Mount Holyoke College - Llamarada Yearbook (South Hadley, MA)

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The place to sec exciting, significant drama « significant plays are being perfornicd-probaWy Be rim or Par. possibly London or New York, probably not South Hadley. The £Tcc to decide What plays are significant and exciting or to w ,, them, is anywhere—Mount Holyoke, even. critic at college strut the plumes and feathers of todays hits. am g the bones of today's failures. Spreading out from here andstretch.ng as far as the historical eye can sec. range the dramas of the past, the perspective of such a scholar is occasionally distorted by hyperopia—a fixation on the distant mountains—it is a far less fata disease that the myopia which knows no past at all. Another remarkable feature of ivory towers, one of value to drama- tist as well as critic, is that their windows arc always ojxn and their doors arc never locked. True, and sadly so. the routine of tower activities often leaves the student little time for gazing from win- dows. let alone taking strolls or vacations. Still, there is a freedom from certain distractions which others must face. The great drama of the present will only find its way to Mount Holyoke by chance of occasional invitation, but its critics and contributors will find their way from Mount Holyoke by purpose and design. They will have left the tower to tramp upon the earth, but they will always remember the view from above. James D. Ellis Art history, like all academic subjects which involve the study of man’s achievements, is by no means an exclusive discipline. To some people, it is of interest primarily because of the record which it provides of the values and aspirations of cultures both similar to and different from our own. To others, its value lies in its investigation of the work of art as a primary object, its expressive power and its relation to the technique which produced it. The best teaching of art history which I have encountered, and which 1 attempt to emulate, uses no specific method, but presents the work of art from a variety of viewpoints. It seems to me that diversity of approach is very significant, be- cause the work of art has as many meanings as there arc people interested in it. Thus, art history may be somewhat more flexible as a discipline than other Hu- manities, but I imagine that this is in part due to its comparative youth as an area of study. In any case, the flexibility of the discipline makes art history for me both the most demanding and the most challenging field of the Humanities. Jean Harris 16

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The Department of Italian Language and Literature is concerned not only with the intellectual values in life but with the emotional and artistic as well. We arc concerned with the development of the whole person and the relevance of knowledge to the life of the individual today. In our elementary language courses we try to give the student enough prepara- tion so that should she not continue after the first course, we hope she will have learned to read well, express herself ade- quately orally, and have a better under- standing of the people and culture of Italy. In the literature courses emphasis is placed on truth, on the understanding of a great personality or a masterpiece. We hope that through our literature courses the student will gain some notion of hu- manity and become better prepared to work out for herself a scale of human values. We try to contribute to her knowledge of what civilization has been, how it has changed, and what our inher- itance is. Valentine Giamatti The end of teaching is the desire, not only to acquaint students with the ideas and skills of this or that area of knowledge, along with its history, its role in human experience, its special refraction of the human condition, its current functions and future possibilities; there is also the desire, hopefully, to introduce students to the community of intellect, which is wonderfully free of national or regional bounda- ries. partisan politics, time, place, and fashion. In the process of learning, we always have to be concerned with the letter and the spirit. The drawbacks which we particularly experience are. I think, principally these: First of all. time. The process we wish to further is a gradual one; and human beings often put up quite a resistance to new ideas. A second drawback is the not so total prevalence of zestful intellectual curiosity. Grades constitute an- other drawback to the aims and desires inherent in our work, as they tend to encourage an attitude which is by definition far front these aims. Currently, the major drawback lies not in the academic system but rather in the anti-humanistic tenor of our times. If we permit a less than deeply absorbing interest, concern and fascination with the human being we help the levelling, hollowing and otherwise destructive elements which arc so prevalent and so rau- cous. Teaching and studying arc most singularly and directly involved with de- velopment of the individual human being who is still the most important creature on earth. In an era which downgrades the human being, we have only four years in which to work toward this realization. We may never be wholly rid of the aspects which stand in its way, but we might achieve another step in the realization of human potentialities. Edith A. Range 15

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F reedom, as I see it. is a mixture of opportunity and discipline. I regard opportu- nity as a panorama from which one may choose to focus upon a special segment. Hut discipline can become meaningful only if the segment of focus constantly pushes outward again toward panorama. In this way discipline can provide a source for opportunity as much as can opportunity for discipline. l-rccdom seems to me to be a mode of thought. It can be exercised in any environment. Although environment may condition the scope of opportunity, it cannot kill all opportunity. Vision, ingenuity, and perseverance arc the ingredients for achieving freedom under any conditions. Colleges would seem to me more likely than most other environments to tolerate freedom. Mount Holyoke is no exception. And, although we may hope that any college will strive to improve, there is no reason why we should expect it to achieve perfection. Lack of improvement, however, will stem only front lack of vision, ingenuity and perseverance on the part of the college community directed toward upholding a clear concept of the nature of freedom and practicing freedom. There is no substi- tute for individual responsibility in this regard. I lay no blame outside myself for any freedom I do not possess. David Holden