POWEL SEES IN LAMPY TENDENCY TO REFORM

The following review of the current issue of the Lampoon was written by Harford Powel, Jr. '09, former president of the Lampoon, and now editor of the Youth's Companion.

George Ade, perhaps by no fault of his own, has not yet become a member of the Harvard faculty. Among his many golden truths is the often quoted aphorism that "they all look good when they're far away." To nothing in Cambridge does this apply more forcefully than to the Lampoon. In its own office, and among all Harvard men everywhere, is a tradition that once upon a time the Lampoon was a perfectly side-splitting paper.

Having heard this boy and man, for twenty-five years, the present reviewer nevertheless feels that, like Punch, the British Empire and the New Haven Railroad, the Lampoon isn't as good as it used to be, and never was.

Lampy's Ways Become Loose

In recent years, moreover, the Lampoon has followed the example of so many middle-aged churchwardens and trustees, and has gone on the loose, The sight of the old reprobate reeling home from a night in a barroom has distressed the whole congregation. Various sisters and brothers have stood up and urged his expulsion from the fold. Only a few cooler heads have dared to think that these symptoms are characteristic of many individuals in their fifties and sixties; and that such sisters usually come to their senses, and become the sweetest, most pious old gentlemen that you would care to meet

During the past few weeks there has been evidence that this view of the Lampoon is the correct one. The current issue shows that the Lampoon has got religion, a clean collar, a shave, shine and shampoo, and is reverting with god2ly zeal to its old state of grace. It is a good, clean book for the whole family, and you can show it to Bill Roper too, if he comes around after supper for a Ford ride. The little group of graduate Lampooners in New York, who recently apologized to the world for the Lampoon's latest lapse from virtue, can now introduce the paper without hesitation to their clients in the sensitive rural communities of New Jersey. President Fawcett and Ibis Jones' are little Dutch girls. They chase dirt. They are obviously leading an earnest crusade to make the Lampoon as pure and respectable as it was in its age of innocence.

Few Faults in Current Issue

The present reviewer yields to no man in his satisfaction in this reform. It is good journalism and good business, and will do more to lift the mortgage from the old home than any amount of "special number", fake CRIMSONS, and the like. All that remains is to make the paper a little bit funnier, without, of course, admitting to its columns anything that would bring the blush of shame to the cheek of modesty. For instance, Jones contributes to the May 4 issue a first rate professional cover; the kind of work that outside magazines are glad to buy. But Jones shows the defects as well as the virtues of the professional manner. He might have reversed his two characters, showing the student looking into the bulging skull of the professor, and with similar results. Similarly, the writer of the leading editorial views with alarm the CRIMSON'S baseball games with its esteemed contemporaries in Cornell and Princeton. He would have been more comical if he had congratulated these journalists on their willingness to learn a new trade before it is too late.

Is "Pickwick" Among College Comics

The whole tone of the new Lampoon, however, is not ironic but kindly. It beams with benevolence, like the Christian Science Monitor. It is the Pickwick among college funny papers; a smiling old philanthropist, with a fondness for old friends, old wine and old jokes. Only at intervals in this issue will the reader cut himself on the razor edge of real wit. There is a paragraph in the south-west corner of page 232 which would have made F. P. A. very happy had he thought of it. The parody of the sainted Bruce Barton on page 237 is clean-cut work; and Reynal's full page drawing, though encumbered with too much work on the background and accessories, gives promise of a real gift for cartooning. Questions 2 and 4 in "How Much Do You Know" are as funny as they come anywhere.

Lampoon Entering New Era

The next stage in the Lampoon's development will, accordingly, be watched with interest. It has passed through the dangerous age. And the reviewer would like to express his conviction that never, not once, has the Lampoon's worst been one half as bad as the very best of most other college comic. Their jejune obscenities can be studied, by any sociologist who will take the trouble to collect an armful of them; and this will be an excellent thing for anyone who has lifted a supercilious eyelid at the peccadilloes of the Lampoon. The nastiness of little boys telling dirty stories in the alley behind the livery stable finds beautiful literary and artistic expression in the humorous papers which most American colleges put out at this time.

So, with the Lampoon back in the straight and narrow path, not the thin and feeble sheet of seventeen years ago (and earlier) but a good, honest wad of text pages and advertisements, its subscribers have become its friends and all others ought to become subscribers without delay. Harvard deserves a first rate magazine, and this is it