The Indianapolis times. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1922-1965, 1931-01-09
BY ALEC WAUGH
Written for NEA Service

MERE always has been a mod
n ern girl" Socrates married one.
and IN his old age, instead of doing
before his fire, sat around street
corners asking questions, till his
fellow Athenians in desperation
handed him glass Of hemlock.
Shakespeare married one and after
a year or two of it, slipped out one
morning, made for London and
wrote THE Tanning of the ShreW."
Here modern girl" is term of
abuse; when we employ the term
we do not refer TO the average girl
between the ages Of 10 and Is that
we meet at our friends houses.
We refer to the type of girl that
exasperates her contemporaries by
exaggerating and caricaturing the
characteristics of her period.
Usually "the modern girl" is some
one who tries to get q, thing both
ways. That certainly is what she
is today.
She's a Real Paradox
On my side of the Atlantic and
suspect on This, she is demanding
the freedom of the twentieth CEN
tury and, while retaining the chiv-
airy of the nineteenth, she expects
to be allowed to do what she likes,
where she likes, with whom she
likes.
She expects also to be cher
ished, made allowances for, pro-
tee ed. She expects to be treated
as 4 reliant, capable, and respon-
sible person when it is a question
of latchkeys, bank accounts, and
the choice of friends. But when
friends prove false and bills mount
up and bank accounts get over
drawn, she expects a shoulder to
weep upon, a hand to pat her
shoulder and strong, kind voice
to murmur. There, there now,
you can't be expected to under
stand these things. Wen see you
through"
Tough on Father
1t is not much fun being the
father of .the modern girl" She
will treat his house as a hotel, din
ing at his table only when there
is nowhere else to go, bringing to
his drawing room young men he
does not know, and then when life
grows complicated for her she will
turn round on him with the re-
poach, 81 never stood a chance.
You and mother never made a real
home for me-"
It is not much fun being in love
with "the modern girl; she will
explain to her flance that she must
be free that he must not be jeal-
Gus, that he must not be proprie-
tory, and when the young man &C
cepts her commands, allows her to
break dates, smiles friendlily when
ne sees her dancing at night club
with another man, she hands him
back his ring and says: I'm sorry
it's no good, you're very sweet, but
we'd be miserable together. You
could never keep me in order"
Also Tough on Husband
1t is not much fun being mar
ried to THE modern girl. Her
husband must work industriously
and necessarily so that she be fit
tingly adorned; but when he re-
turns home to receive the rewards
of industry it will be to find a note
perched against the mantelpiece:
Don't bother to wait. Have gone
out"
He must himself make no COM
ment on her behavior, but should
she see him dancing with his secre-
tary, he will find on his return
bed made up for him upon the sofa.
It is in the name of such that
old men in their club and young
men sitting beside desolate tele-
phones invoke high heaven with the
groan these modern girls"
Luckily tine modern girl is. as
she always has been, the excep-
ton.
Read Dawn Powell, famous Amer
lean novelist, on "The Disappearing
Man" in The Times Monday.