of the historical scene exchange insightsnwith Mr. White — has thendepth of a bowl of soup. Even journalsnexceedingly friendly to Mr.nWhite, in which he’s considered a contributor,ndid not hesitate to term hisnideas about history commonplace. Tonus, Mr. White and his creative-intellectualnprofile was best epitomized bynan interview in Women’s Wear Daily,nin which he enunciated:n”The moment of standing aboardnthe U.S.S. Missouri and watchingnthe Japanese come aboard [to surrender]n. . . was a moment thatnwas better than sex —“nThe interview featured a recentnphoto of Mr. White in which henlooked like all Seven Dwarfs incorporated.nAs we thought that thosenWaste of MoneynSchlesinger’snSentimentalitynArthur M. Schlesinger, Jr.: RobertnKennedy and His Times; HoughtonnMifflin; Boston.nWhatever historical insight, seminalnambivalence, superb penmanship, scrupulousnessnof research and attempts atnobjectivity emerge from these 1066npages, there also emerges from them anRobert F. Kennedy who is a cross betweenna genius and a saint. This, ofncourse, is silly and it is much too muchnto pay $19-95 for it. Thus, the mostninteresting aspect of the book is historiannSchlesinger’s valiant struggle tonescape exactly this kind of projection,nwhich he loses with a sigh of releasednsentiment, nursed since 1968. The realnvalue of this wrestling between one’snemotional propensities and one’s intellectualninhibitions, as performed bynSchlesinger, we assess at $5.95 —wellnbelow the book’s market price. Qn321nChronicles of Culturentimeless little oldsters, charming asnthey are, are not notable for their expertisenon sexual pleasures, according,nat least, to the tradition of folk poetry,nsuch a remark, “in” as it seems, putsnany expertise of Mr. White intonhealthy doubt. The impression thatnMr. White would do anything to remainnon Women’s Wear Daily’s intellectualnwavelength was further reinÂÂnStagenLives Fractured by RubbishnLanford Wilson: The Fifth of July;nDirected by Steven Schachter; St.nNicholas Theater Company; Chicago.nRubbish was in the air those days,nand everybody was hell-bent on callingnit virtue, reason, beauty. Silly nationalnweeklies, extolled it as the path of thenfuture and the contribution of America’snmagnificent, morally alert youth.nTime indicated in cover stories thatnwhat we were witnessing was no lessnthan the new dignity and nobleness ofnthe American ethos. Wild-eyed GreenwichnVillage fools came to politicalnpower. A mentally debilitated Yalenprofessor tagged all that the “Greeningnof America,” and the gentlemanly —ntill then — New Yorker, intoxicatednwith the fumes of nonsense, publishednhis drivel as its own manifesto. Boysnand girls found the essence of being inna drugged stupor, fornication and benumbingnnoise which they called music.nTheir social awareness had beennprocessed into prayer wheels. Theirnhomogenized moral impulse had becomenlimited to seeing the communistnrobots who killed their American peersnin Vietnam as redeeming angels of justice.nCowardice became sensibility, ignorancenspirtuality, and vulgarity innocence.nMany called it counterculture — anmiscreated word for a freakish decadenwhich pretended to elevate life’s conÂÂnnnforced by his views on feminism:n”It’s about time women had theirnsay in the laws governing them —nlaws that for 5,000 years havenbeen made by old men with shriveled-upngroins —“nThis was enough for us to know wherento locate Mr. White in the literarynspectrum. Qntents by dwarfing them; others callednit an historical aberration. WatchingnMr. Wilson’s play, one is more thanncertain that the latter were correct.nWhat Mr. Wilson did, was simplynto show the ’60s ten years later. As hisnsympathies are unabashedly with hisncharacters (and it is not only an allhumannsense of compassion for thosenmistreated by life, but rather an ideologicalnaffinity) while they convey ansense of morbid failure, the playwrightnmust be commended for his work. Thisnseminal ambivalence is, unfortunately,nnot helped much by the direction,nwhich tends to blur rather than tonemphasize it — a considerable feat innitself, as blurring the inherent ambiguitynof a play requires a lot ofncounterproductive animus. To an unprejudicedneye, there’s no doubt thatnthe people on stage have made an awfulnmess of their lives because, a decadenago, they accepted a trendy andnmeretricious gospel as a guideline, embracednpermissive indeterminism as anmeasure of conduct and emotions, indiscriminatelynslept at random withnone another to the point where no onenknows for sure who fathered a 13year-oldngirl, and considered draft-evasionnan opportunity for a trip to Europento “have the time of one’s life”nwhile others went to Vietnam. Now,na decade later, their lives are in shambles,ntheir inherited financial wealthn(one of the characters, a millionaire’sn
January 1975April 21, 2022By The Archive
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