Wade in the Balance. . .

(Ed. Note--The Crimson does not necessarily endorse opinions expressed in printed communications. No attention will be paid to anonymous letters and only under special conditions, at the request of the writer, will names be withheld).

To the Editor of the CRIMSON:

I wish to call attention to a statement in the February "Advocate made by H. M. Wade in his article, "The Phoenix in the Babbitt Warren." In speaking of American literary criticism, he says:

". . . Even journalistic criticism has vastly improved, despite the balderdash and hogwash poured out weekly in such papers as the "Saturday Review" by superannuated professors whose knowledge of literature stops with Hardy."

Perhaps this was written with tongue in cheek, but it is open to a more serious interpretation as a statement of the author's real opinion. As such it is a prize example of that absurd undergraduate pomposity which has reduced so-called Undergraduate Opinion to a negligible factor outside the college world. Does Mr. Wade realize that he is merely making a fool of himself--that even an experienced literary critic of mature age and opinions could not make such a statement with impunity?

He has perhaps forgotten that the superannuated professors have considerably more prestige in the Literary world than he has, and, moreover, that their knowledge of literature and his own compare as the mountain and the mole hill.

A small amount of undergraduate humility should be a good nostrum for the literary aspirant. If the Mr. Wades of the college would content themselves with sober and constructive criticisms within their depth they would gain a great many ears which are now deaf to them. "The Saturday Review" would I am sure not only welcome but publish a sensible criticism of its policies. (Name withheld by request.)