PURGE OF HUMORS USED IN "NEW YORKER" PARODY PRODUCED BY LAMPOON

The following review of the current "New Yorker Number" of the Lampoon was written especially for the Crimson by Lucius M. Beebe 1G.

It was, we believe, something less than two years ago that we suggested in these olumns that if the Lampoon were going to continue to shout "present" or even "accounted for" in the ranks of the current comics, the best thing it could do was to hoof it to the nearest Liggetts and insert its savings in a tidy stock of Enos Fruit Salts or some equally efficacious cathartic.

Whether or not the drug counters of Harvard Square pharmacies have been besieged by flocks of Ibises and Presidents bawling for relief, we do not know, but that some purge of humors has been employed, is, at first glance, obvious. In the old days, on make-up nights on Mount Auburn Street, cork helmits were a necessity much as they were in any British tropical outpost, that is, to keep those present from going completely under when their back teeth were floating. Under the new regime, however, it appears that at least the invaluable Bob Lampoon keeps semi-sober and acts in the joint capacity of managing editor and wash-room attendant, and that as a result a more palatable brand of humor is on sale at Felix's the following week.

The current issue of the Lampoon (and have a care you don't get inferior brand with the "New Yorker" lables) is almost entirely the result of the energies of four contributors, Hichborn, the present Ibis, Blackburn, Batchelder, and the bilingual, and ambidexterous Mr. Churchill who serves the ridiculous in two disseparate fields, as an editor of the CRIMSON and as continuous contributor to Lampy's columns.

The whole issue, is, in fact, far more New Yorkerish than any issue of that esteemed contemporary journal that has yet come to hand.

The cover, by Batchelder, will unquestionably cause enormous confusion at local news stands, and the worst of it is that this error will not be immediately rectified by consulting the inside matter. The advertisements are after Saks-Fifth-Avenue and Brooks in their Ritziest moments, and if there is a little gents-room language somewhere on the page it will escape the eye of all but the most inquiring. Blackburn's Raymond ad and the Oh-so-French perfumery exhibit (pardon fumes of exquisite women) of Mr. Breck are after this manner.

Mr. Ted Hall's single column sketches and headings are in the best New Yorker style, but the two best layouts in the issue are by Batchelder and Hichborn. Mr. Batchelder's Peter Arno picture (Arno wasn't so fancy in New Haven two or three years ago when his name was Curt Peters) is fully as good as that satirical fellow could do himself, and the halitosis ad is what is popularly known as lifelike. How many in the class can give this little girl an identifying hand?

The only possible fault to be found with the entire issue is with one of Blackburn's sketches depicting an incident of Harvard Club life which is so like an illustration in a recent New Yorker as to seem almost plagiaristic. Detailed comparison will show that it is not too close for safety, but the impression it creates is somewhat unhappy.

If the Lampoon can continue to produce issues in the current vein there is every reason to believe that it will regain the prestige it acquired with the publication of its "Transcript" issue and its still more celebrated and creditable Lasky number. That it should again play a ponderable part in Cambridge life must be the ambition of every editor, and a few New Yorker parodies would serve as admirable pick-me-ups to cure the hangover from which it has suffered. What Lampy needs now is not salts, but a few tall ones to keep up its good, nay, excellent spirits.