The Harvard Theater

As one of the speakers at the Agassiz Theater forum Monday put it, there was irony in the topic of their discussion--"Do We Need a College Theater" There was really double irony: one, that a university which is looked up to for its eminence in the liberal arts should have no theater; and, two, that it was on the stage at Agassiz that the late George Pierce Baker's English 47 Workshop gave its performances, performances which first gave voice and action to the plays of some of this country's best dramatists. (Baker left the University for Yale when a $2,000,000 grant for a theater and a Drama Department was refused by President Lowell.)

Perhaps the University attitude toward the theater (if it has an attitude) reflects both Harvard's Puritanical beginning and the prevalent American attitude. As this is the only major university in the country without a theater, so is the United States the only civilized country in the world without a national theater.

The most important single step in altering the deplorable local situation would be the construction of a suitable theater building. Though presumably the only way this could be accomplished would be through a large gift or gifts, the impetus for such gifts must come from the Administration.

The theater building is as organic a part of a liberal arts college as the library, the laboratory, or the lecture hall. In a sense, it is a laboratory itself, where the great dramas of the Greek, Elizabeth, and Modern Ages may be handled in the container in which their creators intended them to be.

While waiting for the miracle of a theater building to materialize the University could be taking a second important step. That would be the formation of a faculty committee to study the best method of directing the academic theater once it exists. Whether courses in playwrighting, directing, and acting are desirable, and whether a permanent professional director for student productions should be added to the faculty, are pertinent questions for the University's consideration.