Evening star., 1949-02-24

| can author who was described IN the recent
| Army spy report as "a spy and agent of the
| Soviet government" The report later was
| diSavoWed by the department as contrary
to Army public relations policy" Gen. Will
| loughby also protested release of the report.
'Oliver Twist and Tolerance
| To the Editor OF The Star:
Advocates of toleration should reflect that
| it is a glass house on tWo-Way street. Toll
| erance must be practiced as we'll as preached
| 1t seems that the English speaking world
is to be denied the pleasure of seeing the
moving picture, "Oliver Twist" because, for
sooth, one of it's numerous villains is Jew
The English, who are said to be short on
humor, made the picture, depicting, as it
does. a long since obsolete system of orphan
ages. From Bundle the Beadle, to Kags
| Crackit ct al, the characters are, to put 1t
mildly, unpleasant. Skies, the heavy villain.
| is such thorough Scoundrel that he achieves
the distinction of being the one rufflan in
fiction whose dog deserts him. All this and
more. the English tolerate without protest.
No street riots, no brickbats, no detlllng the
tomb of Dickens, king of the muckrakers.
whose fiction forced reforms untouched by
the cold, grim facts of life.
To ban this picture because one character
is despicable, in spite OF belonging to race
that has given the world a great literature
in the Old Testament. and The Greatest
Story Ever Told of the Greatest Life Ever
Lived" is sorry surrender to the most fat
uous kind of intolerance. 1t is a perfect
example of Talleyrand's: 1T is worse than
crime: it is blunder.''
An English clergyman has pointed out the
curious fact that while most historians gloss
| over the failings of their leaders, the Jews
told the whole damning truth, even about
their heroes. That is one reason why they
remain real. To sing the songs OF David,
without forgetting Uriah and then draw the
line at Fagin is just plain stupidity. The
author of the Pentateuch never would have
been so silly. ELLIS MEREDITH.
DANCER at Fourteenth and Monroe
To the Editor of The Star:
From personal experience, feel that it
is about time something were done to pro-
tect the rights of pedestrians at the inter-
section of Fourteenth and Monroe streets
NV.
IS feet from the actual street intersection
and traffic lights. Consequently, the NOV
ing traffic crosses this safety zone for pedes-
trians at the same time the pedestrians are
crossing the street.
Until recently there were white lines across
the street to denote where traffic should
stop, but these have worn off and have not
been remarked RUBY STANFORD.
Two Views of Poetry Award
To the Editor Of The Star:
In these days of congressional investiga-
tions which quite frequently seem far from
equitable, it is refreshing to note that the
Fellows of American Letters of the Library
of Congress had the intestinal fortitude to
award the Bollingen Prize to Ezra Pound
for the ''PiSan CantOS"
DIR. EDWIN N. c. BARNES.
To the Editor of The STAR
The Library Of Congress Fellows in Amer
ican Letters, when on February 10 they
awarded the first annual Bollingen Prize
for poetry to Ezra Pound, had this to say:
ITO permit other considerations than that
of poetic achievement to sway the decision
would destroy the significance of the award
and would in principle deny the validity OF
that objective perception of value on which
any civilized society must rest"
BY this restatement of traditional con-
cept namely, that of the poet as an ''unpolit-
ical'' man. the Fellows in our opinion have
raised far-reaching assumptions which end
by unsettling the very principle they seek to
defend, and expose their award of the $1,000
prize to an American under Indictment for
treason as an irresponsible act.
Let us grant for the argument that Mr..
Pounds "Pisan Cantos" is indeed the "high-
est achievement in American poetry" for
the publishing year 1948. Let us even
waive for the moment the sound contention
that Mr.. Pound himself, in many of his
writings, does not draw the distinction
between poetry and life which his 13
admirers have drawn in the statement
accompanying his award.
There is yet the obtrusive and overWhelm-
ing fact that the "other considerations"
referred to by the Fellows involve what the
Department of Justice in 1943 and 1945
persuaded Federal grand jury were overt
acts of treason against the American people.
The transcriptions of Mr.. Pounds broad
casts from Rome were filled with the hymns
of hate by which the Fascists and the Nazis
proclaimed the particular value percep-
tions" on which their own society was to
rest. Echoes of this hate are found in Mr..
Pounds "Cantos." The Fellows apparently
are untroubled by them, given the greater
validity of an objective perception of value"
In our opinion, they as critics may 50
that far; they, however, must go farther.
In the traditional role of q poet, Mr.. Pound
had the alternative of Escaping" the war;
He had the alternative other writer's have
chosen of advocating philosophical paciflsm
or maintaining conscientious objections in
confinement. Could he choose the alterna-
tive of enlisting in the totalitarian campaign
of hate and confusion directed toward his
own country and its leaders and yet affirm
as his admirers do, "the validity of that OBJ
jective perception of value on which any
civilized society must rest?
Poetic achievement" indeed should SWAY
the decision" if the question involved were
Mr.. Pounds right to publish his work in
America and that right would have to be