University of California Berkeley - Blue and Gold Yearbook (Berkeley, CA)

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' 5] Blue and Gold I9O4 number of creative minds to produce at least a fairly clever composite picture of Berkeley life. Rich humor, if not everywhere in evidence, is still waiting for the clever man or woman who searches for it. University life is thrilling with subject matter for the right pens. In the old days the skit, cartoon or pasquinade must not only have a local setting, but it seemed to be rather expected that it would be rudely, even savagely, personal. Close familiarity of the students with each other and with the faculty seemed to give rise to the demand, even if it brought no ethical justification for the supply. The editor of today must still look to the local setting; but happily the taste of his audience is now more generic. To- day the successful writer for the BLUE AND GOLD must appeal to the whole Student Body. It is not possible to do away entirely with pointed allusions; but as a general rule the Student Body will best be reached rather by the depiction of college types than by the portrayal of particular individuals. All will recognize the type, while it will only occasionally happen that mere personalities will reach far enough to justify themselves. But by whatever road the editorial work is approached, the result to be attained must always be the same. Each successive editorial board should seriously set out determined to concenter and hold captive within the covers of its BLUE AND GOLD the sunshine of three hundred and sixty-five Berkelev davs.

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Blue and Gold 19O4 was a big sale. Each reader had the setting for the joke ready and waiting; he read, and generally grinned and enjoyed. To an outsider, unfamiliar with the properties and dead to the point of view, the humor of those days was perhaps puerile and the wit dismal enough. The thought that the editors owed any duty or responsibility beyond looking after their personal safety, hardly occurred to them. In issuing the BLUE AND GOLD they were merely upholding class tradition and the reputations of their respective Junior classes. The time had come for ' 82 or ' 83 or ' 84 to have its fling; we were free to whack each other and to whack everybody, students, males, females, faculty, president, regents, legislators, and the townspeople generally. The idea was to hit them all, so that nobody could feel too lonely and sore over his distinction. It was a sort of an editorial Mardi Gras, and no one must be offended at the little liberties taken with him during the holiday. Such an atmosphere of abandon is necessarily absent in the real univer- sity. Berkeley today is a city; the students are so many and their interests so varied, that they have neither time, opportunity nor capacity to know intimately the members of their own classes, let alone the whole college. A BLUE AND GOLD of today is not a place for recording incidents the humor of which only the few can fully comprehend. A more dignified demeanor has been demanded of the publication. It has come to be under- stood that the BLUE AND GOLD represents something. It is looked to as an expression of what is best in mod ern student life. And this does not mean that the BLUE AND GOLD must eventually degenerate into a ponderous com- pilation of dry statistics and yawning chronologies. Every feature of univer- sity life has its humorous aspect; and it is largely because care-free, happy- hearted university men and women see and enjoy the humor of it all that their college days are never to be forgotten. Notwithstanding the changes from the old days to the new, it is, as it always has been, the mission of the BLUE AND GOLD to express and per- petuate the sunny side of university life. When all things are considered, the earlier issues, however indifferent their qualities otherwise, did that much fairly well. The modern BLUE AND GOLD must achieve by courtlier methods a like result and improve upon it. College men can see the humor of the situation whether you are dancing a jig or posing out a minuet. All that they demand is that you must not take yourself too seriously in either dance. The more dignified pose demands of the modern editor a higher class of work than was demanded of us in the older days, but the opportunities are now greater. There are more types to portray and the editor has a wider field in which to work, and many more heads from which to demand assist- ance. He may not find a Balzac, a Thackeray, or a Clemmens ready to come to his aid at a nod, but our University should bring out annually a sufficient

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Blue and Gold I9O4 [16 Literature from tKe University- short as has been the life of this University its years ' present a line of writers varied in activity and imbued with true literary talent. Of those who have felt the charm of nature and the force of art may be mentioned, first, the name of Mr. Charles A. Keeler, one of our most versa- tile writers both as regards theme and form. In Mr. Keeler are conjoined rare power of imagination and scientific accuracy, teaching toward Truth as well as Beauty. His writings include, The Evolution of the Colors of North American Land Birds, a book of verse, The Light Through the Storm, The Woodchopper ' s Song, A Vaquero ' s Ride, Life ' s Jour- ney, and his new volume, Verses from the Southern Seas. Mr. Charles P. Greene is one of the earliest University writers we can lay claim to. His work appears both as prose and verse, the style in each being delightfully readable. Frank Norris, in spite of his five different noms de plume, has always been recognized and appreciated as the same graphic describer of life as it really is. It was during his college course that Mr. Norris published his first book, Yvernelle, a romantic tale in verse. The Third Circle is one of his most successful earlier stories. It is hardly necessary to mention his great novels, The Octopus, and The Pit, epics of the wheat. The Wolf was to have completed the trio. Mr. Norris is a man of whom Alma Mater may well be proud. His untimely death during the past year was a keen blow to her and to the reading public. Jack London is one of the men who has launched us upon an entirely new field. With a background of Alaskan glaciers he depicts in vivid, strong and sometimes rough manner, the life of that far northern land. Mr. London gives promise of further and better work in his chosen line. Other recent graduates already making fame for themselves are Richard Walton Tully, and his wife, May Eleanor Gates Tully. Mr. Tully ' s activity is mainly along dramatic lines and his recently accepted comedy promises a successful presentation under Nat Goodwin. Mrs. Tully, or Eleanor Gates, as she is known to her readers ' , has contributed largely to Eastern magazines. Mary Bell has continued the work commenced in her college days, and may be named among those who are successful magazine contributors. Of present work in the University it is hard to predict. No geniuses seem looming up on the literary horizon, but several students are doing what, from a college standpoint, may be called good work. The formation of the University English Club during the past year argues well for sustained interest in creative work. MARTHA RICE.