Books: Nonsenseorship
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NONSENSEORSHIP
BY
HEYWOOD BROWN
GEORGE S. CHAPPELL
RUTH HALE
BEN HECHT
WALLACE IRWIN
ROBERT KEABLE
HELEN BULLITT LOWRY
FREDERICK O'BRIEN
DOROTHY PARKER
FRANK SWINNERTON
H. M. TOMLINSON
CHARLES HANSON TOWNE
JOHN V. A. WEAVER
ALEXANDER WOOLLCOTT
and the AUTHOR of "THE MIRRORS of WASHINGTON"
Edited by G. P. P.
SUNDRY OBSERVATIONS
CONCERNING PROHIBITIONS
INHIBITIONS AND
ILLEGALITIES
Illustrated By
RALPH BARTON
WE HAVE WITH US TODAY
At current bootliquor quotations, Haig & Haig costs twelve dollars a
quart, while any dependable booklegger can unearth a copy of "Jurgen"
for about fifteen dollars. Which indicates, at least, an economic
application of Nonsenseorship.
Its literary, social, and ethical reactions are rather more involved.
To define them somewhat we invited a group of not-too-serious thinkers
to set down their views regarding nonsenseorships in general and any
pet prohibitions in particular.
In introducing those whose gems of protest are to be found in the
setting of this volume, it is but sportsmanlike to state at the start
that admission was offered to none of notable puritanical proclivity.
The prohibitionists and censors are not represented. They require, in
a levititious literary escapade like this, no spokesman. Their
viewpoint already is amply set forth. Moreover, likely they would not
be amusing.... Also, the exponents of Nonsenseorship are victorious;
and at least the agonized cries of the vanquished, their cynical
comment or outraged protest, should be given opportunity for
expression!
Not that we consider HEYWOOD BROUN agonized, cynical, or outraged.
Indeed, masquerading as a stalwart foe of inhibitions, he starts right
out, at the very head of the parade, with a vehement advocacy of
prohibition. His plea (surely, in this setting, traitorous) is to
prohibit liquor to all who are over thirty years of age! He declares
that "rum was designed for youthful days and is the animating
influence which made oats wild." After thirty, presumably, Quaker
Oats....
And at that we have quite brushed by GEORGE S. CHAPPELL. who serves a
tasty appetizer at the very threshold, a bubbling cocktail of verse
defining the authentic story of censorious gloom.
Censorship seems a species of spiritual flagellation to BEN HECHT,
who, as he says, "ten years ago prided himself upon being as
indigestible a type of the incoherent young as the land afforded." And
nonsenseorship in general he regards as a war-born Frankenstein, a
frenzied virtue grown hugely luminous; "a snowball rolling uphill
toward God and gathering furious dimensions, it has escaped the shrewd
janitors of orthodoxy who from age to age were able to keep it within
bounds."
Then RUTH HALE, who visualizes glowing opportunities for feminine
achievement in the functionings of inhibited society. "If the world
outside the home is to become as circumscribed and paternalized as the
world inside it, obviously all the advantage lies with those who have
been living under nonsenseorship long enough to have learned to manage
it."
WALLACE IRWIN is irrepressibly jocose (perhaps because he sailed for
unprohibited England the day his manuscript was delivered), breaking
into quite undisciplined verse anent the rosiness of life since the
red light laws went blue.
"I am not sure, as I write, that this article ever will be printed,"
says ROBERT KEABLE, the English author of "Simon Called Peter." (It
is). Mr. Keable, a minister from Africa, wrote of the war as he saw it
in France, and in a way which offended people with mental blinders. He
declares that the war quite completely knocked humbug on the head and
bashed shams irreparably. "Rebels," says he, meaning those who speak
their mind and write of things as they see them, "must be drowned in a
babble of words."
And then HELEN BULLITT LOWRY, the exponent of the cocktailored young
lady of today, averring that to the pocket-flask, that milepost
between the time that was and the time that is, we owe the single
standard of drinking. She maintains that the debutantalizing flapper,
now driven right out in the open by the reformers, is the real
salvation of our mid-victrolian society.
No palpitating defense of censorship would he expected from FREDERICK
O'BRIEN of the South Seas, who contributes (and deliciously defines) a
precious new word to the vocabulary of Nonsenseorship, "Wowzer." The
nature of a wowzer is hinted in a ditty sung by certain uninhibited
individuals as they lolled and imbibed among the mystic atolls and
white shadows:
"Whack the cymbal! Bang the drum!
Votaries of Bacchus!
Let the popping corks resound,
Pass the flowing goblet round!
May no mournful voice be found,
Though wowzers do attack us!"
DOROTHY PARKER gives vent to a poignant Hymn of Hate, anent reformers,
who "think everything but the Passion Play was written by Avery
Hopwood," and whose dominant desire is to purge the sin from Cinema
even though they die in the effort. "I hope to God they do," adds the
author devoutly.
From England, through the eyes of FRANK SWINNERTON, we glimpse
ourselves as others see us, and rather pathetically. In days gone by,
lured by reports of America's lawless free-and-easiness, Swinnerton
says he craved to visit us. But no more. The wish is dead. We have
become hopelessly moral and uninviting. "I see that I shall after all
have to live quietly in England with my pipe and my abstemious bottle
of beer. And yet I should like to visit America, for it has suddenly
become in my imagining an enormous country of 'Don't!' and I want to
know what it is like to have 'Don't' said by somebody who is not a
woman."
Also is raised the British voice of H. M. TOMLINSON, singed with
satire. He writes as from a palely pure tomorrow when mankind shall
have reached such a state of complete uniformity of soul, mind and
body, that "only a particular inquiry will determine a man from a
woman, though it may fail to determine a fool from a man." Tomlinson's
imagined nation of the future is "as loyal and homogeneous, as
contented, as stable, as a reef of actinozoal plasm." And over each
hearth hangs the sacred Symbol--a portrait of a sheep.
Next is the usually jovial face of CHARLES HANSON TOWNE (that face
which has launched a thousand quips) now all stern in his unbattled
struggle with Prohibition, dourly surveying this "land of the spree
and home of the grave."... "My children," says Towne, "as they sip
their light wine and beer..." He is, at least, an optimist! But then,
we are reminded he is also a bachelor.
In his own American language JOHN WEAVER pictures the feelings of an
old-time saloon habitué when his former friend the barkeep, now rich
from bootlegging, with a home "on the Drive" and all that, declares
his socially-climbing daughter quite too good for this particular "Old
Soak's" son. Weaver's retrospect of "Bill's Place" will bring damp
eyes to the unregenerate:
"So neat! And over at the free-lunch counter,
Charlie the coon with a apron white like chalk,
Dishin' out hot-dogs, and them Boston Beans,
And Sad'dy night a great big hot roast ham,
Or roast beef simply yellin' to be et,
And washed down with a seidel of Old Schlitz!"
"The Puritans disliked the theatre because it was jolly. It was a
place where people went in deliberate quest of enjoyment." So says
ALEXANDER WOOLLCOTT, who emerges as a sort of economic champion of
stage morality, though no friend at all of censorship. Despite the
_mot_ "nothing risqué nothing gained," Woollcott emphatically
declares the bed-ridden play is not, as a general thing, successful.
"A blush is not, of course, a bad sign in the box-office," says he,
developing his theme, "but the chuckle of recognition is better. So is
the glow of sentiment, so is the tear of sympathy. The smutty and the
scandalous are less valuable than homely humor, melodramatic
excitement or pretty sentiment."
And last in this variegated and alphabeted company the anonymous
AUTHOR OF "THE MIRRORS OF WASHINGTON" who views the applications of
nonsenseorship from the standpoint of national politics.
G. P. P.
CONTENTS
We Have With Us Today.
G. P. P.
Evolution-Another of Those Outlines.
GEORGE S. CHAPPELL
Nonsenseorship.
HEYWOOD BROUN
Literature and the Bastinado.
BEN HECHT
The Woman's Place.
RUTH HALE
Owed to Volstead.
WALLACE IRWIN
The Censorship of Thought.
ROBERT KEABLE
The Uninhibited Flapper.
HELEN BULLITT LOWRY
The Wowzer in the South Seas.
FREDERICK O'BRIEN
Reformers: A Hymn of Hate.
DOROTHY PARKER
Prohibition.
FRANK SWINNERTON
A Guess at Unwritten History.
H. M. TOMLINSON
In Vino Demi-Tasse.
CHARLES HANSON TOWNE
Bootleg.
JOHN V. A. WEAVER
And the Playwright.
ALEXANDER WOOLLCOTT
The Oracle That Always Says "No".
THE AUTHOR OF "THE MIRRORS OF WASHINGTON"
ILLUSTRATIONS
George S. Chappell demonstrating his Outline of Censorship.
Heywood Broun finds America suffering from a dearth of Folly.
Ben Hecht chopping away at the ever-forgiving and all-condoning Bugaboo
of Puritanism.
Ruth Hale as a XXth Century woman guarding the Home Brew.
Wallace Irwin composing under the influence of synthetic gin and Andrew
Volstead.
Robert Keable urging the Automaton called Citizen to turn on his oppressor.
Helen Bullitt Lowry watching Puritanism set the Flapper free.
Frederick O'Brien finds the South Seas purified and beautified by the
Missionaries.
Dorothy Parker hating Reformers.
Frank Swinnerton contemplating, from the Tight Little Isle, the two classes
of prigs developed by Prohibition; those who accept it and those who rebel.
H. M. Tomlinson regarding, with not too great enthusiasm, the Perfect State
of the Future.
Charles Hanson Towne and the Law.
John V. A. Weaver noticing the bartender who has been thrown out of work
by Prohibition.
Alexander Woollcott rescuing the Playwright from the awful shears of the
Censor.
The Periscope of the Author of the Mirrors of Washington is turned toward
the Great Negative Oracle.
NONSENSEORSHIP
EVOLUTION
_Another of Those Outlines_
[Illustration: George S. Chappell demonstrating his Outline of Censorship.]
BY GEORGE S. CHAPPELL
I
[Sidenote: _Time. The Beginning_.]
When Adam sat with lovely Eve
And. Pressed his Primal suit,
There was a ban, if we believe
Our Genesis, on fruit.
But did it give old Adam pause,
This One and only law there was?
X
[Sidenote: _Nine verses are supposed to elapse_.]
And then great Moses, on the crest
Of Sinai, did devise
His tablets, acting for the best,
(Though some thought otherwise).
At least he showed restraint, for then
Man's sins were limited to _Ten_,
C
[Sidenote: _Ninety-nine verses elapse_.]
In later days the Romans proud
Their famous Code began.
And lots of things were not allowed
By just Justinian.
He wrote a list, stupendous long;
_"One Hundred_ Ways of Going Wrong."
M
[Sidenote: _Nine hundred and ninety-nine verses elapse_.]
Napoleon, (see Wells's book)
Improved the Roman plan
By spotting a potential crook
In every fellow-man.
And by the _Thousand_ off they went
To jail, until proved innocent.
MDCCCCXXII
[Sidenote: _Nine thousand nine hundred and ninety-nine verses
elapse_.]
Now in the change-about complete
Since Adam Passed from View.
For apples we are urged to eat
And all else is taboo.
A _Million_ laws hold us in thrall,
And we serenely break them all!
NONSENSEORSHIP
[Illustration: Heywood Broun finds America suffering from a dearth of
Folly.]
HEYWOOD BROUN
A censor is a man who has read about Joshua and forgotten Canute. He
believes that he can hold back the mighty traffic of life with a tin
whistle and a raised right hand. For after all it is life with which
he quarrels. Censorship is seldom greatly concerned with truth.
Propriety is its worry and obviously impropriety was allowed to creep
into the fundamental scheme of creation. It is perhaps a little
unfortunate that no right-minded censor was present during the first
week in which the world was made. The plan of sex, for instance, could
have been suppressed effectively then and Mr. Sumner might have been
spared the dreadful and dangerous ordeal of reading "Jurgen" so many
centuries later.
Indeed, if there had only been right-minded supervision over the
modelling of Adam and Eve the world could worry along nicely without
the aid of the Society for the Suppression of Vice. Suppression of
those biological facts which the Society includes in its definition of
Vice is now impossible. Concealment is really what the good men are
after. Somewhat after the manner of the Babes in the Woods they would
cover us over with leaves. For men and women they have figs and for
babies they have cabbages.
It must have been a censor who first hit upon the notion that what you
don't know won't hurt you. We doubt whether it is a rule which applies
to sex. Eve left Eden and took upon herself a curse for the sake of
knowledge. It seems a little heedless of this heroism to advocate that
we keep the curse and forget the knowledge. The battle against
censorship should have ended at the moment of the eating of the apple.
At that moment Man committed himself to the decision that he would
know all about life even though he died for it. Unfortunately, under
the terms of the existence of mortals one decision is not enough. We
must keep reaffirming decisions if they are to hold. Even in Eden
there was the germ of a new threat to degrade Adam and Eve back to
innocence. When they ate the apple an amoeba in a distant corner of
the Garden shuddered and began the long and difficult process of
evolution. To all practical purposes John S. Sumner was already born.
To us the whole theory of censorship is immoral. If its functions were
administered by the wisest man in the world it would still be wrong.
But of course the wisest man in the world would have too much sense to
be a censor. We are not dealing with him. His substitutes are
distinctly lesser folk. They are not even trained for their work
except in the most haphazard manner. Obviously a censor should be the
most profound of psychologists. Instead the important posts in the
agencies of suppression go to the boy who can capture the largest
number of smutty post cards. After he has confiscated a few gross he
is promoted to the task of watching over art. By that time he has been
pretty thoroughly blasted for the sins of the people. An extraordinary
number of things admit of shameful interpretations in his mind.
For instance, the sight of a woman making baby clothes is not
generally considered a vicious spectacle in many communities, but it
may not be shown on the screen in Pennsylvania by order of the state
board of censors. In New York Kipling's Anne of Austria was not
allowed to "take the wage of infamy and eat the bread of shame" in a
screen version of "The Ballad of Fisher's Boarding House." Thereby a
most immoral effect was created. Anne was shown wandering about quite
casually and drinking and conversing with sailors who were perfect
strangers to her, but the censors would not allow any stigma to be
placed upon her conduct. Indeed this decision seems to support the
rather strange theory that deeds don't matter so long as nothing is
said about them.
The New York picture board is peculiarly sensitive to words. Upon one
occasion a picture was submitted with the caption, "The air of the
South Seas breathes an erotic perfume." "Cut out 'erotic,'" came back
the command of the censors.
In Illinois, Charlie Chaplin was not allowed to have a scene in "The
Kid" in which upon being asked the name of the child he shook his head
and rushed into the house, returning a moment later to answer, "Bill."
That particular board of censors seemed intent upon keeping secret the
fact that there are two sexes.
Of course, it may be argued that motion pictures are not an art and
that it makes little difference what happens to them. We cannot share
that indifference. Enough has been done in pictures to convince us
that very beautiful things might be achieved if only the censors could
be put out of the way. Not all the silliness of the modern American
picture is the fault of the producers. Much of the blame must rest
with the various boards of censorship. It is difficult to think up
many stories in which there is no passion, crime, or birth. As a
matter of fact, we are of the opinion that the entire theory of motion
picture censorship is mistaken. The guardians of morals hold that if
the spectator sees a picture of a man robbing a safe he will thereby
be moved to want to rob a safe himself. In rebuttal we offer the
testimony of a gentleman much wiser in the knowledge of human conduct
than any censor. Writing in "The New Republic," George Bernard Shaw
advocated that hereafter public reading-rooms supply their patrons
only with books about evil characters. For, he argued, after reading
about evil deeds our longings for wickedness are satisfied
vicariously. On the other hand there is the danger that the public may
read about saints and heroes and drain off its aspirations in such
directions without actions.
We believe this is true. We once saw a picture about a highwayman
(that was in the days before censorship was as strict as it is now)
and it convinced us that the profession would not suit us. We had not
realized the amount of compulsory riding entailed. The particular
highwayman whom we saw dined hurriedly, slept infrequently, and
invariably had his boots on. Mostly he was being pursued and hurdling
over hedges. It left us sore in every muscle to watch him. At the end
of the eighth reel every bit of longing in our soul to be a
swashbuckler had abated. The man in the picture had done the
adventuring for us and we could return in comfort to a peaceful
existence.
Florid literature is the compensation for humdrummery. If we are ever
completely shut off from a chance to see or read about a little
evil-doing we shall probably be moved to go out and cut loose on our
own. So far we have not felt the necessity. We have been willing to
let D'Artagnan do it.
Even so arduous an abstinence as prohibition may be made endurable
through fictional substitutes. After listening to a drinking chorus in
a comic opera and watching the amusing antics of the chief comedian
who is ever so inebriated we are almost persuaded to stay dry.
Prohibition is perhaps the climax of censorship. It has the advantage
over other forms of suppression in that at least it represents a
sensible point of view. Yet, we are not converted. There are things in
the world far more important than hard sense.
One of the officials of the Anti-Saloon League gave out a statement
the other day in which he endeavored to show all the benefits provided
by prohibition. But he did it with figures. There was a column showing
the increase of accounts in savings banks and another devoted to the
decrease of inmates in hospitals, jails and almshouses. From a
utilitarian point of view the figures, if correct, could hardly fail
to be impressive, but little has been said by either side about the
spiritual aspects of rum. Unfortunately there are no statistics on
that, and yet it is the one phase of the question which interests us.
Some weeks ago we happened to observe a letter from a man who wrote to
one of the newspapers protesting against the proposed settlement in
Ireland on the ground that, "It's so damned sensible." We have
somewhat the same feeling about prohibition. It is a movement to take
the folly out of our national life and there is no quality which
America needs so sorely.
If enforcement ever becomes perfect this will be a nation composed
entirely of men who wear rubbers, put money in the bank, and go to bed
at ten. That fine old ringing phrase, "This is on me," will be gone
from the language. Conversation will be wholly instructive, for in
fifty years the last generation capable of saying, "Do you remember
that night--?" will have been gathered to its fathers.
Of course, there is no denying the shortsightedness of the forces of
rum. They cannot escape their responsibility for having aided in the
advent of Prohibition. They were slow to see the necessity of some
form of curtailment and limitation of the traffic. Such moves as they
did make were entirely wrong-headed. For instance, we had ordinances
providing for the early closing of cafés. Instead of that we should
have had laws forbidding anybody to sell liquor except between the
hours of 8 P.M. and 5 A.M. Daytime drinking was always sodden, but
something is necessary to make night worth while. Man is more than the
beasts, and he should not be driven into dull slumber just because the
sun has set.
The invention of electricity, liquor, cut glass mirrors, and cards
made man the master of his environment rather than its slave. Now that
liquor is gone all the other factors are mockery. Card playing has
become merely an extension of the cruel and logical process of the
survival of the fittest. The fellow with the best hand wins, instead
of the one with the best head. Nobody draws four cards any more or
stands for a raise on an inside straight. The thing is just cut-throat
and scientific and wholly mercenary.
The kitty is gone. Nobody cares to come in to a common fund for the
purchase of mineral water and cheese sandwiches. And with the passing
of the kitty the most promising development of co-operation and
communism in America has gone. It was prophetic of a more perfectly
organized society. In the days of the kitty the fine Socialistic ideal
of, "From each according to his abilities; to each according to his
needs," was made specific and workable. And the inspiring romantic
tradition of Robin Hood was also carried over into modern life. The
kitty robbed only the rich and left the poor alone.
But now none of us will contribute unquestionably to the material
comfort of others. Each must keep his money for the savings bank.
Perhaps, something of the old friendly rivalry may be revived. In a
hundred years it may be that men will meet around a table and that one
will say to the other, "What have you got?"
"I've got $9,876.32 in first mortgages and gilt-edged securities."
"That's good. You win."
But somehow or other we doubt it.
Another mistake which was made in the policy of compromising with the
drys was the agreement that liquor should not be served to minors. On
the contrary, the provision should have been that drink ought not to
be permitted to any man more than thirty years of age. Liquor was
never meant to be a steady companion. It was the animating influence
which made oats wild. Work and responsibility are the portion of the
mature man. Rum was designed for youthful days when the reckless
avidity for experience is so great that reality must be blurred a
little lest it blind us.
We happened to pick up a copy of "The Harvard Crimson" the other day
and read: "The first freshman smoker will be held at 7.45 o'clock this
evening in the living room of the Union. P. H. Theopold, '25, Chairman
of the Smoker Committee, will act as Chairman, introducing Clark
Hodder, '25, and J. H. Child, '25, the Class President and Secretary
respectively. After the speeches there will be a motion picture, and
some vaudeville by a magician from Keith's. Ginger ale, crackers, and
cigarettes will be served. All freshmen are invited to attend."
They used to be called Freshmen Beer Nights and in those days the
possibility of friendship at first sight was not fantastic. We feel
sure that it cannot be done on ginger ale. The urge for democracy does
not dwell in any soft drink. The speeches will be terrible, for there
will be no pleasant interruptions of "Aw, sit down," from the man in
the back of the room. If somebody begins to sing, "P. H. Theopold is a
good old soul," it is not likely to carry conviction. Not once during
the evening will any speaker confine himself to saying, "To Hell with
Yale!" and falling off the table. Probably the magician will not be
able to find anything in the high hat except white rabbits.
Although we have seen no first hand report of that freshman smoker, we
feel sure that it was only a crowded self-conscious gathering of a
number of young men who said little and went home early.
Even from the standpoint of the strictest of abstainers there must be
some regret for the passing of rum. What man who lived through the bad
old days does not remember the thrill of rectitude which came to him
the first time he said, "Make mine a cigar."
Though they have taken away our rum from us we have our memories. Not
all the days have been dull gray. Back in the early pages of our diary
is the entry about the trip which we made to Boston with William F----
in the hard winter of 1907. It was agreed that neither of us should
drink the same sort of drink twice. Staunch William achieved nineteen
varieties, but we topped him with twenty-four. Upon examination we
observe that the entry in the memory book was made several days later.
The handwriting is a little shaky. But for that adventure we might
have lived and died entirely ignorant of the nature of an Angel Float.
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