Show The Thc Classics Dr Stephen Leacock the Canadian humorist can be deadly serious on oaf occasion and without question he her was 33 in the serious mood when he asserted in his Essay on the Classics Class Class- I ics cs This is what I should like to doId doId do Id I'd like to take a large Jarge stone and and- write on it In very plain writing writing- 2 The Thc classics are only literature They belong in the lame ame class as primitive machinery and primitive music and primitive med cine cine and and then throw it through the window of ot a university and hide b behind be be- hind nind a fence to see the professors buzz J 42 There is no answer to Dr Leacoc 1 The classics actually are prImitive j prImi live tive literature And overemphasis o of j them in the schools is as badas bad as It Jt It would be to force a student of r archi-r lecture to give his whole time lime t to to study of ot the Gothic cathedrals igno ignoring f in ing the sky skyscraper raper and all ail that hu bu led up to it 3 If Ii students arc are made to pore too exclusively over the classics they presently develop a sense of un reality They read one language and andi mode o of life in the books and encounter encounter en- en counter another in the streets and in inthe inv ini the current publications The teach r fails to m make ke clear the connection o of oil the two and the response of the students stu 7 dents Is In dislike dl for the books book because be be- t be-t cause they bewilder him and S to stand apart from reality Portland O Oregonian S |