Stalin & Heaven

Sir:

The Very Rev. Hewlett Johnson, "Red Dean" of Canterbury, believes that God has taken Stalin to his breast and all is well with the greatest mass murderer the world has ever known [TIME, Feb. 9].

If what the Red Dean says is true, I would hate to be caught in the final resting place, or heaven, he represents.

L. T. LEWIS

Dallas, Texas

Sir:

The Red Dean of Canterbury has made the misstatement of the year. I've got news for him. Christ is alive.

EBB A. POUNDS Sacramento, Calif.

Abominable Snowman?

Sir:

I'll now believe all the pessimistic reports I hear about Squaw Valley and the coming Olympics after reading about Alec Gushing (Feb. 9). He sounds like a snob.

NANCY E. WHITING Framingham Centre, Mass.

Sir:

Squaw Valley's Alec Gushing provides a classic example of old-fashioned American capitalism at its best: the selfish motivation of one has provided benefit for all.

MRS. MARY WALTERS Indianapolis

Sir:

Undoubtedly Alexander C. Gushing is The Abominable Snowman.

NATHAN SHAPIRO Astoria, N.Y.

Sir:

Willie Hoppe, who made billiards once again a game of skill and a real joy to behold, rates seven lines in the vital statistics. Gushing, an athletic flop, gets a cover story--your sense of proportion is all out of whack. Another issue like this and TIME will be banned from the billiard parlors.

ART FIEGELSON Eaton Rapids, Mich.

Sir:

Congratulations. to Mr. Alec Gushing on his wit rather than his memory. It seems that he or someone forgot the prologue to the Squaw Valley drama. Might it not have been more accurate to mention the name of Marti Arrouge, the young Basque who trod the warm earth of Squaw Valley through many young summers following the bands of his father's sheep, who lost his only brother in one of its clear lakes and whose nimble skis have caressed its every slope? It was Arrouge who was the original partner of Wayne Poulsen; together they supplied the land and Gushing the money. Marti Arrouge has played an important part in the development of Squaw Valley, has been a loyal supporter all the way, remains a stockholder, and, incidentally because he also happens to be my husband, I regret that his name has been left out of the cast.

NORMA SHEARER Beverly Hills, Calif.

Sir:

Bravo for Alec Gushing. Why waste time catering to cash customers when the State of California is willing to dole out $4,000,000, and then Uncle Sam, not to be outdone, forks over an equal amount. Gushing gets my vote for snob-con man of the year. HERB AMMERMULLER Great Neck, N.Y.

Nom de Nom

Sir:

Please accept my fervid thanks for the service you render this reader when you give the pronunciation of names in the news such as Siobhan McKenna [TIME, Feb. 9]. LULINE* FORTUNE WILLIS Texarkana, Ark.

Sir:

I have no difficulty with Miss McKenna's name.

DYMPNA** SACKETT Ogden, Utah

Classrooms on the Continent

Sir:

For the benefit of schools who wish they could hire a physics teacher as good as Dr. Harvey E. White [of NBC's Continental Classroom on TV--TIME, Feb. 9], may I point out that quite possibly they already have. All they need do is furnish him with that 21-man crew of assistants and that twelve-hour preparation period for each lecture, and, yes, with a bit of motivation: a modest fraction, say, of that $38,000.

I would like to see Dr. White, or anyone else, prepare and deliver five such lectures every day in three, four and five different subjects--and also check equipment in and out, grade papers, give help to individual students in trouble, confer with parents, sponsor clubs and attend meetings, often while holding an extra job to reduce the mortgage.

M. C. DIAZ Chandler, Arizona

Nicking the Beats

Sir:

What you refer to as the "mystical" Beatnik pilgrimage to Chicago's Lincoln Park Zoo is easily explained: they belong there. BRENT WOOD Belmont, Mass.

Sir:

The trouble with the Beat Generation is that they didn't get beat in the right time or place.

MRS. ALBERT NEUSCHWANGER Bartlesville, Okla.

Sir:

And now we suffer from the Beatnik Who pains most people in the seatnik.

LEE ARMS Redondo Beach, Calif.

Sir:

If it weren't for the sparse--but growing --number of Beatniks that inhabit the existentialist cellar, U.S. poetry and prose would be but a stagnant heap of Victorian drivel. Now, even with the fantastic energy of the Beatniks the poetry and prose is in an advanced state of decay.

G. DOUGLAS MCLEAN

Montreal, Canada

Sir:

If we have arrived at the place where the popular demand at Columbia University is for the maunderings of these psychotics, I say shoot the damned wart hog and have done with it.

C. V. PREGALDIN JR. Lieutenant Colonel, U.S.A. Fort Knox, Ky.

Sir:

I am a "young" poet, and I feel that I can speak for the young poets like myself: We are poets who are not "beat." We are not unwashed, and we are not unshaven--but it seems that we are unsung.

We are sick and tired of the desecration of our language by so-called "Beatnik Poets." We are sick and tired of the turning of our medium into something that is laughable and associated with booze, dope, sex and despair. We want poetry to attain the status it deserves. Mr. Ginsberg's Howl created a

sensation in some quarters of the literary world, but it is gratifying to know that great poets never Howled--they spoke--and it is from speech that will come the badly needed generation of American writers.

CLIFFORD G. MORNAY JR. Berkeley, Calif.

Open Trap

Sir:

After reading your story [Jan. 26] on David Riesman's comments in Daedalus [about the academic world], I still don't know if he is complimentary or snide when you quote him as saying: "While in principle the professor still has more time than most professional men to spend at home . . . much of this time in fact is spent either earning money to pay the plumber or working like a plumber."

If the inference is commendatory, it is accepted graciously; if it is the needle, the plumbing industry, proud of its history, is "vein" enough to absorb the injection.

E. T. BUTCHER President

Associated Plumbing Contractors of Fort Worth

Aground

Sir:

In your Feb. 16 issue there is an interesting story on Bill Tripp for the excellent performances of Rhubarb and Southern Star II in the recent Miami-Nassau race. You say that Callooh, originally reported the victor due to an error in calculating time allowances, was designed by Phil Rhodes. However, this Callooh, now owned by Jack Brown, was built to our design in 1956 by Joel Johnson in Bridgeport, Conn. Since then she has been sold and resold, and her present owner rechristened her Callooh. Incidentally, Callooh is no "run-of-the-drawing-board" design. She is an enlarged version of Finisterre.

RODERICK STEPHENS

Sparkman & Stephens, Inc. New York City

Youth Has Its Say

Sir:

I thank you for your complimentary words on my performance in the picture The Perfect Furlough [TIME, Feb. 9]. However, my wife is 26 years old, and she took umbrage at your line, "Even bored old Keenan Wynn is back at his best."

I can understand you, as movie critic, using the word "bored" because of the number of pictures in which I have played the same part, i.e., the friend of the hero. However, my "child bride" does not understand what you mean by "old." Despite five years of marriage and two beautiful daughters, she still fails to consider me old. She may be a considerably old 26, but I prefer to think of myself as a rather youthful 45.

KEENAN WYNN Los Angeles

Haiku

Sir:

Re your story on Japanese haiku (Feb. 2): I have conducted adult poetry writing classes for more than ten years, in California, and now in Seattle, and always included haiku with the other forms to be practiced. I could collect a sizable book from my students. Sample:

In Time

Old sorrows mellow The ego, as patina Enhances silver.

LUCILE V. McCURTAIN Seattle

*Rhymes with Dew Line. ** From the Gaelic Dominaiz, which is pronounced down-ath

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