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1921-03-18
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vassar:45403,vcl_Letters_Aaron_Fannie_1921-03_04_016
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: Page 1, vcl_Letters_Aaron_Fannie_1921-03_04_016
March 18, 1921
Dear Mother, Father, and Pete:
I am an unhappy mortal. The Wellesly crowd left last night after chapel. They all looked so nice and happy and excited and everybody was fussing over them! Honestly, I don't think I ever wished for anything as much as I wished to be sent up there. A whole crowd went down to the streetcar and cheered them off. They took the midnight train from Albany. They all went in a bunch--I guess there were about twenty-five in all. Khaki Dodge, who lives in Boston, is taking them to the College Club for breakfast today and a '20 alum is giving a luncheon for them today, and then they are going out to Wellesley this afternoon and sleep there tonight. It certainly is going to be great. I don't believe it can be as much fun here, particularly in view of the fact I am sure we are going to lose. Our affirmative is very poor--our only hope is that the Smith bunch will be poorer. The negative is very good. I feel quite confident that we will win at Wellesley. I wish you could hear the debate out there, Pete. I am sure you would enjoy it. I am racking my brain at present trying to give the team a stiff practice this afternoon and another one tomorrow morning. I was talking to Lucy just now about Kellogg. She is very disappointing to me. Not only is her delivery so poor that one can scarcely understand her from the back of the room, but her arguments are not sound. Her speech, first affirmative, is the only one that can be completely independent of what everybody else says, and yet she has some ridiculously weak points. Lucy and I agree on them. Believe me, I am going to smash them this afternoon. She makes the ridiculous assertion--among other things, that the Jews are theoretically granted the same rights in everything as the Christians in all the countries of Europe!
The Smith crowd arrive this afternoon. We are giving to have a "tea-dance" for them in the foyer of Students' tomorrow afternoon and tomorrow night we are going to have a debate dinner, either in Main or off-campus. Oh, how I wish we would wind tomorrow, since I do have to stay home! I am afraid I am a rather poor sport, although thank goodness I have been sport enough to keep my disappointment more less--principally, more--to myself.
Did I write that I heard a very excellent lecture on "Folk-Lore and Story-Telling" by Padraic Colum, a very interesting Irishman, Wednesday. I also had the pleasure of listening to him in Miss Peebles' other Romance class that morning. She stopped me on the way to Main to tell me that he had come early and was coming into her class, and that if I did not have a class that hour, she was sure I would enjoy it. He talked informally about Ireland at the present time. He said that there is a very terrible suppressed war going on, and that because of the peculiar topography of the country, it might go on for twenty
Dear Mother, Father, and Pete:
I am an unhappy mortal. The Wellesly crowd left last night after chapel. They all looked so nice and happy and excited and everybody was fussing over them! Honestly, I don't think I ever wished for anything as much as I wished to be sent up there. A whole crowd went down to the streetcar and cheered them off. They took the midnight train from Albany. They all went in a bunch--I guess there were about twenty-five in all. Khaki Dodge, who lives in Boston, is taking them to the College Club for breakfast today and a '20 alum is giving a luncheon for them today, and then they are going out to Wellesley this afternoon and sleep there tonight. It certainly is going to be great. I don't believe it can be as much fun here, particularly in view of the fact I am sure we are going to lose. Our affirmative is very poor--our only hope is that the Smith bunch will be poorer. The negative is very good. I feel quite confident that we will win at Wellesley. I wish you could hear the debate out there, Pete. I am sure you would enjoy it. I am racking my brain at present trying to give the team a stiff practice this afternoon and another one tomorrow morning. I was talking to Lucy just now about Kellogg. She is very disappointing to me. Not only is her delivery so poor that one can scarcely understand her from the back of the room, but her arguments are not sound. Her speech, first affirmative, is the only one that can be completely independent of what everybody else says, and yet she has some ridiculously weak points. Lucy and I agree on them. Believe me, I am going to smash them this afternoon. She makes the ridiculous assertion--among other things, that the Jews are theoretically granted the same rights in everything as the Christians in all the countries of Europe!
The Smith crowd arrive this afternoon. We are giving to have a "tea-dance" for them in the foyer of Students' tomorrow afternoon and tomorrow night we are going to have a debate dinner, either in Main or off-campus. Oh, how I wish we would wind tomorrow, since I do have to stay home! I am afraid I am a rather poor sport, although thank goodness I have been sport enough to keep my disappointment more less--principally, more--to myself.
Did I write that I heard a very excellent lecture on "Folk-Lore and Story-Telling" by Padraic Colum, a very interesting Irishman, Wednesday. I also had the pleasure of listening to him in Miss Peebles' other Romance class that morning. She stopped me on the way to Main to tell me that he had come early and was coming into her class, and that if I did not have a class that hour, she was sure I would enjoy it. He talked informally about Ireland at the present time. He said that there is a very terrible suppressed war going on, and that because of the peculiar topography of the country, it might go on for twenty
: Page 2, vcl_Letters_Aaron_Fannie_1921-03_04_016
years or so. He said that it is very easy to land an army there, but very hard to do anything with it effectively. He knew that it was a class in Romance, and when he came in, he started first talking about Spenser, inasmuch as we had just been reading him. Then, when somebody asked him to tell us something about Ireland at present, he looked thoughtfully about the room for a minute, and then said, "Well, that is hardly romantic".
Mlle. Clement whom I have heard at the Alliance Francaise at home and who I heard give a splendid course of lectures on French literature last year, is lecturing tonight, but I don't see how I can go. I have debate late this afternoon and all day tomorrow and all my studying to do for me Ec and chem midsemesters before Monday morning.
It is a beautiful day. I am going to get a walk this afternoon--debate of no debate.
I read the French play last night and signed up for tryouts this morning.
I had a letter from Helen Diamond this morning. She informs me, among other things, and Dick Fishel also wrote it to Helen--that Maurice Baum's twin brother, the brainy West Pointer, committed suicide. Nice stuff at the age of twenty!
Otherwise I know no cheerful news!
Love,
Fannie
Mlle. Clement whom I have heard at the Alliance Francaise at home and who I heard give a splendid course of lectures on French literature last year, is lecturing tonight, but I don't see how I can go. I have debate late this afternoon and all day tomorrow and all my studying to do for me Ec and chem midsemesters before Monday morning.
It is a beautiful day. I am going to get a walk this afternoon--debate of no debate.
I read the French play last night and signed up for tryouts this morning.
I had a letter from Helen Diamond this morning. She informs me, among other things, and Dick Fishel also wrote it to Helen--that Maurice Baum's twin brother, the brainy West Pointer, committed suicide. Nice stuff at the age of twenty!
Otherwise I know no cheerful news!
Love,
Fannie
