From the Newssland Poons

THE HARVARD LAMPOON has recently undergone a changing of the guard while, almost simultaneously, a new magazine (founded by Poon alumni), The National Lampoon, has made its debut across the country with an initial circulation of 500.000. Martin H. Kaplan heads the local Lampoon's New Regime and has made no bones about the new Jewish flavor at the Poon in his Spring Issue entitled "The Nineteen Seventy Schmeventy Number."

In the lead article. Kaplan writes about Ibis's reaction to the new decade: "'Ninety-seventy, nineteen-schmeventy.' he [Ibis] sighed." not unaware of the ethnic implications of the syntactical construction he had chosen.'" The Spring Issue is better than usual, perhaps because most of the pieces were written by novice Poonies, who haven't yet been trapped by the traditional, overly esoteric Lampoon style.

Newly-elected Jeffrey A. Goodby makes the wittiest contributions. In "Why Do Firemen Wear Red Suspenders?" he lampoons the styles of J. D. Salinger. Emily Dickinson, ?. ?. c??mmings. James Jo?ee. Karl Marx, and Kahill Gibran, by giving their inevitable responses to the riddle: "to keep their pants up." For Emily Dickinson. he writes:

Why do my eyes come to see.

That all big firemen are free

To wear red suspenders all day long.

And work and sing their cheery song?

It fills my heart with awesome mirth,

When my head is laden with the birth

Of the thought that's like a buttercup,

I know they keep their trousers up.

In another piece, "Romeo and Julie?." Goodby makes up a passage similar to a Shakespearean sonnet and proceeds to give 27 annotated comments on 17 lines of verse. lambasting Shakespeare as well as the Bard's life long devotees. The note on "She [Juliet] speaks, yet she says nothing" is "'This line, more than any other, best exemplifies the Shakespearean style.'-Kittridge."

Other articles by new Poonies start out with good ideas but drag on and on past the point of humor. This misfortune befalls Robert A. Rosenberg in "Mopey Dick." which attempts a chapter-by-chapter account of Herman Melville's classic. "Athelsm and Alcohol." by David H. Gaylin, is an example of another piece which begins nicely-giving an account of the goings-on inside Ye Olde Joynte and Lushe-Haus-but fizzles out toward the end.

Except for one article set in type large enough for the elderly, the Spring Issue's lay-out is attractive, with competent art work throughout. The colorful cover picture of the Jester hanging outside the Lampoon castle is a particularly fine display of Lampoon graphics. Jeffrey M. Lowenfals, the new head of the business board, brought in a lot of juicy ads and proved his sense of taste by running an advertisement for dildos.

THE NATIONAL LAMPOON, in its April debut, did not fare nearly as well as the first issue of Kaplan's local group. Three Lampoon legends, Douglas C. Kenney, Henry N. Beard, and Robert K. Hoffman, had done a lot of work on the nationally distributed parodies of Playboy, Life. and Time magazines. The financial success of these ventures evidently went to their heads, and they decided to try their own national monthly using the Lampoon name.

According to Kaplan. "They wanted to start another humor magazine because there is no national equivalent to Punch (a British publication), and Mad is too high schoolish..., Twenty-First Century agreed to pay for it and the Lampoon agreed to franchise the name." Kaplan said that the franchise gives the local Lampoon the right to have the final say on all National Lampoon copy. Unfortunately, Kaplan did not exercise his option of editing the April galley proofs, although he did make changes in the forthcoming May edition.

The April issue seems to be made up almost completely of dull material rejected from the three old magazine parodies. Kenney, Beard, and Hoffman have a Plaything of the Month, a "Schoenstein Report" by Dr. Ralph Schoenstein (reminiscent of the heart transplant article in the Life parody), and a page poking fun at Jackie Onassis-made up of ribbings not good enough for the Time parody.

It seems that the National Lampoon staff culled the poorest of secondary school bathroom graffiti to paste together their April issue. Nevertheless, a few rays of brilliance do shine through. In Stephen Kaplan's "White House Heartbreak." which appears in comic-book form, David Eisenhower begs his wife Julie to sleep with him. Julie is reluctant: "But what about my reputation? The newspapers... And Daddy's career? What if... What if I had a BABY!?" David comforts his bride, and while they embrace he assures her "Don't worry honey, I take those pills every day!"

The National Lampoon will be chalked up as a business failure unless the overall quality of the publication improves soon. Plain curiosity helped sell the first issue. The May edition will need some original ideas and more mature humor in order to hold its own on the nationwide newsstands.