team went into the lead. Dave Prag replied for LSE before half time when the score was 3-3. With the wind behind us in the second half and playing quite well we felt very confident, but HEC surprised us by going into a 9-3 lead with a fine drop goal and a try.
However LSE then put on the pressure. With tries by Rees, Mcleod and Darwin late in the game, the last of which was a verv fine run by the winger, leaving three Frenchmen lying prone on the ground, we came out winners 14-9. Weir successfully converted Rees' try.
Alan Thomas, Dnncan Mac-leod and Steve Pilbeam were the stars of the match, although the whole team played very cred'tably.
The afternoon was less enjoyable, at least for the Englishmen, in that we watched a brilliant France humble England 13-0.
On the Saturday evening HEC gave us a meal in true French style, everybody drinking a great deal and singing songs in both English and French. Afterwards the inebriated were carried home bv the semi-sober comrades to the hotels which French hospitality had provided for us. On arrival one prominent member of the team performed tricks with a bidet for which the makers never intended it.
Versus ESSEC
On Sunday the team ventured out to play: after trailing once more, LS^ came out VFinners by 12-6. The scorers included Weir and Pilbeam (2). LSE should have run up a cricket score aga'nst the mediocre oppos'.t'on but too many passes were dropped or went astray. Once again Alan Thomas and Steve Pilbeam distinguished themselves, and Dai Thomas played superbly at lock.


The ISP hospitality in the evening was just as good as HEC's consisting of Pernod and unlimited quantities of wine. Once again the dinner was superb. The English captain as always led the British singing admirably and everyone enjoyed themselves immensely.
On Monday the opposition was ESSEC, the weakest team of the three played. Over-confidence and fatigue brought about LSE's downfall. Many of the fifteen were playing their fourth game in six days — and it showed.
As the party spl't up and went their different ways in London, the memories of those who could still remember anything were very full.
Our only regret was, that, through lack of finances;, we shall not be able to entertain our foreign visitors in the same expansive manner as they did us.
Dave Prag
RENEWED SUCCESS
On February 14th the college cross country team did well to finish 5th out of 18 teams in the SWETS trophy race. Dave Bagshaw was 8th in overall position.
On the following Wednesday Bagshaw finished 15th in the Northern Junior Championships. Unfortunately he fractured his leg in the process and will be out of athletics for some time.
In a University League Match on the 22nd of February — the last league match of the season — LSE did well to finish in 5th place.
In the Hyde Park Relay LSE were the 3rd London college home ahead of both King's and UC.-
A victory over Borough Road was undoubtedly the finest success of the season. The team had 7 men in the first ten and Harvatt finished second.
GOLF CLUB
The golf club played one of their few fixtures on Wednesday, 21st February. With a much depleted team the college managed to draw with UC whilst losing heavily to King's.	-
Both Fielding and Kessel
—	the mainstays of the side
—	lost to their UC opponents, but Sheasby and Wright won their matches in fine style.
Unless the wintry conditions prevent it the golf club has one more match against King's next week.
There are, in addition, the internal competitions still to be played. It is regrettable that several beginners who joined at the start of the season have not taken advantage of the facilities.
It seems to be a member of the golf club is of greater 'status' value than to actually play the game itself.
NO CHANGE
The final of the LSE Table Tennis Championship was, as last year, between Stevenson and Oyediran.
As last year, Oyed'ran, claying below his best, lost 3 games to 1; Stevenson managing, by a combination of fiendish sponge and uncharacteristically accurate hitting to exploit Oyediran's weakness on the backhand.
The tournament produced no surorises; all four seeds reached the semi-finals with Mehta providing the only ser'ous threat when he narrowly lost to Williamson in the quarter-finals.
The Club entered five players in the University Championships. None of these distinguished themselves in the singles but Stevenson and Williamson defeated the third seed to reach the semi-final of the doubles. They were then smashed by the eventual \vinners.
President*s Column
As it is some little time since I wrote a column and as the year is now well under way, I feel that it is time I brought certain matters to the attention of the readers of "Beaver".
So far this year the records of the clubs have shown an improvement on last year. I would like to congratulate the Men's Hockey Olub on their fine record in both the League and Cup. The Basketball Club also appear to be maintaining the tradition in the University that we are one of the top colleges.
A noticeable exception is the Association Football Club who have so far had a disappointing season. Much attention has been drawn to the activities of the club both on and off the field in previous editions of "Beaver" and I do not intend to reiterate all that has been said.
Poor Attendance
My personal opinion is that the trouble was all a storm in a teacup and was aggravated by the fact that the 1st team were having a bad run in the League. I sincerely hope that the ill feeling in the club has now disappeared.
It would appear that the officials of certain clubs do not check their notice-boards to see when the executive committee meetings take place. Either that or they are just not interested in the running of the Athletic Un'on, as the attendances at executive meetings has, on the whole, been poor.
The Fencing Club has yet to attend one meeting and others such as Badminton, Basketball, Boat, Table Tennis and YHA have attended only one of the first six meetings.
BADMINTON
At last the badminton club appears to be gaining one or two of the successes which it seems to deserve. The second team has won its last two league matches against SOAS and the College of Estate Management.
In the former game the victory was by 5 games to 4, in the latter an overwhelming 9 goals to nil.
The 1st team has been less successful but the defeat by QMC by 5 games to 4, was rather unlucky.
Star Material
The Club is very proud — even if somewhat amazed, by the achievement of one of its ladv members — Sydney Shakespeare — who is over here on a one year course from Canada.
In the ULU Badminton championships held last week Svdney gained a place in the finals of the Ladies' Singles. This final is to be placed off on Monday, March 12th. In getting into the final unseeded, Miss Shakespeare defeated the No. 2 and No. 4 seeds.
Mixed Doubles
In addition to this, Shakespeare and Little are still in the Mixed Doubles event. The results of both these matches could be of important prestige value to LSE.
W.
This surely shows a certain apathy amongst these clubs and as all the business of the Athletic Union is conducted at these meetings it is not surprising that the big clubs, who attend regularly, tend to have more say than the smaller clubs. Each section has one vote in these meetings regardless of the number of members.
This year our sport faculties are being used more than I have ever known them to be used in the past, but I cannot stress enough the fact that all too few people take an active part in sport in the college.
Only about 150 to 200 people become members of the Athletic Union which, in a college of this size, is, I think, very disappointing.
Open Day
We will soon be starting to finalise the arrangements for our annual 'Open Day' which this year will be held on Saturday, June 16th.
I would be grateful for any suggestions as to how to make this event even more enjoyable than it has been in the past.
This event is supported by the same hard core of people each year and as we provide free iransport and tea I can see no reason why more people do not attend.
Mike Shuttleworth
SAILING CLUB
The Racing Captain of the Sailing Club resigned on grounds of ill-health last week. Tony Langlois, the ex-captain, does not believe he can combine the efficient execution of his fairly onerous duties with those he has as President of the Wine and Food Society. When asked if it was a case of preferring Sybarism to Sport, Mr. Langlois said no. He felt, however, that his departure from the position of Racing Cantain would leave a smaller vacuum than his resignation from the Wine and Food Society would. And in view of his examination commitments and ill-health one of them had to go. Members of the Wine and Food Society should, therefore, now, receive his undivided attentions.
His successor is as yet unknown, but should be appointed in the near future.
Arrangements for the Sailing Club visit to the Norfolk Broads are well under way. There are still several places left and anyone wishing to go should apply to G J. Stevens.
W.K.
EXECUTIVE MEETINGS CONCERN YOU and YOUR CLUB
— please attend
8
BEAVER
March 8th, 1962
'West Side Story'
Act
I o n
Colour and Zest
Vladimir Mayakovsky
'The Bed-Bug'
Three years acquaintance with "West Side Story" has not dimmed its electrifying excitement but the film, through the tremendous power which it embodies, evokes an impression of paralysing savagery. It glitters not with the sequins on the dress in the bridal shop but with the gleaming blade of Bernardo's flick knife.
"You was never of my age, none of you, and the sooner you get hip to us, the sooner you'll dig us". The emphasis is on the social problem with its connotations of racism ard delinquency which overshadows to a degree the basic "Romeo and Juliet" theme. Hence the lyricism of the stage score is less in evidence. The 'Jets', a teenage gang fighting to drive the immigrant Puerto Ricans off their 'territory', are more juvenile than in the stage show, and the melodrama and the fantasy of the dance scenes (notably the street fight that opens the film) seems feasible where a direct translation from the romance of the stage would probably have seemed unreal.
Adult Treatment
This adult treatment is shown also through the Sharks, the P-Rs. For Bernardo (George Chakiris), the conflict which is just a game to kids 'for whom trouble is a relief, becomes a festering > sore in a fight for acceptance. The screenplay matches the attitudes in a way that the stage did not always achieve. The 'Cool' routine which takes place in a basement garage lighted by lorry headlamps is almost harrowing in its ferocity and the scene where Anita tries to warn Tony that he is being hunted shows a depth of hatred, expressed through the rhythm of the action, which startles.
Weakness
It would be a mistake to turn "West Side Story" into a sociological study but certainly there is an awareness of wider implications than the stage suggested. Perhaps this is due to a weakness in the romantic parts. Richard Bey-mer as Tony is but a poor exponent of the ail-American toothy grin and Natalie Wood as Maria, though a fine actress is not sufficiently confident to lead the orchestra in the 'Tonight' duet and only comes into her own vocally
CORRECTION
The advertisement, which appeared in the February 22nd issue of "Beaver", concerning sailings to America, contained the following omissions :
There are two additional sailing dates:
May 30,1962 June 19, 1962.
Also, enquiries regarding these sailings should be addressed to:
PHIL STRASBURG c/o FRANK KIRBY 62 WELBECK ST.,
W.l.
in the recitative 'I have a love'. In addition certain Hollywood 'effects' over-romanticise the scenes although, thank goodness, the charm still works.
Press Applauds
The press audience applauded the dance sequences. With no form containing proscenium and the opportunities for wide tracking and infinite angle shots that the cinema provides, the opportunities for freedom of movement are greatly increased and the camera shows an 'avant-garde' awareness of the potentialities of its subject.
Rita Moreno as Anita is almost as good as Chita Rivera and Jerome Robbins has made a thousand small changes in the choreography to retain its freshness.
individuality
Perhaps it could have been done better. Although Maria is ideally portrayed by Natalie Wood, Richard Beymer is weak. Hence the basic plot is not as strong as it should be. Nevertheless, with Robbins guiding hand, the production has action, colour, and zest and, even though it follows so closely on the heels of the show, it retains magnificent individuality.

i
"Sharks" and "Jets" play it cool in "West Side Story"
'The Last Goddess'
or
(Waiting for Cat las)
"Drop you here, shall I?" asked the taxi-driver, sticking his head out of the cab to survey the almost stationary line of cars ahead. "Never seen it like this. Normally you can drive right up to the entrance with no difficulty at all".
I shivered as I crossed the icy wastes in front of the Festival Hall straining imaginary nerves to keep my bouffant hair-do intact as capricious winds blew from the Thames. Wind and water were forgotten inside the glowing foyer, warm with the scent of fur coats and glossy programmes. Conversation in the bar and restaurant was high-pitched and nervous. People talked to relieve the solitary anguish of anticipation. Their movements were unco-ordinated as they clambered up the aisles into their seats as if each one were battling against unseen dangers which might arise between the bar and their seat. Voluble Greeks developed last-minute coughs, but they were soon suppressed as the audience grudgingly accepted the tedious preliminary of the first overture. The applause that followed seemed to indicate hysterical relief rather than any heartfelt appreciation.
3,000 People
Three thousand people strained forward in their seats as the lights were dimmed one by one. The softness of this
climactic darkness acted as a mild sedative on the audience who waited. Every man was alone with his frisson as the spotlight haloed the entrance of the goddess. She stood motionless for a few moments, her arms hugging her slender body, her head slightly bowed, and four thousand people worshipped.
The wind blew little grey swirls on the Thames, and the lights of the Shell building flickered once or twice as La Callas sang "Ocean, thou mighty monster" and white flowers lay at her feet.
Jeannette Weitz (By one who worshipped)
Vladimir Mayakovsky is the outstanding Russian poet of this century, yet he is virtually unknown in the Eng-lish-speaking world. The Moscow of the 'twenties, in which he lived, was a centre for all that was most avante-garde in the arts. Numerous literary movements developed, each claiming to represent the only form worthy of the dictatorship of the proletariat. They vied with each other for the official approval of the Communist Party and the Arts Commissar Lunachevsky. Unfortunately none of them succeeded and with the publication of the first Five Year Plan the tasteless philistines of Socialist Realism was adopted as the only form which could embody the legitimate aspirations of the victorious proletariat.
After the disastrous civil war Lenin introduced his New Economic Policy (NEP), a programme of small-scale capitalism, in an attempt to put the country back on its feet again. The slogal was; "We must take one pace backwards before we can take two forwards". When Mayakovsky wrote "The Bedbug" the first of these steps forward had just begun. NEP had been superceded by the first Five Year Plan. Mayakovsky had been an active and enthusias-tice supporter of the revolution since 1917 and it is possible to read into the satire of the first part of the play some of the disillusion in human nature that the NEP excesses provoked.
The play tells the story of the marriage of a social-climbing worker, Scrofulov-sky, to a petty-bourgeois hairdresser's daughter. Unfortunately, an accident during the riotous wedding causes a fire in which all but the groom perish. He falls through into a cellar whore he is refrigerated for fifty years to be resurrected into the brave new Communist society of 1979. His habits of smoking, swearing and drinking create such havoc in this aseptic world that he is finally classified, not as 'homo sapiens' but as 'suburbianus vulgaris', a parasite and put into the zoo as food for the sole surviving bedbug that had been brought back to life with him.
The
Controversy
controversy over the
'Linda di Chamounix'
"Linda di Chamounix" is one of Donizetti's lesser known operas, being performed by the Music Society next week. For once, though, its ueglect (as far as we can ascertain, this will be its first English performance since 1847) bears no relationship to its merits but is largely due to its lack of detachable display arias.
"Linda" is the inspired product of many weeks browsing in London's public libraries by Michael Graubart, our musical director, a mathematics teacher by day who dons the baton as dusk falls. Based on a simple love story it is astonishingly devoid of the usual operatic absurdities. No 'deusex machina', saves the entangled librettist from an untimely demise in his own spider's web, no one turns out
to be anyone else's long lost mother, and only one male part is played by a female.
Certain features, however, await treatment by Anna Russell. The hero is a viscount who marries a simple village girl and suffers from a heavy mother fixation. Linda's relationship with Pierotto, the wandering minstrel boy (contralto) is equivocal in the extreme and everyone comes under the influence of the father figure (with prep-school overtones?) of the prefect.
But the music's the thing! The cast of full time students headed by Elisheva Landman, ex-LSE law student turned professional singer, and Alan Armstrong, a Cambridge choral scholar, flow through the superb tunes of Donizetti's greatest lyrical inspiration.
play has been caused by doubt as to where the author's sympathies were. To non-communist audiences and according to the recent Mermaid production the play's main purpose is to ridicule the sterilised regimented communist world of tomorrow whose seeds were apparent in the Soviet Russia of 1928. Human emotions and passions are no more than a vague unpleasant memory, 'falling in love' is a disease and dancing an epidemic. The inhabitants speak in unison, think in unison but are still susceptible to the 'vicious habits' that characterise the hero. Whereas the Tambov of the 'twenties, though sordid and poverty-stricken, is comprehensible and the Scrofulovsky is both plausible and sympathetic. Bernard Levin summing up this point of view claimed that Mayakovsky's message was that "The individual counts far more than the mass".
The opposing view was presented by the Soviet production in Moscow in 1957 and argued recently by Kenneth Tynan in "The Observer". They claim that Mayakovsky intended to ridicule the deception and tawdry 'spivery' of NEP Russia. "We satirise what we call the birthmarks of capitalism. Even when The Bedbug has been shown how society ought to be, he still wants the old system. So he must be educated". This was the explanation provided by the Russian producer.
Explanation
Neither of these explanations is entirely satisfactory. The real solution probably lies deeper. Mayakovsky supported the revolution because he thought it would both improve the physical conditions of the vast mass of the population and bring about a radical change in human nature, in peoples' attitudes to one another. In the event he was proved wrong; just by the sordid speculation and trashi-ness of NEP. Then by the seeds of bureaucratic dictatorship that were apparent in the first Five Year Plan. He supported neither Tambov in the 'twenties nor the 'World Federation of Communist States', Scrofulovsky is the personification of all those negative characteristics that are at once understandable and harmful. His desire to better himself socially by marrying into the petty-bourgeois, his preoccupation with the cheap and artificial romanticism of love stories and pop-songs, his drinking, smoking, swearing, these are the habits and attitudes that will have to be eradicated before any attempt can be made to build a new and better society. These attributes, typical of a deprived working class are the real hindrance to the building of communism rather than right deviationism, bourgeois formalism and all the other crimes of the Stalinist calendar. And they cannot be cured by Stalinist measures, bv repression and control. Mayakovsky does not suggest any positive solution in "The Bedbug" but, true to the main thread that runs right through Russia literature, he is concerned with eradicating the "vulgarity from the Russian soul".
Alastair N. D. McAudla)
Published by Hie Students' Union, London School of Fxonomics and Political Science' University of London. Printed by Albert Clark & Co. Ltd, (t.u.), Waterloo Road, I-ondon, N.\V,2