Dear Editor
DEAR EDITOR DYLAN THOMAS Everyone who has looked into John Malcolm Brinnin's Dylan Thomas in America knows that a case can be made against it, and Robert Gorham Davis has made it eloquently [NL,...
...Buffalo C. I. Claflin AUTHOR'S QUERY I am undertaking a comprehensive study of Soviet education and want to include a chapter on the schools and institutes for the training of foreign Comunists in Communist ideology, strategy and tactics...
...I protest that he pays little attention to statistics all the way from Deaf Smith County, Texas, to two contrasted cities of our own state, New-burgh and Kingston...
...When an author flaunts his shortcomings, as Thomas did, there are only two possibilities: They may become a matter of private gossip, to be politely glossed over or deliberately lied about in the public prints...
...But by far the largest areas still have living tissue that strives for survival amid infectious blight and deterioration...
...This is the "selective surgery" that removes dead and diseased tissue, renews the circulatory and respiratory systems, and gives the neighborhood organism a new lease on a healthy life...
...At best, this approach will only delay eventual death, which would mean foreclosures on thousands of the rehabilitation loans...
...Upton Sinclair CITY SLUMS One must agree with E. G. Shinner's analysis of the slum problem ["City Slums: Challenge to Free Enterprise," NL, December 51 and hope that his proposal for financing urban renewal on a vast scale will be the successful means for accomplishing, within the foreseeable future, this job of great magnitude and of greater economic necessity and urgency...
...In your December 19 issue, Robert A. Heckert asserts that "the man for whom the Christian religion is named never indulged in this repulsive habit"--i.e., the eating of flesh, fowl or fish...
...Unfortunately, materials on these institutions are difficult to obtain...
...Heckert got this idea...
...Consequently, the basic and chronic ills will not be removed...
...it cannot be attained by unorganized individual efforts...
...I wonder where Mr...
...Brinnin, but I cannot accept the suggestion that his book deserves to be compared to Confidential magazine, even with talk about "somewhat higher levels...
...New York City Alfred Kohlberc It would seem that Professor Shils needs a sedative to steady his nerves...
...It is ridiculous...
...if this is his meaning many will dispute it...
...But what does "antinomianism'' mean...
...I don't know why he wrote it, but I am not ready to believe that he was indulging in sensationalism for the sake of making money...
...This resulted not entirely from his omission of the China Lobby from the list of unworthy anti-Communist disturbers of the peace...
...I cannot see that the first alternative, which was standard practice in the Victorian era, is greatly preferable to the second...
...Only unsuitable and unusable buildings are demolished...
...or they may become general knowledge...
...Shinner's proposal, enacted into law, could be the financial means for bringing them into being...
...Davis has in mind when he talks about "the right to privacy" is not clear to me...
...Some open spaces and pedestrian green-ways can be created, often tying together existing community institutions such as churches, schools, etc...
...Shinner seems to say, however, that city planning is not prerequisite for urban redevelopment...
...Easy now, Professor Shils, it isn't as bad as all that...
...I am not strongly impelled to defend Mr...
...All too often these certainly are impossible of attainment...
...Perhaps he has seen too many plans for total demolition and total rebuilding of older city areas...
...Chicago has been preparing for fluoridation for a long time and will start it in a few weeks...
...This does not mean that an author can have no privacy, but it does mean that his privacy, like that of a politician or an actor, has slipped out of his control...
...No one has asserted that the book is untrue, and most critics have found it sympathetic...
...Economic possibilities will restrict such drastic action to necrotic neighborhoods only...
...But Governor William G. Stratton vetoed a bill that would have permitted Chicagoans to vote on it first...
...I vividly recollect that a cousin of mine died of "black diphtheria" in Boston when I was a child there...
...His reference to the possible influence of sugar on tooth decay reminds me of the arguments used in the 19th century by those who opposed compulsory vaccination against smallpox...
...Monrovia, Calif...
...All but a few of them have limited foresight in such matters, are ignorant of the physical causes of urban blight, and will follow their individual, expedient desires...
...He merely chose to tell a story, no small part of which was already widely known...
...Perhaps too eloquently...
...The Gospels do not indicate that the eating habits of the individual in question differed significantly from those of his compatriots...
...others are repaired and remodeled...
...Let us assume that thousands of individual owners, using such FHA-guaranteed loans as Shinner proposes, remodel and rehabilitate their properties as they see fit...
...DEAR EDITOR DYLAN THOMAS Everyone who has looked into John Malcolm Brinnin's Dylan Thomas in America knows that a case can be made against it, and Robert Gorham Davis has made it eloquently [NL, January 16...
...I can see why Mr...
...Does he insist that the people of Newburgh were deprived of sugar, while those of Kingston revelled in sugar...
...Chicago Arthur Hedberg James Rorty is an excellent economist, but he appears to be a faddist so far as the fluoridation of drinking water is concerned...
...By implication, he included The New Leader among those guilty of the "ten-year-long disturbance of public peace by the angry quest for publicity about conspiracy...
...A great deal of nonsense has been written--by William Faulkner, I am unhappy to say, among others--on the subject of privacy...
...Davis wishes that Brinnin hadn't done it, but I don't see why he has drawn so passionately on his stock of moral indignation...
...Grafton, N. Y. Granville Hicks FLUORIDATION Thank you for James Rorty's excellent and important article, "The Case Against Fluoridation" [NL, January 2...
...I would therefore appreciate it if any of your readers having such information, or knowing where it is obtainable, would contact me at Teachers College, Columbia University, New York 27, New York...
...Woodstock, N. Y. Elsie Meyer VEGETARIAN...
...I have not forgotten that even afterward some doctors opposed antitoxin, While I feel that polio vaccine is going to curb the spread of infantile paralysis, I suggest that Rorty would have done better to attack this vaccine...
...Philadelphia Norman N. Rice POLITICAL DISCOURSE' Reading the article, "The Poisoning of Political Discourse," by Edward A. Shils [NL, January 9] gave me a warm feeling of superiority...
...New York City George S. Counts...
...Every innovation in medical treatment has brought forth faddists who scorn statistics...
...The act of publishing a book is public act...
...New buildings of various and suitable types are built in strategic locations because the renewed environment makes them functionally necessary and economically feasible...
...Frenzy will not controvert cold, sober facts, but a sober look at facts might help separate the wheat from the chaff...
...It my ego hadn't been thoroughly puffed up before Igot to it, I would have slipped on that one...
...Professor Shils's article is every bit as dispassionate as Richard Rovere's recent piece on "kept witnesses'' in Harpers...
...Schenectady, N. Y. Herbert M. Merrill...
...Above all, the old neighborhood is transformed into a proper environment for human beings—clean, safe, convenient, pleasant and even handsome...
...They are not mentioned in the Soviet pedagogical literature...
...Brinnin did not hide under Dylan Thomas's bed or spy on him with telescope or plant dictaphone in his room or betray his confidences...
...But such rehabilitation requires planning and controls...
...No, my feeling of superiority came from fancied ability to understand the Professor in spite of his unscholarly emotionalism...
...Indiscriminate medication will only alleviate symptoms...
...CREDIT DUE It is a curious thing that William E. Bonn could write a whole-page history on the LID [NL, January 9] and not name the man who thought of it, wrote the call, sent it out, presided at the first meeting, named Jack Londoni for President, ran the whole thing for years and raised the money that started Harry Laidler at the job...
...Some streets arc removed or closed to wheeled traffic, and others are modified, so that most through traffic is kept out and neighborhood traffic is classified and canalized...
...Here in Philadelphia plans are completed for rehabilitating many neighborhoods by employing the principles of "selective surgery...
...For these neighborhoods the proper organic treatment is "selective surgery" and repair...
...If stable gentlemen lend themselves to wild and unsupported statements, what may we not expect of the ruder sort--unstable ex-wives, ex-landlords, ex-neighbors, ex-janitors, ex-Communists, etc., not to mention untutored Senators...
...What Mr...
...I am sure that like myself many thousands of people will want reprints of this piece...
...The doctor must prescribe the surgery and therapy and the patient must follow the prescription...
Vol. 39 • January 1956 • No. 4
