The Thresher (Houston, Tex.), Vol. 40, No. 21, Ed. 1 Friday, December 5, 1952 Page: 3 of 8
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FRIDAY, DECEMBER 5, 1952
THE THRESHER
Three
1HRESHER DECEMBER LI1ERARY SUPPLEMEN1
A Monthly Publication of
THE RICE THRESHER
Edited By JAMES KORGES
to-
Volume 1, Number 2
Friday, December 5, 1952
The Reincarnation of Caldwell.
a a
By Ann Coe
The eight-ten was packed with the overflow of exhausted and die-
hard weekend vacationers, and I was forced to squeeze and wedge my way
past fishing rods and sunburns to drop in the only vacant seat available—
to Caldwell. He had folded his Times in the usual Chappaqua to Manhat-
tan fashion which leaves the stock reports on the top and the editorial on
the bottom and had obviously been
computing the inexplicable bounc-
ings of American Tel and Tel because
there were small, neat figures in red in the
margin. I knew Caldwell by sight, because
of our joint eight-ten excursions into the
city, and so far, had carefully avoided him
because of a chance remark dropped by
Talby, my habitual comrade on the ride.
"Bookkeeper," Talby had snapped. "Has an
ulcer he likes to talk about." And then in
"a rare flash of insight, "Couldn't get along
without it." It didn't occur me to question
this judgment because Talby knew every-
one on the eight-ten. It was his religion.
Caldwell lowered his paper and greet-
ed me with a friendly smile of recognition
as I eased myself into the familiar green
"^plush.
"Crowded," he murmured pleasantly,
peering into my face with anxious puppy
eyes to see if this remark were pleasing
to my present state of mind. I felt an almost
overpowering desire to pat him on the head.
When he ascertained by my equally
pleasant reply that "It certainly was," and
the fact that my Times still remained
in my pocket (I had read it at breakfast)
that I was not only going to bite him, but
that I was obviously ripe for conversational
plucking, he folded his Times happily and
wedged himself deeper into his seat with
a sigh of satisfaction.
My fallacy "had been in perusing my
Times over my coffee so that now I was
bankrupt for an occupation. I surrendered
myself to the situation.
"Too bad we don't find time for things
like that," he' said, indicating the now dor-
mant crowd with a nod of his globular head.
"Used to do quite a bit of fishing myself
up on Saranac; but with a wife and family
it's kind of hard to pull your nose away
from the grindstone even for a weekend."
He surveyed mer again intently, and
feeling that a reply was necessary for his
well being, I grunted in agreement.
Engulfed with satisfaction as my ap-
parent willingness to be talked to, he re-
laxed and threw himself into the conversa-
tion with gusto.
"The thing about little jaunts like that
is that besides being enjoyable, they're so*
beneficial to your health. Take me, for
instance, I've got a terrific ulcer that I've
had for years." He stopped to be sure the
full implication of the statement had got-
ten across to me, and when I immediately
dropped a mask of sympathy ever my face,
he went on happily. "The doctor says that
getting away from the job for a couple
of days every month would be the best
thing in the world for me. But, 'like I
said before, when you've got hungry mouths
to feed, weekend jaunts are pretty well out."
He stared out the window for a min-
ute, lost in contemplation, and then return-
ed magnetically to his subject.
"It's quite an-impediment to my work
too. A man just can't give his all to a job
when he's got. something like that hanging
around."
% This time he turned completely side-
ways in his seat and anxixously searched
my face for a sign of agreement. When *
I had complied, he subsided peacefully.
"No," he agreed ^with himself happily,
"when you're burdened with a damned thing
like this, you just can't jump up and grab
the top rungs of the ladder the wag* these
stronger fellows do. Whether you like it
ofnot, you're going to be a plodding rut for
the rest of your life." His sigh this time
was obviou^ satisfaction.
I grunted again in the same vein and
waited.
"The thing that really hurts is the
(Continued Overleaf)
... Homage to Picasso
... Book Review...
LANGUAGE AS GESTURE. Twenty-one
Essays in the Art and Elucidation of
Modern Poetry. By R. P. Blackmur.
440 pp. New York: Haucourt, Brace
and Company. $5.75.
By Willard Thorp
This book is not milk for babes. In an
age when literary criticism has become a
highly specialized profession, with many
excellent practitioners, Mr. Blackmur is
known as one of the most learned and exact-
ing craftsmen of his guild. Even those of
us who read these collected essays as they
appeared singly in the reviews now have
to go to work again, trying once more to
get the gist of what he is saying, and judg-
ing, sentence by sentence, whether it is true.
The difficulties arise from three habits of
his disposition, for it is more disposition
than method.
Blackmur's approach to a work of art
is avowedly technical (see 'A Critic's Job of
Work" in this volume), but his criticism
seldom stays at the explicative level, as
does that of Cleanth Brooks or Allen Tate.
No sooner has he made an observation which
clears up the poet's intention, than he
makes a leap to what he calls "technique
on the plane of intellectual and emotional
patterns" and from that to the "technique
of securing and arranging and representing
a fundamental view of life." These leaps,
which are like a sudden coming—about into
the wind, leave the reader wondering which
tack Blackmur is on now and just what the
sea-mark is anyway.
Another difficulty is Blackmur's de-
light in paradox, which impels him to turn
an idea on its head and to see if it looks
better that way, and, what is even more
puzzling, his habit of expressing an idea
in several different forms. One must admit
that these ways of getting at his subject,
baffling though they may be, often turn
By James Chillman Jr.
A little over a year ago, on October 25, 1951, Pablo Picasso, l'enfant
terrible of contemporary art, reached his seventieth birthday. That the
achievement of seven-tenths of a century should be marked in some special
manner, the Institute of Contemporary Arts of London held an exhibition
in Dover Street which reviewed Picasso's life as an artist, by means of
a well-chosen collection of drawings
and watercolors. This series of seven-
ty-seven works begins with a study
in conte pencil made when Picasso was
twelve years of age and already a student
at the School of Fine Arts in Corunna,
Spain. The series ends with drawings done
in 1950 and early in 1951.
Reproductions of the entire collection
together with a sihort text have been pub-
lished under the title of Pitfasso, with a
supplementary title of "Homage to Picasso
on his 70th birthday." The text is in two
parts, the first being devoted to Picasso,
his artistic development and an appraisal
of the importance of his drawings. This is
written by Roland Penrose, and is followed
by a poetic appreciation entitled "Picasso,
good master of liberty" by the late poet
Paul Eluard. This is given in the original
French and in a translation by Roland Pen-
up new and brilliant concepts. Watching
this go on is rather like watching a keen-
scented bird-dog snuffing about for his
prey. You think there is nothing there in
the bushes but in no time at all Old Red
has flushed a covey of quail right under
your nose. •
The third difficulty stems from the
kinds of poetry on which Mr. Blackmur exer-
cises his criticism. So far as I know he
has never been caught reviewing Masefield
or Edna St. Vincent Millay or even Robert
Frost. The essays in this volume deal with
the most difficult poets of our time—Yeats,
Eliot, Pound, Hart, Crane, Wallace, Stevens,
Marianne Moore. No critic can say any-
thing important about such writers with-
out being abstruse. To ask him to talk
about them in elementary terms would be
like asking a physicist to put the general
theory of relativity into a comic book.
This review, I am afraid, will not per-
suade anyone who has read this far to
go out and buy Language as Gesture. This
is just as well, for the effect would be
fatal if it were given as a Christmas present
to anyone taking English 100. (He might
never try to read a line of poetry again.)
On the other hand, I should be ready to
certify an English major for his degree
at once if he could demonstrate that he
has understood all the implications of a
single one of these essays.
Mr. Thorp, the M.D. Anderson visit-
ing professor, is from Princeton Univer-
sity where he is the Holmes Professor
of Belle Lettres, and Chairman of the
American Civilization Program. Well-
known for his work in many fields of
literature, his latest book, "A Southern
Reader," will be published next year.
Deep Sand
By Nancy Condon
"Kiss me, Philip." Catherine wanted to
think. She had to tell him. A kiss would
give her time to think of something to say.
She pretended to react to the kiss. His
.lips were soft yet firm. Hers trembled,
but she thought perhaps Philip sensed the
indifference under her outward show of
passion because he drew back leaving her
lips parted against the air. She turned her
face from him before opening her eyes.
When she looked around, Philip was a huge
rat. She ran screaming aroun# the oom,
Philip right behind her; and just before
he caught her, she awoke.
Catherine lay' there and shivered in the
August heat, wondering why she always
dreamed before waking. She thought the
dream itself, like most of her dreams, was
easy enough to explain. The mouse had
surprised her in the kitchen when she was
getting a drink of water just before going
to bed. She hated mice—repulsive creatures.
Lying in bed, she had decided'to teirPhilip
To Mr. Tom R. Burkett, of 1825
Prospect, we wish to extend our sincere
apologies. Mr. Burkett is the author of
"Celebration," a story which appeared in
the November Supplement without a by-
line. Mr. Burkett ia a senior at the Rice
Institute who is from Corpus Christi,
Texas.
tomorrow. She simply couldn't marry him.
He was sweet and adored her, but being
adored wasn't enough.
"He says he loves me, but he really
doesn't. No one loves; they don't even
know what it means, but they say, 'I love
you, I love you.' I say it too, but I don't
mean it—not any more." She thought she
meant it when she was sixteen and first
met Philip. But she was twenty now. She
didn't expect the thrills of novelty, but
when it got boring, that was time to call
■ it quits. She didn't want to hurt Philip
because he was so good. Maybe she did
really love him. She didn't know about
love or about anything, but she wanted to
be free.
The day was Sunday. She got up about
ten o'clock and read the funnies—just the
funny ones. The others were disgusting.
Dinner was just like every Sunday meal
with the family, and there was a feigned
pleasantness in her manner. Why did they
pretend to be gay, forcing her to smile
occasionally? She excused herself before
desert.
Philip came about two. She heard him
fn the living room talking with "her parents.
Although Philip was polite, he really didn't
like to chat with people, and his relief was
apparent when she suggested a ride in the
country.
The air blowing through the car win-
(Continued Overleaf)
That the great Spanish expatriate is
entitled to the esteem and respect of his
contemporaries is beyond question. No
matter on which side of the fence modern
art one happens to stand, one cannot fail
to recognize the stature of a personality
who has exerted influence as deep as it is
widespread upon both ideology and per-
formance of contemporary artists, and yet
has remained the chief controversial figure
in the world of art for nearly fifty years.
Picasso is an artist to whom few of us
can be indifferent. Either we heartily de-
spise him as an opportunist, a showman, or
a faker, or we greet him with an adoration
akin to worship and accept his works almost
as divine emanations. There, is a bit too
much of this latter in Elaurd's "Picasso,
good master of liberty." A few will feel
with Eluard when he says "I could evoke
here your loves. I have the right, because
I have put my hand jon your shoulder to hold
me up. And you have held thousands like
me, for you are, this rock from which all
men who' have hope launch themselves into
the unknown"; but many will think that
there are other bases as firm as Picasso
from which men, of hope can launch them-
selves into unchartered seas.
Roland Penrose when not translating
Eluard writes enthusiastically but authori-
tatively about Picasso and his drawings, and
gives sound reasons why the drawings lead
us close to Picasso's creative genius. It.
would be well for the reader to remember
that as much can be said for the sketches
and drawings of all great figures in the
arts. The drawing is often far more reveal-
ing, far more expressive of the art philos-
ophy of the artist than his completely fin-
ished product. Irj. developing his apology
for Picasso, Penrose points out that the
word "beauty" has lost its meaning. "To-
day," said Penrose, "most of us hesitate
to make categorical statements that this or
that is beautiful. ... We have started to
form new ideas of the beautiful basing them
on the experience of our emotional lives.
Nobody, in fact, should be allowed to dictate
to us what is beauty; what we require in-
stead is someone who can make us feel
sufficiently deeply and violently to discover
beauty for ourselves and relate it to the
hard road of our own experience." This
Penrose thinks Picasso has done and has
demonstrated to us by means of his draw-
ings and watercolors.
Those, even in reproduction, speak for
themselves. Several of them in full color
and many almost at full size give the read-
er seventy-seven reasons why Picasso is so
greatly loved, as well as respected, and at
the same time cordially detested. As an
example, drawing number 37, which was
done in 1925 and is now in the collection
(Continued Overleaf)
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The Thresher (Houston, Tex.), Vol. 40, No. 21, Ed. 1 Friday, December 5, 1952, newspaper, December 5, 1952; Houston, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth230925/m1/3/: accessed July 16, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; crediting Rice University Woodson Research Center.