VIETNAM

To the Editors of the CRIMSON:

In the last few days some of the most distinguished members of our society have recommended cessation of the bombing of North Vietnam: Professor Henry Steele Commager before the Senate panel on Monday and General James M. Gavin on Tuesday. These are only the two most recent among numerous other appeals by distinguished men.

That these appeals go unheeded by the President we by now expect. It clearly seems to be the case that nothing anyone -- however important -- says about this war makes the slightest impact upon Mr. Johnson.

But I wonder if there isn't another reason for ending this war that rarely receives attention in the press: we have become so obsessed in America by the Vietnam War that all other aspects of human life have lost perspective.

There used to be a time when people cared and wrote about Sophocles, Mozart, and Picasso; when music, art, and philosophy were the subjects of private discourse and public lectures; when things of beauty that were joys forever could be lovingly appreciated and spoken of by civilized men.

Now there is only Vietnam. The rubble of Vietnam. Over and over and over and over again in the public lecture halls, on television, in the papers -- everywhere. We have heard all the arguments, pro and con, a thousand times. We have tread the path of the same argument countless times and in each case derived the same answer. All else, previously beautiful, has faded from our sight. We have become disillusioned as a nation because we hear nothing but Vietnam -- day and night. And in addition to all this ugliness and loss of beauty -- it's damn boring. George S. Rousseau   Instructor in English