Perth Amboy evening news., 1922-11-01
Tests from the Agony Column

rests rom the agony ColuInn
For test material DR.. Slosson went
first of all to the personal column of
the London Times. The personal
column in this particular paper is
notable for it's unusual messages, and
is popularity known as the agony
column Lovers who cannot write
or get together exchange cryptic en-
dearments. Business firms send sig
nails in code. Mothers beg estranged
sons to return home, and people of
peculiar talents advertise here hop
ing that some reader may need their
services.
Most of the messages are only for
the person to whom they are address
ed, and the general reader must
guess at the meaning. Such a mes
sage as "Golliwog.-The gold is gone.
Waiting" might refer to an at
tempted burglary, or a business deal.
or it might be a lovers sentimental
way of saying that a trouble-making
blond had passed out of his life.
DR.. Downey tried a series of these
items on students, asking them to
construct a story from a given per-
sonal and classified the results ac-
cording to grades of imagination. We
quote her divisions of imagination
here because it may be of interest
to the reader to classify his own
creative faculty.
The divisions are: (1) the inert i'm
%agination; ca the stereotyped mag
nation; CD the melodramatic i'm
agination; ca the g~eneralizing i'm
agination; 60 the par~ticularizing
imagination; co the ingenious or
inventive imagination.
The last class contains persons
who construct an unusual and inter-
esting situation from a hint such as
the personals give. They avoid the
obvious conclusion which the stereo-
typed imagination seizes upon. Their
imagination is stimulated easily.
They do not reject the plot germ
in a personal as trivial or meaning
less, as the inert imagination does.
The ~generalizing type of magma
ton is not specific enough for fiction
and the results on paper are apt to
be distractions. This sort of imagin-
alton usually accompanies the scien-
tific turn of mind.
The particularizing Imagination on
the other hand. is of real assistance
to fiction writing. The person who
notes the little things that distin-
guish people and situations has fc-
ton material if he can use it skill
fully. When the fifth and sixth types
are combined the possessor has a
promising equipment for creating
stories.
The individual who regards him.
self as lacking in Imagination may
be encouraged by the fact that this
Go 40 - - "
veloped. In a recent book on the
subject, Drs. Slosson and Downey X
plain their experiments in training
as well as testing the creative i'm
agination. They point out that GER
tain famous artists deliberately stim-
ulated their creative impulse by de-
vices:
MANY of the minor eccentricities
of genius appear to be the outcome
of accidental discoveries of ways of
increasing brain activity. Rousseau
and Shelley We're given to exposing
the barred head to the hottest of
midday suns; and Whitman wrote
much of his Leaves of Grass while
prone upon the white sands of a
Long Island beach, with such a sun
as only seems to blaze there"
Music and Colors Stimulate
Dr.. Downey further points out that
Darwin found scientific reflections
stimulated by music, and that Was-
ner's sense of the dramatic was
heightened by the presence of rich
fabrics and colors.
Undoubtedly, different brains re-
spond to the stimulation of different
senses. DR.. Downey tried expert
ments with combinations of odc}E
on students. Music was similarly
employed to see whether themes
would suggest striking personalities
or dramatic situations to the stu
dents. Setting small groups of writ
ers to composing a story together
was still another experiment. Some
well known writer's have produced
their best work by the social stimu.a-
ton gained through collaboration.
The experiments were not conduct
ed by the college professors so much
for the purpose of making scientific
tables as to show the students the
character of their imagination and
its possibilities. Devices such as
those mentioned, the two professors
call gymnastic exercises for the Inn
agination. When the subject is ex-
plored further we may find that
such exercises can be reduced to a
! scientific daily dozen for the buoy