Haverford College - Record Yearbook (Haverford, PA)

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JOHN ASHMEAD, JR. During his student days at Harvard University, John Ash- mead worked at one time or an- other as a salt tablet dropper in a tomato cannery, a music critic and reporter for the Hartford Times, a translator of German, and a cowboy and piano player at a Colorado dude ranch. The diversity of Ashmead ' s activities has stuck with him as Associate Professor of English at Haver- ford. Most of us know him as a teach- er of literature and creative writ- ing, areas to which Ashmead brings a wide knowledge encom- passing many of the arts. He be- lieves that literature should be seen in a context which is not strictly chronological or isolated but which spreads into other areas of aesthetic endeavor. Thus Ash- mead was a pioneer force in bring- ing to Haverford the Carnegie Study o f the Arts of the United States — a collection of three thousand color slides of American architecture, painting, and sculp- ture which he uses to broaden the student ' s (conception of literature as a work of art. Similarly. Ashmead brings his knowledge of music to bear on the style and structure of literature. He frequently reads -aloud to the class to give students a feeling for pitch and harmony in langu- age, in the belief that ' nobody is tone deaf. Interpreting a book, he may associate certain motifs with a character, or note an ope- ratic effect, where three char- acters are singing at once. Perhaps Ashmead ' s most valu- able experience as a teacher, in preparation for his second role as a writer, has been simply in meet- ing people. Having a wide variety of acquaintances is invaluable, he feels, and his various foreign teaching assignments in Athens, Japan, Burma, the Philippines, Korea. Formosa and Hong Kong have added greatly to this circle of friends. Out of those years of teaching and travel, and out of his experience in World War H. came The Mountain and the Feather. Ashmead worked on the novel on and off from 1944 un- til November. 1960. when it was accepted for publication. The book was written mainly from 10 p.m. to 2 a.m. or from 4 to 8 a.m.. the only times available with a busy teaching schedule. Future plans include another novel (completed but not yet published) and a third in the drawing-board stage. In his third role as critic. Ash- mead has not confined himself to literature alone. He also has some rather provocative opinions about Haverford College. He com- plains of a desperately over- worked faculty and student body dominated bv the Puritan idea that work is the first thing in life. Such conditions, he claims, produce an atmosphere where study is 95% analytical and 5% creative and acts as a stim- ulus to grinding out plodders. As a remedy for this situation. Ash- mead suggests the possibility of abandoning compulsory classwork in the senior year. Students need some time to reflect, even though the ' goof-offs ' will take advantage of this free time . . . they will under any circum- stances. Commenting on the new two million dollar science build- ing. Ashmead half-humorously wondered about the possibility of buying 100 dollars ' worth of re- flection. Some of the points John Ashmead has raised in this ac- count of his diverse career would certainly bear such reflection. Page 14

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ERNEST PRUDENTE It ' s pretty hard to get through Haverford without meeting Ernie Prudente. You can do it. although Ernie probably has as many peo- ple in his courses as any other professor. You can do it: hut you miss something. You may sign up with Ernie simply because of athletic require- ments, or because you have the sinking feeling that a few weeks of grinding or loafing have left you miserably out of shape. So you sign up for sports instruc- tion, body-building. Softball, base- ball or basketball: and vou dis- cover, if Vou didn ' t know it al- ready, that there ' s an unusual man at the heart of the program. He knows what he ' s doing and he does it well: and if vou came til learn something, you ' ll learn. Of course, if you don ' t want to learn. Ernie won ' t force vou; if you want to goof off, you can get away with it. You won ' t fool Ernie: but he won ' t get tough with you either. If you want to put ourself in shajje. he ' ll help, shouting words of encouragement to his sweating disciples. Let ' s keep those weights hot! he ' ll b :iow. And build up those necks and get those arms strong and those stomachs tight. Easy? Take it from Ernie. This is a gut course. When ou ' re sure nu can ' t lift five pounds more, hell grunt for ou so vou don ' t waste your energv: or he ' ll get you laughing so vou have to start over again. Usually the result is that vou make it next time: and that you find keeping vourself in shape great fun. Ernie may be serious about it. but be still makes it fun. Perhaps that ' s why vou like him — and there ' s no one who doesn ' t. When you come down to the gym. you don ' t stop being a stu- dent. Ernie believes that everv part of you needs to be toughened and exercised and brought into harmony, mind and body. Keep those arms going so vou won ' t get tired t ping. he ' ll roar. Ernie doesn ' t begrudge you the time ou have to spend stud ing. He knows you ' re here to get an edu- cation. That ' s part of Ernie ' s job: and ()u like the wav he does it. Page 13

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PAUL J. R. DESJARDINS In Paul Dfsjardins. Haverford has its arrh enemv of s(i{)hists. past and present. Pliili)S(iphv for him is a life commitment, a |)as- sionate search for meaning: on hoth the intellectual and practical levels of existence, and not just another academic discipline. Paul was l)orn and raised on a farm in u|)state New York. He entered ale College, where he majored in English during his undergraduate days. During the war ears he served in China as a lieutenant in the army. For one ear after the war he was a novice in a monastic order. Then he re- turned to Yale and studied philos- ophv. writing his Ph.D. on the Platonic dialogues. At Haverford we have known Paul as amateur ps chologist. familv man. con- firmed Platonist. sophisticated Catholic, and a good guy who could use the King ' s English with the best or worst of us. There are some who would say of Paul Desjardins that of all the professors at Haverford he knew the most students but understood the least. But those of us who have benefited so greatly from his friendship realize with apprecia- tion that Paul set for himself a hard task: to understand us at the deepest levels of our complex and often confused natures, and not at the level of appearance. To this task he brought a live- ly and sometimes baffling method of teaching. He was fond of classi- fying us. for purposes of argu- ment, into certain Platonic per- sonality categories. Every class at Haverford has one or two Charm- ides or Cephalus figures, an oc- casional Phaedrus or Thrasv- machus. and sometimes a potent- ial Socrates. Paul ' s hope for all of us. as we advanced from Phil- osophy 11 and Ethics to Plato. Aristotle and Kant seminars, was that we put off the old Charmides or Cephalus figures and become more and more like Socrates in de eliiping the philosophical view of life. Truth is never one-sided, accord- ing to Paul, but steers its way through opposites. The reconcil- iation of these opposites is the aim of philosophy, to rediscover the original harmony which man. in his alienation, sees in terms of polarities. Paul sought to teach us all to be good charioteers, harness- ing the appetites in service of the rational elements of the soul, and good helmsmen, steering our in- dividual courses upon troubled seas of warring appetites and motivations. Even if most of us did not ful] achieve this harmoin in our own lives, most of us will agree with Paul that a life should be led from rotnicliiin and iml from |)er- sonal whim or inclination. Paul taught us to hold in contempt the liberal arts relali isl who knows a lot about ever thing but has no convictions about anything. He al- so encouraged us to revitalize our often moribund religious heritage in the service of the philosophical life. By his own example he show- ed us that this life is not easy, for it involves constant self-over- coming and sacrifice. Yet with Paul we were all proud to climb Plato ' s ladder in search of a truth which would ultimately harmonize in a kingdom of ends — a kingdom within us, but not of this world. fA nm ptv I B iiV ' . ' a ' ji.i 1 ' r ' iP j - HBr gj fl L fid n. ■ ' ■ 1 • mm mm » -4- h C Page 15