College News, 1937-12-01, Vol. 24, No. 08

              The College News
VOL. XXIV, No. 8
BRYN MAWR AND WAYNE, PA., WEDNESDAY,
DFCFMRFR    1     1<H7        Copyright-TRUSTEE8  OF
UCV.CMDEK    I,    1VJ/    BRYN   MAWR   COLLEGE.   1t37
PRICE 10 CENTS
Dimnet Describes
�'My Two Worlds,'
France,   America
Early Life Was One of Books,
Trips to U. S. Introduced
Him to Reality
COMPARES CULTURES
OF THE TWO NATIONS
Goodhart, November 22.�"My old
world was one of books; my new
world introduced me to reality," said
Canon Ernest Dimnet, the famous
French writer and psychologist, who
spoke on My Two Worlds: France, his
native country, and America, the
country "which I annexed."
The "old world" of his early life
was both secluded and literary. He
lived in a tiny provincial town, sur-
rounded by forests. There was no
train and little communication with
the outside world. The child made
his escape partly through nature but
especially through books. The lit-
tle village was a literary one. The
saintly parish priest wrote novels.
His uncle, who was also a priest, en-
couraged him to read, and, when he
was ten, gave him a copy of Vol-
taire's Historie de Charles XII, at a
time when Voltaire was being de-
nounced by the church. "There are
20 M. de Voltaires," he informed his
nephew, "you may read this one."   (
School brought him no closer to real
life. In those days, he remarked, "a
French Catholic school was a sort of
monastery; a French public school a
sort of barracks." There were no
sports, no form of community life,
and very little comfort of any kind.
The whole day, from five to nine, with
two hours out for meals, the boys
spent in study. The subjects were
chiefly classical or literary, and were
chosen without reference to the boy's
individual taste or future career: pup-
ils training to be priests had to learn
dramatic criticism in order to pass
the government examinations. Above
all, they were trained to be apprecia-
tive rather than creative; and they
were taught nothing to prepare them
for life.
Even after his ordination and the
beginning of his career as a writer
and a student of English culture, Can-
on Dimnet felt that he was still "de-
veloping within books" rather than by
actual experience. His initial contact
with his 4<new world" was to come
in 1908, when he made a first visit
to America as the guest of Colonel
George Harvey, the editor of the
North American Review, to which he
was contributing a quarterly letter.
This first trip impressed him very
Continued on Page Three
Sly via Wright, '38, as Rosencrantz;
Sarah T. Meigs,
Mary Dimock, '39, as Gildencrantz;
'39, a* Hamlet
Cast of Hamlet
The News regrets that the follow-
ing cast of Hamlet was omitted in the
write-up in the last issue:
Hamlet............Sarah  Meigs,  '39
Horatio............Mary  Meigs;  '39
Rosencrantz......Sylvia  Wright,  '38
Gildencrantz.......Mary Dimock, '39
Ophelia........Augusta   Arnold,   '38
Claudius.........Prisdilla Curtis, '40
Gertrude..........Huldah Cheek, '38
Polonius..........Vrylena Olney, '40
Hamlet's  Ghost
F. Robinson  Hoxton, '38
President   of   the   University   of
Wittenberg.....Dorothea Peck,. '39
Laertes.......Margaret Howson,  '38
Player King.. .Margaret Howson, '38
Player Queen... Hildegarde Hunt, '41
Third  Player......Susan  Miller,  '40
ROCKEFELLERITES PLAN
A    CHRISTMAS   DANCE
Thirty-five couples and 25 stags
will attend a Christmas hall dance at
Rockefeller on Saturday, December 11.
It will be the first hall dance of the
year and the fifth that Rockefeller has
given since it introduced the now
popular custom to the campus. The
faculty guests are Mr. and Mrs. Bern-
heimer, Mr. and Mrs. Dryden; Miss
Lake and Mr. David.
Music will be provided by Frankie
Day and his orchestra, which comes
from Philadelphia, and has played at
the University of Pennsylvania
dances. Since the program is to fea-
ture a guitar-solo by Frankie and
singing by the drummer, a special AC
current wire has been brought from
Goodhart  for proper amplification.
The dance will begin at 7.30 with
a buffet supper and close at 12.
Those with escorts have the privilege
of remaining out until two.
November 'Lantern' Best in Four Years,  ,
Neither Obscure Nor Dull, Says Miss Walsh
Its Poetry Achieves Originality
Of Expression, Springs From
Real    Emotion
(Especially contributed by Miss
Dorothy Walsh.)
I have read the Lantern faithfully
for the last four years and this copy
of November, 1937, appears to me to
be the best that I have seen. The
editors are to be congratulated. They
have, successfully met the criticism
of the past. The November Lantern
is neither obscure nor dull.
To begin with the prose�Isota
Tucker's story is conspicuously good.
This is splendidly condensed, vigorous,
objective and effective writing. It
leaves me very curious to know if the
author has mastered one particular
type of expression only or if, con-
fronted with the problem, she could
present in different  ;------   ^S^MflAf
ence which moves to a different
rhythm.    1
Dorothy Counselman has conceived
a very interesting idea as the theme
for her story. Unfortunately every-
thing is too thoroughly explained here.
The total effect would be greatly
strengthened by condensation and by
presentation of, rather than statement
about, the change which time has
effected.
Eleanor Bailenson has a splendid
sense of detail and a fine eye for set-
ting. The characterization is weak in
comparison to the scene. We are
told that Anna experiences aesthetic
satisfaction, bitter resentment, sullen
determination, eager hope and blank
despair, but we do not feel this in the
convincing vivid way in which we see
the slums, the street urchins, the
wharf, the water.
We were amused by Suzette Wat-
son's satire on psycho-literary re-
search.
The poetry of the Lantern is good.
All of these poems achieve originality
of expression without obscurity. They
are, moreover, quite definitely the
product of genuine emotion.
Unfortunately I cannot appreciate
the prize poem as it deserves because1,
Lat whatever angle I look at him, I
cannot see Thomas in any angel-
haunted sanctuary. Surely this is
Bonaventura�or maybe it's only T. S.
Eliot. In spite of this intellectual
difficulty I appreciate the fact that
the poem is well written.
Conviction and The Mystery are
good but slight. Ut Quid? is excellent
Continued on Pace Tnjee
Russian Revolution
Is Subject of Movie
Two   Educational   Films   Deal
With Dust Storms and Mail;
Auden    Poem    Read
PHOTOGRAPHY IS CLEAR
Goodhart TJall, November 18 and
18.�Three more English movies were
shown this week, on Tuesday The End
of St. Petersburg and on Thursday
The Plough Tluit Broke the Plains and
Night Mail. The first, a Russian film
made by Pudovkin in 1924, follows the
methods of Griffiths, but is a great
improvement over the jerky excite-
ment of last week's Birth of a Nation.
The other two, both government-made,
illustrate further development in
cinema technique; clearer photogra-
phy, swifter movement, and vitaphone.
They also show that even the sober
governments of Great Britain and
the United States are not above blow-
ing their own trumpets now and
again.
The End of St. Petersburg is an ac-
count of the revolutionary movement
from 1916 until the Soviets overthrew
Kerensky's military government in
1918. It begins with shots of a peas-
ant's home, empty pails, broken door-
sills and weather-beaten faces. A
child is born, more shots of poverty-
stricken conditions and two of the
peasants setting out for St. Petersburg
to find work. They are photographed,
at a long distance, plodding down a
huge stretch of road with clouds
�.gathering above them. So throughout
the picture which moves slowly from
angle-shot to angle-shot, emotion is
built up by significant symbols.
The audience for whom this movie
was intended could not read and such
devices had to portray the meaning of
the action. Again and again the
Czar's statue, with the upraised hooves
of his charger in the foreground, is
flashed across the screen between
scenes of oppression and starvation.
Close-ups of workers' faces constantly
reappear in strike crowds, in their
filthy homes, in the glare of the steel
mills, shouting, fighting, marching
and dying. A parallel of an army at-
tack and a stock market boom are
played against each other with such
eloquence that English captions are
unnecessary and even annoying.
No single figure stands out, no at-
tempt is made at characterization, but
the movie achieves immense dramatic
feeling of group emotion and move-
ment. Pudovkin had little material
to work with, and only two profes-
Contlnued on Pa*e Three
COLLEGE CALENDAR
Thursday, December 2.�Non-
Resident supper. Common Room.
Friday ayd Saturday, Decem-
ber 3 and 4.�Players' Club and
members of Princeton Theatre
In time, A BiU of Divorcement,
8.20 p. m.
Saturday, December 4.�Col-
lege Dance. Gymnasium. After
the play.
Monday,. December 6.�Art
Club tea in honor of Miss Flor-
ence Waterbury. Common Room.
Industrial Group supper, Com-
mon Room 6,30.
Thursday, December 9.�A. S.
U. meeting. Common Room.
Saturday, December 11.�
Rockefeller Dance. Merion
Dance.
Sunday, December 12.�
Christmas Service.
Monday, December 13.�Dean-
ery party.
Tuesday, December 14.�Sum-
mer Camp party. Common
Room. 4-6.
Wednesday, December 15.�
Maids' party.    Gymnasium.
Friday, December 17-January
3.�Christmas vacation.
Panofsky  Traces
Neo-Platonic   Ideas
In  Medici  Chapel
Michelangelo   Depicts   Struggle
Of Soul Against Matter
Throughout   Life
FIGURES SYMBOLIZE
CLASSICAL CONFLICT
Princeton Actors Reveal
Impressions   of   College
Intimate    Interview   Shows   Astute
Criticism of Ourselves
League Sponsors Sale
The Bryn Mawr League an-
nounces that on Wednesday and
Thursday of this week they will
sponsor a sale of handicraft
work, offered by the Southern
Highlanders, an organization
representing small southern
cWhmunities. League proceeds
will go to the Bryn Mawr Sum-
mer Camp. The articles will be
displayed near the Pembroke
East bookshop.
So seldom does an unattached
Princeton man darken Rockefeller
arch, that it is with a certain amount
of interest that we now consider the
members of the Princeton Intime who
are playing in A Bill of Divorcement.
In the past the Players' Club has held
a firm monopoly on fellow actors, but
we hope that the following intimate
fxpo.se will eliminate any such unfair-
ness. After a careful survey of the
field,,, we drew up these revealing
questions. Firs� we asked about their
own interests and activities (see
H. T. M. F. A. I. P. and note be-
low), then more boldly what they
thought of us, and lastly, with'an ill-
concealed glint in our eye, what they
thought of LOVE.
The first, Clyde Hubbard, #'38, ju-
venile lead, has been in several other
Intime productions and last summer
joined the Farragut Players at Rye
Beach, N. Y. Comedy is his forte
and some day he hopes to grace the
silver screen. When we inquired if
he thought this play gave him an op-
portunity for experience, he replied
ambiguously, "Well, you are bound
to learn something."
He is still looking for his Ideal
Woman who, quaintly enough, must
not smoke. To his dispassionate eye,
New Jersey Teachers' College seems
as good as any but tact forced him
to add that as yet he knows little
of Bryn Mawr and hopes to learn
more.
Sandford Etherington, '39, started
his stage career as Malvolio, at Gro-
ton, and progressed to more serious
parts in such dramas as Time of
Their Lives and The Whole Town's
Talking with the Intime. This or-
ganization, he explained, is run by
students who are willing to give most
of their time to it. Their plays are
selected carefully by the president and
guidance is afforded them during pro-
duction by a faculty advisor.
With usual masculine astuteness,
he remarked on the dungarees worn
Continued on P�*e Two
In his last lecture, Professor Pa-
nofsky traced the final effects of neo-
Pla^onism in Michelangelo's work be-
fore his reconciliation with Christian-
ity. He considered in detail, as the
two best examples of this phase, the
Medici Chapel and a series of draw-
ings made for Thomaso Cavalieri in
connection with the chapel.
The Medici Chapel,"Ofce the tomb of
Julius II, did not materialize as it
had been planned. The definitive pro-
gram embodied the ideas in the tomb
of Julius. The new sacristy of Lo-
renzo was to be used for the younger
generation after his death. In the first
plan, four tombs were to be united
in one structure, but this was given
up in favor of two double tombs on
either side wall, one for the Duci, the
| other for the Magnifici. The ultimate
solution was found, however, by allot-
ting the side walls to the Duci alone
in a curious combination of double
wall tombs and altar-piece.
Above the sarcophagi, a madonna
flanked by saints was envisaged, with
river-gods on the sides. In addi-
tion, the side walls would have shown
statues of Earth and Heaven in the
niches flanking Juliano, and Truth and
Justice as counterparts for Lorenzo.
On top of the pilasters, were to be
empty thrones and two crouching
children; and frescoes were planned
for the lunettes above the tombs.
In the chapel as it was achieved,
each ducal tomb depicts the neo-Pla-
tonic apotheosis conceived by Ficcino.
Therefore, since in neo-Platonism the
human soul imprisoned in the body
is like the soul in Hades, the four
river gods which adorn the tombs may
be the four rivers of Hades. These
stand for all the evils which spring
from a single source, matter, and
would therefore signify the four-fold
aspect of matter enslaving the soul
on  its birth into  the  world.
If the river gods stand for mat-
ter, the corresponding figures of the
times of day stand for the terrestrial
world, and Dawn, Day, Evening and
Night are intended to designate Time.
The four times of day depict the life
on earth as actual suffering, and are
co-essential with the four humors
which determine the body, just as
Fire,- Earth, Air, and Water corre-
spond to four temperaments in the
neo-Platonic system.
The images of Juliano and Lorenzo
emerge from the inner realms of mat-
ter. They are impersonal in charac-
ter, neither portraits nor personifica-
tions. They do, however, denote a
definite contrast, the antithesis be-
tween Juliano representing the active
life, and Lorenzo, the contemplative.
According to neo-Platonic concepts,
Continued on  Page  Four
Are Taylor Busts to Go?
The Committee on Buildings
and Grounds is planning to do
some painting in Taylor Hall.
They also plan to remove the
busts if the college does not ex-
press a definite desire to have
them retained.    Miss Park will
aember 2, on the subject of the
busts, and the College News will
issue a polite questionnaire to
the members of .the faculty the
same day to/ascertain public
opinion, and /will pass around
lists for i|ndergraduates to
check.
Mrs.  Gilbreth   to   Advise   Students
(The  following  was  given  to   the
News by the Dean's Office.)
Mrs. Lillian M. Gilbreth, Vocational
Adviser in the Bureau of Recommftn^
dations, vrill be at the college from
Tuesday, November thirtieth, through
Thursday, December second. She will
speak to the seniors and graduate
students at a reception in the Dean-
ery on Tuesday evening and to the
freshmen on Wednesday evening.
Mrs. Gilbreth will have interviews in
the office of the Dean on Wednesday
and Thursday morning and any stu-
dent who wishes to confer with  her
,_,  tw-----u�              l�hpuld   sign  on   the   lists   posted   on
speak m cnap*            rJ^#*?T^   t-e bulletin board outside the Dean's
office.
Mrs. Gilbreth will return to^Bryn
Mawr for a longer visit early in the
Becond semester. At this time the
sophomores and juniors who are in-
terested will be invited to meet her
and students may again sign for in-
terviews.