Haverford College - Record Yearbook (Haverford, PA)

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and becomes the central topic it is ictortlcil. The hand gnarled with writer ' s ciainp is tempted to affix to the honor pledge: 1 didn ' t reeei e any help on this and Cod knows, I couldn ' t have given any. Academic in olvement is manifested in my- riad a s. It is isihle in the way eyes, searching for inspiration, lollow the mo emcnts of The liohhysox iMiise as she saunters the length of the reference section in the lihrary. It presents itself in the group scene of a harried student, dictating his completed project paper to a battery of typists, inspired by a united pledge to help their suffer- ing friend meet his deadline and by the fact that their suffering friend is paying them twenty-fi e cents a page. One sees it in the rapt attention at a tutorial session as freshmen hang on e ' ery word in the sneering retort of a Geiiens or search for hidden subtleties in the latest well-turned Satterthwait ianism. Possibly it is manifest in the slightly-em- barrassed smirk on the face of a senior caught in the act of purchasing copies of the College Outline Series. Paul Desjardins on the trail of a recalcitrant student, Stark Jones hiding from Paul Desjardins; this too is part of the scene. More seriously, deep involvement with the academic atmosphere can be of most discussion on campus. Page 11

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Haverford was one of the most influential moments in their careers, But . . . Try to find the man who admits that he continues to return to Ha erford for intellectual challenge. J-Iis existence, if such there be, is drown- ed out by a resounding chorus of rationalizations led by the soloists screaming, I keep coming back because I like the guys; or I ' m going with a girl from Bryn Mawr; or Mv parents made me come back again. Still everyone deri ' es some satisfaction from contact with the scholastic germ. How else to explain the satisfied feeling one experiences after hours of work when a neatly-tvped paper, bound well, and prefaced by a good tit le lies before him, ready to be submitted. Regardless of the quality of its content, a sense of craftsmanship acts as a narcotic on the sleep-deprived brain and lulls the author into a feeling that his work not only is one of labor and lo e, but more importantly, probably borders on genius. Not to say that this state of academic satis- faction embraces every part of Haxerford life. There remain those moments of truth when one suddenly realizes that the paper he has written or the examination on which he has just scrib- bled his name is not worth the paper on which This academic realm, as might be expected . . eventuallv filters into Page 10

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. . . the student soon is forced to realize . . . sensed in the mood of an exciting lecture, a re- warding lab experiment, a lively seminar dis- cussion. But often on the other end of the scholastic spectrum is the figure of a student seeking his own special form of Nirvana at Roach and O ' - Brien ' s as he braces himself into a booth with a glass of beer and a well-worn copy of The Abo- lition of Mail before him. Or his good friend who sits at breakfast with an uncut grammar book propped against a pitcher of milk and franticallv mutters German verb conjugations between mouth- fuls of scrambled eggs. The placid front of the ivy-draped ivory tower could lull one into a false sense of security if one were not aware of the world of repeating challenges, impossible deadlines, and overfilled schedules which lies directly behind it. Having made it into Haverford on the basis of some sort of mental prowess, the student soon is forced to realize hitherto untapped sources of cerebral activity within himself. The discovery made, the refining process can move in several directions. It can be channeled into sophisticated bull, or occasionally express itself in genuinely creative productivity. The transformation may change our man at Haverford into an idealist, a cynic, or even a smooth-talking fence-straddler. Whatever the re- sult, the effect will have been felt and will con- tinue to be felt long after he leaves the College. . . . hitherto untapped sources of cerebral activity ' within him- self.