3

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Wednesday, February 22, 1950

THE COLLEGE

NEWS

Page Three



Foreign

Correspondent

Specially contributed by
Eva Rosenbaum, 50

Each year, in the darkest part
of the night, when the cold Febru-
ary winds are blowing in from the
Rhine, the entire population of
Basel rise out of their warm beds
to witness the beginning of the an-
nual Fasnacht celebration. Prompt-
ly at four o’clock in the morning
all the lights in the city go out,
and from all parts and all streets
appear the Cliques with their tre-
mendous, lit up lanterns and their
hideous masks. Fifing and drum-
ming they parade through the
town, and when everyone, partic-
ipators and spectators, is thor-
oughly chilled, they adjourn for
the traditional Zwiebelwai and
Mehlsuppe, two horrifying concoc-
tions which can only be compen-
sated for by much beer.

For those of us at the Univer-
sity who were unfamiliar with the
whole procedure, it was all very
mystifying and very pleasing—
pleasing, for it meant a week’s va-
cation, and mystifying, since we
could not understand the enthus-
iasm for a religious holiday. Tra-
ditionally Fasnacht stems from the
days when Basel was still one of
the Catholic cantons of Switzer-
land, with a bishop as ruler. This
time was set aside each year to
give the people one last opportun-
ity to indulge in worldly affairs
before retiring for Lent. (Now the
only connection left with the for-
mer religious motive is the season
at which it is held. It has become
a grand opportunity for the re-
served Baselers to lose their inhi-
bitions.

Fasnacht is a festival which in-
volves the making or breaking of
marriages, the spending of savings
all year accumulated. It is a time
when a foreigner in the streets of

Basel is safe only under the pro-

tecting wing of a native. For one
week anything may be
one, and usually is. The Cliques
which parade the streets day and
night in grotesque costumes vie
for the prize for the best lantern.
Each lantern portrays and satir-
izes some event which took place
during the year. No error, regard-
less of how small, that any public
official or well-known individual
made, escapes the watchful and
cynical eyes of the Cliques. Fias-
nacht is a free-for-all with none of
the niceties of behavior observed.
It is a time of great profit for the
cafes and paper mache industry,
since only masks are considered
acceptable wearing apparel. Hus-
bands and wives make rendezvous
with strangers. Then there was
the professor who made a date
with a charming mask, who turned
out to be his laboratory assistant;
and the man whose date proved to

‘be his wife.

Continued on Page 4

id to any-'|



“Plunge, Ye Jolly Men of Science.”



by Barbara Joelson, 52

The scene is the gym; the time
is Saturday, the 18th; the occasion
is the Undergrad Dance following
the Freshman show. Gone are the
familiar badminton nets and other
athletic equipment. Instead cupids
hang from the baskets and aim
heart-tipped arrows at the danc-
ers crowding the: floor. On all
four walls there is a bright red
border with cut-out hearts. The
walls of the fencing room contain
more of cupid’s darts and numer-

Bard’s Eye View

by Jane Augustine, °52



Of themes and tests we always
groan.

In Merion — while drinking tea,

we always listen for the phone.

And Denbigh’s juniors now have
flown

abroad—we eye them enviously.

Of themes and tests we always
groan.

To well-dressed Rhoads the men
are blown,
(or from us unkempt creatures

flee)
We always listen for the phone.

In Pem and Rock bridge holds the
throne

until the first exam’s decree.

Of themes and tests we always
groan.

By us No-doz and cokes are
known,
In Radnor’s upstairs smokery

we always listen for the phone.

We Bryn Mawr girls two habits
own,

whatever otherwise we be.

Of themes and tests we always

... ZPOaN ; |



We always listen for the phone!



Victim of Nash-ness Sees Life
Complicated, Variegated Prism

by Barbara Joelson, °52

Life is like a variegated, many-
faceted prism;

And is complicated by such things
as grades, required courses,
weekends, pay day bills, and
plagiarism. .

It is as spiteful as the weather,
and just about as consistent;
And the things that come easy are
either awful hard to find, or
else they’re entirely non-ex-

istent.

Marks are unpleasant details,
though it isn’t hard to figure
out why I only have D’s...

Because when I get to exams’ all
that ever comes to my mind to
write down are the first two
lines of Joyce Kilmer’s poem,
“Trees.”

As far as romance is concerned,
I’ve definitely been through the
well-known school of hard

knocks.
And: now the years are creeping
> on me and everyone e':
either engaged or married, while
I sit writing term papers, play-
ing bridge, and trying to knit
argyle socks.

I’d adore to be dangerous, a femme

fatale, toasted and sought after
from here all the way to Siam;

But instead, everyone just says
isn’t it nice that I look at least
three years younger than I actu-
ally am!

And to top it all off ... when I
decide I’ve finally written a
masterpiece with rhyme, mean-
ing and originality,

Someone says a man named Nash
has already done it much bet-
ter and anyway how can it be
a poem when it doesn’t even
scan and at least every other
line contains some sort of
banality?







Hearts, Cupids and Lanin’s Music
Add Gaiety to Valentine Dance

ous lacy valentines. Here also
weary dancers are being served
with a pinkish punch, spiked with
sherbert and strawberries. In the
main room hundreds of corsaged
Bryn Mawrtyrs dressed in a ka-
leidoscope of colors are dancing
with their penguin-clad partners.
In one corner Lester Lanin & Co.
are distributing felt chapeaux, and
giving forth with Waltzes, Fox-
trots, Sambas, Rhumbas, Lindy
Hops, Charlestons, and Mexican
shuffles. Along with the familiar
old favorites and many newly

popular tunes, they played The

Last Resort’s hit song, “Won’t You

tbe My Little Polar Bear.”

Towards the middle of the eve-
ning, everyone stopped their danc-
ing and settled down on the gym
floor to listen to the entertain-
ment. First on the program were
the Harvard Dunces, who sang
about “Aunt Clara,” whose picture
is turned to the wall; about
“Maria” in her swing crying “Oh
Fred, tell them to stop”; and about
‘Lydia, the tattooed lady.” Then
the Bryn Mawr Octangle rendered
“Yesterdays,” “Mood Indigo,” “Do
I Worry,” and “Father’s Day.”
Last came the Princeton Tiger-
tones singing “Good-bye My Coney
Island Baby,” the story of “Anne
Boleyn, with her ’ead tuck’d un-
derneath her arm,” and many
others.

At last the strains of “Good-
night, Ladies” and “Good-night,
Sweetheart” hinted that the dance
was over; and everyone repaired
to various destinations for the en-
suing hour-and-a-half that was al-
lowed to them.

The Observer

AN IMPORTANT DISCOVERY
HAS BEEN MADE

We observed while walking in
the Library that there
extraordinary pattern in the brick
floor at the bottom of the stairs
jin front of the main desk. To be
sure, we had noticed before a few
designed tiles sprinkled among
their smooth pink neighbors but
had always thought them placed
there haphazardly by a floor-layer
who was more practically than
spiritually inclined. Search for the
spiritual in everything, however,
for these tiles were laid by no un-
designing individual who found in
his hand, by chance, the castle, the
fleur de lis, the pretty checkered
square.

Start near the door that leads
down to the main desk. You will
see on your right a tile with a
fleur de lis wpon it and on your
left another. Take three steps for-
castle exactly ten tiles from the
steps. On your left is another in
much the same position. Two steps
more and there is another pair of
castles, each one near a card cata-
logue case. Two more steps, there
is a fleur de lis balanced by a
checkered square. (Here for the
curious is meat for further study.)

Continued on Page 4

is an|_



‘Boola Boola’ Immortalizes Yale
From Bulldogs To Eager Alumni

by Barbara Joelson, ’52

Many things have come out of
Yale, such as bulldogs, Whiffen-
poofs, and even one or two gradu-
ates. The latest release is of a
somewhat different nature than
those I have-mentioned. It is a
book of cartoons about Yale, writ-
ten by Julien Dedman, Yale ’48,
and published by Coward-MeCann.
The name of this literary master-
piece is Boola Boola!; subtitled,
“A Satirical Peek at Yale, Its
Foundations and Other Unmen-
tionables.”

The illustrations depict the high
spots in the life of a Yalee from
his first encounter with the regis-
trar, who informs him that “this
office does not ordinarily employ
the term ‘gut,’” to the time when
he returns for a reunion, bellow-
ing into a fellow Alumnus’ ear
trumpet “I said Boola Boola, damn
it!” The time between is filled
with variety, an indomitable spirit,
and a multiplicity of classic com-
ments. Among the latter we find:



Incidentally

Letters we finished redding be-
cause of morbid curiosity ...
“Dear Benefactor (And that you
are!): Happy Valentine’s Day!
Since it isn’t customary for boys
to send Valentines to boys...
You made the Ralph Flanagan
band an important attraction over-
night. I don’t know how to ex-
press my appreciation . . . What
can be more sentimental than
“Where Or When”... And speak-
ing of sentiment, this side holds a
special place in my heart because
it was one of my last Bluebird
hits. This week, RCA Victor
raised the band to the parent RCA
Victor label with our ‘new record
of “Rag Mop.” But I'll always
have a soft place in my heart for
Bluebird and all it did for us...
THANKS! THANKS! THANKS!
THANKS! THANKS! THANKS!
THANKS AGAIN!!!”

...QOh, it was nothing .. .?

“Dear Madam, ...I am trying
to build up material for a feature
on the American student’s view of
Britain . .. A British student vis-
iting the US told me the other day
that Minnesota was a part of
Iowa ... Have many Bryn Mawr
students visited Britain? ... Have
these travellers had the opportun-
ity to recount their adventures to
other girls in College? ... Is there
any long-range interest in more
obscure British institutions as in-
violability of jury’s right to pri-
vacy and so on? Does anyone stop
for afternoon tea at Bryn Mawr, or

'wear British tweeds and sweaters?

. . . I'd love to have something
considered along these lines .. . I
hate to write to you anonymously”
”

Perhaps it’s just as well.

“Did you prep at Andover, or did
you just happen to arrive at
Yale?”; “It was D, D, D, all along,
and then I got a big surprise
—F.”; “It was a toss-up between
Schopenhauer and Bogart, and
guess who won?”; “Why, room-
mate! You little devil! Is this a
bottle of scotch I see?”; and “I
decided to stop worrying about
finals, and put my faith in God.”

Not the male point of view alone
is presented. There are many
scenes that will ring a painfully
familiar note in the mind of every
red-blooded American girl who
has experienced the vagaries of a
college weekend. For example,
there is the college man who stag-
gers out of the Junior Prom lean-
ing against his date for support,
and remarking happily, “I hope I
haven’t shattered the magic of it
all.” Then there is the girl who
is ushered into a room of about
twenty other women in various
stages of deshabille, with the
casual comment, “Uh—there’ll be
another girl or two sharing your
room”; and the bedraggled Vas-
sarite who collapses at the feet
4f her roommate announcing,
“Well, I made it through another
Derby Day!”

Boola Boola! does for men’s col-
leges what Everything Correlates
did for women’s colleges. One of
the most delightful things about
Mr. Dedman’s drawings is the
detail. His men have masterfully
comical expressions ranging from
the supremely naive, to the suave,
to the ribald. They are dressed
in striped ties, Brooks Brothers
shirts, checked sports jackets,
belted raincoats, baggy slacks, and
other typically collegiate apparel.
Immortalized in the pages of this
satire is the man having his hair
cut and directing the barber to
“make it tweedy.” Here lives the
student eagerly reaching into his
mailbox with the cry, “Come on
Judy, Come on Geraldine, come on
Yale Co-op bill for December!”
Here also is the Yalee who uses
the cyclotron to crack walnuts, the
fastidious dean who detects a
“bald spot on Wrexham Tower,”
the senior at graduation who
faints “from the sheer ecstasy of
the moment,” and the student at
an exam who wants to trade “two
Homeric similes for a Vergilianm
stanza.”

Mr. Dedman’s sense of humcr is:
subtle and penetrating; his ob-
servations are acute and well-
chosen; his style is satirical and
delightful; he is a most efficient
master of understatement. In one
of his cartoons a contribution to
the humor magazine is criticisedi
because “‘it lacks boff.” I believe
we are more than justified in ob-
serving that if there is one thing
that Boola Boola! has in the great-



est abundance, it is very definitely
“boff.”



Rare Book Room Has Exhibit
Of Type-designer Goudy’s Work

by Judith Konowitz, ’51
In the Rare Book Room there is
on display an exhibition of the
work of Frederic W. Goudy, who

was the most distinguished de-

signer of type in the last century,
with few peers in the history of
printing. Examples are shown of
his drawings and the stages of
the process of producing the final
matrices from them, as well as
many of the 120 fonts which bear
his name, and books printed from
them,

The samples of Mr. Goudy’s
work which are displayed show the
remarkable- variety of uses to
which the designs have been put.
There are pages out of books
about printing written by the de-
signer himself, in addition to se-
lections from more genera] texts.
There are testimonials by other
printers of his genius which are

effectively printed in his own
type. One may even find a sam-
ple of an advertisement by Saks
Fifth Avenue, for which an ex-
clusive kind of print was origin-
ated

The debt which the contempor-
ary reader owes to Frederic W.
Goudy is well expressed by the
last sentences of an editorial in
the N. Y. Herald Tribune which
was written after his death al-
most three years ago, “There was
a great sum of accomplishment in
this practical artist. He was a de-
signer and a philosopher, a writer
and a craftsman, a printer who
preached of beauty in utility. In
his time he won vast acclaim and
once it was said that half of the
display lines in a national maga-
zine were set in Goudy type.
The entire reading public is in Mr.



Goudy’s debt.” ti: