Dear Editor
DEAR EDITOR The New Leader welcomes comment and criticism on any of its features, but letters should not exceed 300 words. WOUK Leslie Fiedler, a good man with a cleaver, does a fine job on...
...And what is his point anyway...
...It is time for the puppet government to pass on...
...Yet, the phenomenon of Mr...
...And, furthermore, how can she be ousted with powerful Western forces supporting her...
...Certainly, if one goes on objective evidence alone, Mr...
...3. Mr...
...The people want Bao Dai dismissed, officially and forever...
...As one of the conditions for recognition of Red China, he suggests a "non-aggression pact between the two regimes which would end the meaningless semi-war between them," for the "continuation of their present conflict leads nowhere...
...Wouk . . . can . . . boast of having written about love without referring to the sexual organs.'' I looked at this a few times, and it seems Leslie Fiedler is saying you can't write about love (in a good novel, anyway) without referring to the sexual organs...
...WOUK Leslie Fiedler, a good man with a cleaver, does a fine job on Herman Wouk ["What Makes Herman Run...
...2. "Another kind of bowdlerization has been going on Such bloody and barbaric survivals as the brith are not portrayed and we never learn whether Marjorie goes to the mikvah...
...With the "semi-war" called off, how can the present regime in Tapiei maintain the fiction of regaining the mainland...
...Theoretically, it has been enjoying total independence...
...Even by the wildest stretch of the imagination, it would be difficult for anyone to conceive of an independent, democratic, anti-Communist state without a constitution, assemblies, political parties, an army, a free press, effective administration and finances...
...Or that Wouk should take them to task for abandoning the true faith...
...The Vietnamese problem is no longer that of a privileged class, it is the primary concern of the country's 25 million people...
...Indeed, the generous aid given to the unfortunate refugees from North Vietnam and to the Vietnamese nationalists has woven a solid bond of friendship between South Vietnam and the United States...
...Even a few hundred energetic YCLers can seem pretty small in a college of 8,000 girls--if one isn't interested...
...This is the quickest and most effective way to fight Communist North Vietnam and win the general elections when the time for them arrives...
...Surely the United States as well as Nationalist China would not go along with that...
...Even if she is ousted, Red China would certainly insist on replacing her in the Security Council...
...What middle-class housewife in Mararoneck goes to the mikvah...
...Without delay, we must build democratic foundations for the state of Vietnam...
...The high road and the low road lead to the same place...
...Of course it isn't a lie...
...The elections of 1956, called for by the Geneva accords, were decided upon by other nations and cannot bind our people...
...Orchard Park, N. Y. David W. Nicklas SOUTH VIETNAM The United States policy of helping South Vietnam raise its standard of living and build a strong, free country that can take its place among the democratic nations of Asia is an outstanding example of what can be done to aid underdeveloped areas...
...With Dr...
...Now that Nationalist China has a seat on the Security Council and maintains the fiction of returning to the mainland, she certainly will not give up her seat without a fight...
...Leslie Fiedler should have decided whether he was attacking (1) the religious practices of American Jews or (2) Herman Wouk's description of them...
...Now really...
...NL, October 3...
...The elections we are interested in note are free elections in South Vietnam...
...The newly-created Democratic party of Vietnam has dedicated itself to this program...
...Fiedler really find Marjorie Morningstar--going on and on, with few climaxes, about middle-class Jews--a natural for the movies...
...The answer to the question, therefore, is that South Vietnam can be saved only by the Vietnamese themselves...
...Fiedler unnerved by the suspicion that he is the egghead's Herman Wouk...
...How much blood and barbarism did Leslie Fiedler notice at his last brith...
...Is Mr...
...But one wonders about his agitation over such tepid pap as Marjorie Morningstar...
...Any political program that deliberately overlooks this fundamental democratic principle cannot hope to succeed...
...The South Vietnamese will never forget the importance of the economic, technical and financial assistance they have received...
...5. ". . . the rich highbrow Jewish literature of the United States . . ." If the "highbrow Jewish literature of the United States" is "rich," what does Leslie Fiedler have left to apply to American highbrow literature in general...
...Delaware, Ohio E. V. Walter Leslie Fiedler wrote some weird passages in his review of Marjorie Morningstar, and, on the assumption that the frenzy that seemed to have possessed him while he was writing the review has passed, I wonder if he would concede now that some of the passages in his review were silly: 1. "Marjorie attends Hunter College in 1935 and finds no more trace of Communists there than she does in the theater in the years following...
...Failure to do this will result in dissipating the help given us to date by the United States...
...The picture becomes blacker when one realizes that what exists today is an antiquated feudal system which is under the constant threat of a coup d'etat and civil war...
...Now the paramount question is: How can we help South Vietnam emerge victorious from an eventual general election...
...Wouk seems as hard a writer to get movies out of as Tolstoy...
...This would undoubtedly lead to a more peaceful situation, assuming that the parties were favorably disposed toward such plan...
...New York City Nathan Glazer RED CHINA David J. Dallin's comments on solving the Taipei-Peking situation ["The East-West Detente,'' NL, September 5] are very interesting, but several points need clarification...
...New York City Nguyen Thai Binh President-Founder Tran Van Tung Generat Secretary...
...If this is a good example of highbrow writing, the campaign against the middlebrow novel still has a long way to go...
...The United States would certainly not countenance such an idea...
...And the mikvah...
...These elections, held immediately, with the financial and technical help of the United States, would permit the creation of a legislative assembly that could vote on a constitution and give proper support to the president-elect...
...4. "For writers like Wouk, book-form is a not quite dispensable stage on the way to becoming a movie.'' This is a surprising bit of insight into the processes of Wouk's mind in view of the fact that (1) his first novel did not become a movie, (2) his second novel did not become a movie, (3) his third novel became a movie only because of its fabulous success, factor which dictates that even so unlikely a candidate as War and Peace be, in some way, processed for the screen...
...That Wouk is being false in ignoring the mikvah as an issue of contemporary Jewish religion as completely as his fictional characters would...
...And does everybody have to be interested in Communists all the time-- or otherwise be liar...
...Fiedler to the core...
...These are two different matters, and considerations of quite different realms (the religious and the esthetic) come into consideration for each of them...
...Wouk seems to shake Mr...
...Pallin's plan put into effect, it would be necessary for the West to discredit the Tapiei regime...
...They want a republic with constitutional assembly, an elected government which will be the image of the nation, devoted to the cause of the people...
...And does Mr...
...But is it feasible to persuade Taipei to abandon its "semi-war" and yet maintain present troop morale in Formosa...
...I can hardly keep from crying out 'I was there...
...After all, when, in the name of sophistication, one puts an end to innocence and scorns the prophets of rebellion, what is left but the ministry of Herman Wouk...
...Is he talking about the Israelites camped around Sinai, or the Jews of Central Park West...
...In truth, however, for the past eight years Vietnam has remained a political fiction, a pawn in the game of shifting blocs...
...I know it's a lie!'" What's a lie...
...Fiedler is no innocent, he keeps telling us, and he knows that Wouk is a part of our universe as immutable as nervous diarrhea...
...That it was possible for a girl who was interested in "dramatics" to go to Hunter in 1935 and even attend little theater groups, and not notice the Communists...
...Fiedler sarcastically comments, "Mr...
...Another point needs clarifying, i.e., limiting the veto privilege to only four powers...
...Gott im Himmel...
Vol. 38 • October 1955 • No. 41
