|_ THE CHINA ✨ MAIL MONDAY, FEBRUARY 27, 1956.
CAN YOU BE GOOD-LOOKING
AND CLEVER?
T
of
HIS is the aspirin
the age age, realism and Marilyn Monroe, when ull- mysterious, sensible actressen queue for buses and wear glasses, and no one has the time or inclination to drink champagne out of Windmill girls' slippers, wide-awake, Things are serious; (who
fact
In an age when poets tend to look like
bank officials AMANDA MARSHALL finds
two up-and-coming faces that succeed
of
In looking differest . . .
bini-a elegant which just might have puely struck
her ex-husband, the
Peter, suspect have all abandoned painter and bird expert
debauchery) Scott. She has a daughter and oplum have a tendency to look like 13, and has at one time
another accomplished a variety bank officials. #n some, of jobs, including a little acting.
and Now she lives in a flat times actually are,
mure Landon's Little Venice, and is o women novelists likely to be university dons part-time reader for a pubilah- than figures, of intrinsic glamour.
arc
Literary Hons of the Byron, Rupert Brooke and Elinor Glyn type, who looked as romantle as their lives and occupations, are as dead as the dodo
The eur- rent image of the writer ap fi proximates more to Mr J
when sucress Priestley:
handful of nought to odds a
the pelion he takes Es to buy drought. proofing strips for his dours
Sandy
程
wildest.
Wilson's
Incan most reckles
Remarkable
In thr
Natural gifts
Swriter,
B
WILLIAM MERWIN pad ELIZABETH JANE HOWARD Two faces that manage to look specia!...
for
bo mund
traditional appearance, Mr Mer- ideals-but more, I suspect, for win combines a strictly con- comfort's sako then art's.
respect temporary
ilo's Mr Merwin takes his craft Miss Howard's writing 区 sensitive in the beat sense of a comforts, such as good cooking, and his career seriously; has
modern painting, book of
poems about to word that
immediately warm rooms,
beautiful COTR. and published the old ond
England; in when applied to
and holidays abroad.
is working long, 'disciplined works of Judy novellata,
In Starving
garrets 13 .a hours at another play and an the light she trains on women
poets that is no autobiography. und their
refation- fashion for emotional
only con- This may be an age for stock- ships is a trifle lesa ferocious longer chic. The
but but no less revealing than the cession he maloes to the tradi- brokers rather than poots,
tions of his profession is to I would back him as Poet Most battery of an operating theatre.
alittle Likely to Succeed of My second in the Handsome wear clothes that fall
of Tailor and Cutter generation, In Spite
Clever short of Boing bracket is William Merwin, an American
his twenties, honoured in his own country and rapidly gaining re- cognition here for broadcasts of his poems and play-translations. Mr Merwin left America for on itinerant Europe and after
tutor-his as spell
Robert Included children Majorca- settled, with his English wife, a Siamese cnt, and a comfortable. well-proportioned house within roaring distance of the Regent's
she is a flow worker, and an a hostess she has great natural gifts (includ- ing a curiosity about humanity, andi a talent for making such classics ou lemon meringue pie) which she likes to keep exer- cised. These two faels account for the widely spaced Interval between her first novel. The Beautiful Visit," and her argon,
The Long View," which due Park hona, rut next month.
In spite of elegant, very con- temporary ek/thes. there IN something Bou her which
HURRAY, then, for two not- makes one think of an age when H,
tu
FUT Lic
were more treasured, yet-a-well-known faces that women
and more expressly "womanly" than look perud, malage remarkable,
Frw. but they can' and very the-ordinary. A young novelist at young port. neither them in the least drab, neither In the remotest danger of being tuten for a bank trim, now on the way up.
and
Her first book displayed Knowledge of of uncanny
1914-18 war period, well before she was born. Uncanny in some ways the ts-with
ון
יאן
First play
in
charges Graves's
now
THE MAESTRO
GOES TO SCHOOL AGAIN
to learn the double-bass
London, their parents, and it would be
of the two! Dr
a bold man who would say that Arst pluy, "Darkling DAME MYRA HESS Incked
odd. On the Epsicin bust such activity isn't worth while." nt Child." has just opened
of the Parents will indeed warm to with A new young of her, in the vestibule the Arts
of Academy
Music, the Doctor's bedside manner, actress. Margaret Whiting. and Royal
some.re hect irreverently “But his other qualities will be witcheruft in the plot.
draped a black beret,
needed to solve certain severely 1st There
cither nothing
But
to technical almost odder was
problems. I namo the study academic or willowy about Mr
A brawny-enter Merwin's exterior. uneasy built boy, he looks like a use- ful member of a Poeta Hugger talent for table furning, and o
be (et predilection
dis- XV. if such a thing could writing turbing ghost stories, Elizabeth Jane Howard
some of imagined. In
volume Tren novelist.
Curiously at odds early which appeared in a very
with This other, The called "We Are For The Dark."
frame Impressive
in 30's, she looks good enough to
a face The Long View" tells the in- rather reminiscend of xxlel-and has done so for the
those jangly slightly shiniest of the shiny magazines, side story of a marriage, and beautiful and
sinister
called Her mother
with tells it backwards, starting will young men who look out from genuine Diaghilev's company. and the Its heroine middle-aged today. the blue skie of Elizabethan mechanically
Andree Howard and working back over the miniatures, choreographer
und often started working.
wam
4270
the
cover
1
The
Academy's
new Principal, Thomas
dis. The Case Armstrong, and
of the Missing In a barrel-organ one Harpsichord, A revolution has concert ilte In the corner and double-bass in an overtaken
past few years. If you want to -not the plas barrel-organ
Bach, Purcell and their properly contemporeries you
not must Instrument
street-plano, but a use a piano but the instrument miniature pipe-organ these composers themselves operated--is not knew-the harpsichord. Many
double-bass is students appreciate the new de For Dr Armstrong, mand and would like training. years to the moment when she the day by composing a sonnet fully in use,
then is the Academy's A tall, dark girl with bright first sces
future. busband and killing 32 mon before supreme musical authority to his Where
breakfast. With this pleasingly .727 picked students, is a be harpsichord? You cannot see it, eyes, she looks like a watchful, at a party.
ginner on the double-base and There im't one. is taking Jessons from one of his own stad.
Great Operatic Volce The attitude nt darnest Mystery. Where are Britain's endeavour is typical of Thomas singers? The opera-houses, at Henry Wait Armstrong, MA, present buoyed up on a vocal D. Mus.
flood (Oxon),
is her cousin.
her
STOCKTAKING
BARGAINS
SPECIAL CLEARANCE OF SURPLUS STOCK -
AS A RESULT OF STOCKTAKING JUST COMPLETED WHITEAWAYS ARE NOW IN A POSITION TO OFFER
THOUSANDS
GENUINE
OF
BARGAINS
WHICH MUST BE CLEARED
DURING THE NEXT TWO DAYS
PRICES HAVE BEEN SLASHED
DURING STOCKTAKING
And Wise Shoppers Will Take Full: Advantage of the Many Reductions.
COME EARLY
ALL GENUINE STOCKTAKING DEPRECIATIONS
Whiteaways
HONGKONG & KOWLOON
AY, LAIDLAW
CO.LTD.
• The
Hon RAM BY ARTHUR JACOBS
FRC M
Australians,
tu
like know
Hon. FRCO. In his new post The success of the Opera School, which carries the virtual cer- recently founded by singert tainty of knighthood, he insists Joan Cross and Anne Wood, that he is "just learning the job." seems to indicate that specialised He is 67, about the nomul nage opera training at the older music for such high
office in
siald schools is inadequate. academic circles. He talks, with
disarming simplicity, of "de- Dr Armstrong, although 'aware
problems, retuses to of these pose brandishing a new broom. I suspect that as a product of the rival institution, the Royal College of Music Ex South has a gentle- Kensington-he
nol 10
voting the remaining 10 years or professional life to so of my helping these deserving young people.
But there 19 no com- pulsory retiring age.
Who are his students? About two-thirds are girls. About half manly over-anxiety
10
are planists. About one in 12 wound susceptibilities at his new
home
It overseas (almost is literally
In Marylebone Road, comes from
his home, for his entirely
the from
Common..
oficial Ent
opens
Into the wealth
About Ave-eighths Academy. have their Ices 25 guineas a term-paid by grants or scholar- ships.
average period of The study is three years. Part-time students are not accepted.
מקרני
The Principal cannot hope to know them all intimately, But "my wife is asking all the fresh men to tea in turn,
my36 more than 200 a year." More officially, students encounter the Principal interviews and as conductor:
has modestly tuksen over the least expert of the Academy's three orchestras,
he
Somto decades ago, under three Successive Scottish principals, the Academy was dubbed the Macademy of Music. There is no chance that under Armstrong it will become the Strong-Arm Academy. For the new Principal -tall, portly, mild of speech and look-Tadlates gentle moral persuasion.
I should like to know, though, what thoughts and plans enter his mind with the solitary and doubtless soothing music of his solo double-bass. Will he, by the way, play the Instrument in one of the Academy orchestrast "I fear I shall not be good says the modest, enough,"
diplomatie misionary-minded, Dr Armstrong...
CUMMINGS” car contest
FROM SIR ANTHONY: The Cliché Tourer (For exploring every avenue, reaching the light ne the end of the sunnel, leaving no stone unturned, and turning
tité comiter.)
FROM THE CHANCELLOR: The Platitude 3-Wheeler (With room only for people with tightened belts who have not dined on over ripe pheasant or the national cakej
FIRST
[PRINCIPLES
FROM MR. BEVAN, The Split Straight Eight
With capacious boos for old luggage.)
CARE FOR A LIFT
FROM MR. KRUSHCHEV:
The Take-You-For-A-Ride ROADSTER. (Spiked upholstery, revolver dashboard and trap-door
LOOK WHERE
YOU'RE GOING
ARE YOU
MAD, GIR!
flooring.)
YOU ROAD HOC! /i
YOU'RE NOT FIT TO DRIVE, MADAM!
FINALLY FROM GILBERT HARDING ; The Family Fury-
MUSICAL
tHelpful to all road-users.)
TANGLE IN
THE DARK CONTINENT
From ERIC KENNEDY
Brussels. vocalists to record "European" frequent personal appearapken
A CRAZE for "European" music, yo turned out like suite, the docs, customers to buy
music has
A musical missionary, he talks of musical activity, as others might of social welfare. Amid today's cynicism, such attitude is heartening. It won him devotion et Oxford, which Africans. In the ho has just left after more than Congo.
years as cathedral organist,
ing only a fraction of the price, gripped of second-hand European re Belgian corda, At the same time he sold
cheap Japontro gramophones, and choral It all began when local ser-
His schema was a success, vants went back to their villages Two rival Congo, firms followed qualif to tell of the music they beard sult. cathxis at his new job, in the coming from radiogramą lą thick of the hard-boiled pro- | European clubs and forty,
30
and orchestral
But do a
universo
ports
on
The "composer," whose name
Also, "composora" were sent to outlying villages with loud- speaker vans and a stock of rocards for sale.
`IN CANADA:
DRUGS ON THE RAMPAGE
By McKenzie Porter
Vancouver
DOCTORS, police chiefs
and politicians in Wes- tern Canada are reaching the conclusion that new legislation is imperative if an alarming epidemic of drug addiction is to be checked.
Since the end of the war the number of addicts in this country of 16,000,000 people has risen from fewer. than 2,000 to more than 5,000. The gravity of this figure becomes apparent when it is remembered that in some countries (Britain
for one) with more than “ 50,000,000 people, the drug addicts can be counted in hundreds.
Threo Canada's
thousand of drug
habitues infest a
square mile of dilapidated wooden rooming houses on the fringe of Vancouver's Chinatown. There are two reasons for this virulent concentration.
CHINESE COLONY.
One is the fact that Vancou- ver has always, had Canada's biggest colony of Chinese, the descendants of those imported to labour 'on tho first trans- continental railroade Although
the percentage of drug addle- tion is no higher today upong the Chinese population than is among the Europeans, there сап be
the doubt that
in the scourge had its origins spread of an Oriental taste for oplum.
ከሱ
The other reason why oddlets select Vancouver as n ́domicile
is the temperate climate. They can survive in winter on less fuel and food than la essential to life in the more fritid cities to the cast and so they, have more money to spend on drugs.
The appetito creates illegal market worth more than £20,000,000 a year and smug- and retailers giers, wholesalers wage constant warfare among themselves for a monopoly.
During the past 12,months three men have been shot, one battles. fatally, in dope gang Scores have been brutally mauled. The most bizarre re- prisal was taken against- o known trafficker who stepped into his car, turned the Ignition key and detonated powerful ex- plosives hidden under the bon- net by his enemies. The car was blown to fragments, and the man lost a leg.
TEENAGE ADDICTS
Seventy-five percent of new addicts are in their teens. The typical cases are boys or girls of above average intelligence but suffering from a psychosis-the result of a pour home background. Almost invariably they are con“, victed juvenile delinquents who pick up the habit in a criminal envirotment. They usually take the first "fix" to show off, much Uke a boy taking his first cigarette. Unfortunately the sensation is so agreeablo that they are enslaved by the drug for the rest of their lives.
· So far anti-narcotic measures have been taken chiefly against the traffickers. But heroin, 'so light in relation to its value on the black market, and so easily smuggled, continues to pour in and, despite severe penalties, to And distributors. Now it is 10 argued that the best way locep down the crime role is to eliminate the demand,
One proposal, considered a hocent Senate Committee. Inquiry was for an official dis tribution of drugs at a nominal prloo to registered-addicts. This experiment was tried out, how- aver, by the United States In the twenties and it resulted in
Blasco,
LOCKED UP
Serious attention is now being paid to published proposals of HSS, Wilson, a former Super- intendent of the Narcotics Now the trouble is that am
Division of the Royal Cariadilan, even more asute businessman Mounted Police. Wilson Lakes in the colony has formed the view that there is little to is on the label, did not really Performing Rights Society to distinguish the behaviour of K fessionalism .of London music? Requests poured in for the compose a nole. He was in protect their interests.
modern drug addict from that of Abroad, such
go to lead.
Congo Radio to play European variably the vocalist with the
a dangerous lunatic. On there ing composers or other men in
grounds, the musical public's eye. I asked grammes--difused
its native
ho argues convicted - recorda
pro- orchestra, which usually con
adillots should be oerlifea, in over. loud Bisted of a gulter, a set of Sle Arthur Bilas why
The recording companies, men of bly
the same manner as 'the insane, тапк
shummed academhle pokers in the larger native drums or an empty bottle and course, have a reply ready; and committed to special. in-
nomolding to tap it with. - positions in Britain. "Bocause,"
"No performing ""rights--we's stitutions. :: Master' of
He thought up impromptu pay each composer aklary." Quton's Music, ninety percent
number, which were always
Hero attempla would be made And the "composers” aro to cure them · and : Üromisint, of the job consists of telling Communities raised their own giayed in European tempo, parents that their child, though arts to buy atcond-hand gramos Whether gontrots, tangos, quiale adding complications of their case would be liberated
parola, After two lapses, how- gifted, has not quite got what is phones. The prices of second step, or down-to-earth booglo own. They signed a few con- needed. .•*
over, they would be locked un droots on the side, nga hand European recorda soared, oogle,...
for, life. This is the only way, Dr. Armstrong's comment on
To boost miles, the recording -- Glad to receive a rulary, | says Wilson, to bring an end to this: was!!! "Decisions of that Then an astute businessman companies placed radiograms, they pre oven happler at the the degradation and violenes sort involve the happiness of in Loopoldville had a plan. He tram of chilege in Adelotas bang) thought of putting extra money | which sourishes in Vanco thötsnds of josing' people`ind, recruited (Afrioan emasdelane and "CompoRIT were man to units for so sodittom) works,
townships.
on