POETIC JUSTICE

In another column of this issue of the CRIMSON there is an account of the arrangements now in progress for the proper housing and correlation of the valuable libraries of poetry belonging to the University. Few institutions can boast such completeness as that afforded by the Norton gifts. Practically all the important, and a great deal of the lesser, verse written in English since Elizabethan times are here represented. With this material as a background the collection of modern verse left the University by Miss Lowell should combine with the books bought by the Gray fund to give Harvard a poetry library unique in this counrty.

With the acquisition of a separate room for the housing of the modern collection the facilities for the study and appreciation of poetry at Harvard receive a substantial strengthening. A start has been made in the right direction, for of all forms of literature poetry most of all forms of literature poetry most of all requires comfortable and quiet surroundings for its appreciation. The hurly burly of the main Widener reading room with its scraping chairs and hoarse whispers or the deadening fastness of the stacks are equally inappropriate for the sort of pleasure to be found in the reading of verse.

There is a disadvantage however in the comparative isolation which a special room gives. In the minds of too many students the extra flight of stairs and the atmosphere of New England reserve necessary for the success of such a room give to it a sort of mystic unapproachability inconsistent with every-day use. Nothing could be more unfortunate, and efforts should be made at the outset to reduce all possibility of such a situation to a minimum. For it is by the general interest and support of the student body that the success of such a thing as a poetry reading room is to be judged.

Support of another and more tangible sort is likely to be necessary. In order to make the rarer books in the collection generally available, it will be necessary to have a librarian in attendance at all times. The aid of such a person in helping patrons of the collection to find what they want and to care for the books would increase the desirability of his constant presence. As yet the funds for such a functionary have not been provided, but it is seldom that a good cause must cry unheard forever. It is to be hoped that the many unusually appealing features of the scheme so far excellently projected by Mr. Winship may attract the interest of the generously inclined who have an eye to the amenities of college education.