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College news, December 7, 1932
Bryn Mawr College student newspaper. Merged with Haverford News, News (Bryn Mawr College); Published weekly (except holidays) during academic year.
Bryn Mawr College (creator)
1932-12-07
serial
Weekly
6 pages
digitized microfilm
North and Central America--United States--Pennsylvania--Montgomery--Bryn Mawr
Vol. 19, No. 07
College news (Bryn Mawr College : 1914)--
https://tripod.brynmawr.edu/permalink/01TRI_INST/26mktb/alma991001620579...
Digitized by the Internet Archive in 2012 with funding from LYRASIS Members and Sloan Foundation.
BMC-News-vol19-no7
“THE COLLEGE NEWS
Page Three
Roll of Buddhist Images
‘Explained by Miss Chapin
In the Music Room, Wednesday, No-
_ vember 30, the History of Art De-
partment presented Miss Helen Chap-
~in, a graduate of Bryn Mawr, who
has spent seven years in the Orient,
studying Chinese art and culture.
Armed with a thorough knowledge of
Eastern religions and philosophies,
she has been attempting to under.
stand that)mysterious quality in the
art of the’ yellow races which seems
so bafflfng to the West.
‘Recently, togethér with.Dr, John C.
Ferguson, a well-known connoisseur
of,-and writer on, Chinese art, Miss
Chapin was permitted to see many
artistic specimens in the Palace Mus:
eum at Peking, which had been seen
heretofore, only by members of the
Imperial family and by officials of the
court.
Among. the mahimonos exhibited
was “A Long Row. of Buddhist
Images,” which had ‘been brought out
of a secret closet in which it had
prohkably been hidden since the Fall of
the Empire. This is the roll which
has. been termed by Miss Chapin as
her “pet discovery.” It is a narrow
silken scroll, fifty feet in length, beau-
~tifully painted in delicate shadés of
yellow, blue and vermilion, with abun-
dant notes’ of pure gold. Certain
parts of it are in monochrome, and
are thought to be unfinished. Unfor-
tunately, during the Ming dynasty,
between 1486 and 1450, this long roll
was cut up,into small sections and
pasted into an album. Sometime lat-
er these parts were pasted back again
in thé form of a mahimono, but many
of them, for example. eight scenes
from the life of the Sakyamuni Budd-
ha, were lost in the process, and a
number of them seem to be out of
their proper sequence. The Emperor,
for instance, now walks at the head
of the procession, although, according
to religious canons, it would seem
proper for Buddha: and his followers
to assume the place of honor. The
magnificence of the roll, fortunately,
has in no way been destroyed by this
shameful mutilation.
The caligraphic character of this
painting is one of its most admired
features, and the presentation of the
subject matter; which is treated in a
slightly humorous vein, is icono-
graphically correct. Miss Chapin be-
lieves it to date from-one of the best
periods of Chinese painting, consider-
ing it a Thirteenth Century work of
the Southern Sung dynasty. There
are three inscriptions upon it, the
first, written by a monk in 1240 A. D.,
the second by a scholar of the Ming
dynasty, and the third, which gives
the history of the roll since its execu-
tion, by an emporer who ruled during
the Eigfteenth Century. The°second
inscription seems to indicate that the
roll in question is a copy of a. work
executed in 946 A. D. by a master liv-
ing in the ‘Tai-lu Kingdom in South-
ern China, probably in the province
. now called Yunnan. - Although the
mahimono now in the Palace Museum
was painted during Sung times, it
shows little interest in landscape and
portrays rather a great hierarchy of
Buddhist divinities, very much in the
style of the religious paintings of the
‘classical Tang period, 618-907 A. D.
Sung Buddhism:took the form of indi-
vidual contemplation, instead of
spending itself in elaborate works,
rich in iconographical signficance.
These facts render it likely that this
painting is a copy of a much earlier
work. To; quote Miss Chapin, “Al-
though ‘A: Long Row of Buddhist
Images’ is in a sense a document of
Buddhist iconograhy, it gives. one
pleasure purely as a work of art.”
United Campaign
Seventy-eight members of the
Faculty and Staff have contributed
$1,589 to the 1933 United Campaign.
Of this amount $525 was contrib-
uted. by four members of the Faculty
in amounts of $100 or over; $235 by
four members of the Faculty in
amounts of from $50 to $75; $370
was contributed by fourteen mem-
bers of the Faculty and Staff in
gifts of from $25 to $40; there were
two contributions of $20 each, five
contributions of $15 each, and ten
contributions- of three dollars or
under.
This. represents 49.1 per cent. of
the Faculty and Staff, who have sub-
scribed to the campaign this year,
News of the New York Theatres
(Continued frem Page Two)
unceremonious exit from Hollywood,
following another good-bad woman, de-
‘bacle, it will be taking all the glory
away from the father of the Prodigal
Son. Miss Bankhead left the stage
flat-footed to go out and blink at or-
namental males, but now that she has
starred her last on the screen, she is
back with prospects of the” lead in
Ivor Noveflo’s comedy, Party. What
a party. it will be if the lady is her
usual dynamic, vital self. She will
have to revise her technique, because
the scenery won’t hold up under the:
Bankhead “lean.” Mr. Novello will
be remembered as.the author of The
Truth Game, in which Billie Burke
disported herself two years ago.
Clear All Wires, the newspaper cor-
respondent play, which has had rath-
er an éncouraging success, has closed,
as has Chrysalis, the twenty-one
scene creature which Theresa Hel-
burn had a hand in bringing to life.
This year there is a marked tendency
on Broadway to close up and get out
before you’re thrown out, so to speak,
and plays still fairly popular close
before it’s all over. .Of course, there
are always some plays that are closed
before they get through the first re-
hearsal, but if there is any spot
where hope goes through more set-
ting-up exercises than the theatrical
breast, we have yet to encounter it,
and even. the worst play can survive
one night. Chrysalis could not go
much farther, though.
M. Paul Hazard..Speaks
on Voltaire’s Talent
4
«Continued from Page One)
knew Latin, French, English, and
even studied philosophy. A Plato now
in the library of Leningrad is an-
notated by her, and reannotated by
Voltaire, who likewise sought “le fond
des choses." He was ever an ap-
prentice in philosophy, always go-
ing over former decisions, as he tells
us in “Sur l’Homme,” in the hope of
reaching perfection.
At this time there were two new
tendencies in philosophical thought:
toward the empiricism of Locke, and
toward Newton’s seareh for the. con-
crete. In both of these Voltaire had
a part; he was glad to abandon specu-
lation on the unknown in favor of
humanity. Humanity was_ his re-
ligion. And so he was an apostle,
not of Descartes, but of Newton,
whose attitude with regard to facts
he very much admired. Voltaire him-
self not only wrote a “Traite des
Mathematiques,” but conducted exper-
iments “Sur la ‘Nature et la Propaga-
tion du Feu,” for the best work on
which the Academy of Sciences at
in France, thus showing us another
of his aspects—Voltaire proselyte.
To make Voltaire feel nearer to us,
we need particularly a sign of an-
guish from him. And _ undoubtedly
he was sad; from him we have irony,
piquancy, wit, but never gaiety. He
even writes that were it not for love
and work, he would kill himself. Za-
dig is Voltaire himself, the story of
a pale Chateaubriand. -He speaks in
bitter, painful accents; he is not. pleas-
ing to women, and seeks happiness in
science and thought. But he causes
jealousy, and is persecuted for his
knowledge. Nor is power the road to
happiness, for however just one may
be, a caprice may-dislodge one from
office.
Voltaire insists on the absurdity
which seems to rule over human life;
there is no cause and effect; the wick-
ed are the happiest and he cries “Quid
est felicitas?: Quid est veritas?’
Regret for lost youth, a sense of in-
justice, of persecution, are ‘apparent
also in some of Voltaire’s poems. .
Two hundred years ago, the period
was frivolous, but it busied itself with
great questions. The spirit had free-
dom and made use of it: Voltaire is
Munich were offering a. prize. Vol-; not a statue sculptured for ever; we
taire did not win, nor did Mme. du;
Chatelet, who, sleeping one hour a
night for eight months, also sent in
the results of her researches. That
Voltaire (contrary to his own belief)
did not discover a physical law is of
no importance; what matters is his
attitude toward experimental physics.
It was he who made Newton popular
must retouch it; Voltaire was much
deeper than we will allow; he was
sad; he was always working and was
never satisfied. Often he was des-
perate. Voltaire is “un homme leger
mais qui pense profondment,” and that,
concluded M. Hazard, is far better
than an appearance of depth with
'slightness of thought.
International Club for ~
Bryn Mawr is Suggested
‘Continued from Page One)
an organization would make Bryn
Mawr’s membership in the Interna-
tional Student Committee more than
a nominal honor. Vassar and the
more widely known New England
women’s colleges have formed a loose
intercollegiate association called the
International Student Committee,
which maintains contacts between
the different college clubs and pub-
lishes a magazine called the Student
Internationalist, a copy of which will
be placed in the Common Room by the
Undergraduate Association. Bryn
Mawr sent eight representatives to
the first meeting of the committee in
May, 1931, and contributed to the
magazine, but the Bryn Mawr édi-
tors have never been appointed by
any active campus organization.
Three new editors, Vung-Yuin
Ting, Nancy Hart, and Josephine
Williams accepted responsibility for
the December issue with the under-
standing that the question of the or-
ganization of a club and the further
| membership of Bryn Mawr in the n-
tercollegiate committee should be re- —
ferred to all Bryn. Mawr. students.
interested in foreign.affairs. Accord-
ingly, it is hoped that a large repre-
sentation of students will &ttend the
meeting in the Common Room Tues-
day night to decide whether an In-
ternational Club would be desirable
on the campus, and if so, to choose
officers and discuss a program.
—————
scsromee neal Recast
wie
mildness and better taste are to me!
thusiastic.”
“*No wonder Chesterfield smokers are so en-
. CHESTERFIELD RADIO PROGRAM
Every night except Sunday, Columbia
ect
ee 4
. Coast-to-Coast Network.
¢
bute lin Mr Mheyre Z
“TYVERYWHERE I go, I have to listen to the
same thing. ‘Try Chesterfields. Honestly,
a they are milder, and you simply must try them!’
“Me... try Chesterfields! Why, I haven’t
smoked anything else. That’s how important
THEY’RE
(ler.
®
MILDER—
THEY TASTE BETTER
3