ALUMNI PUBLICATIONS
"Purposive Writing and Speaking" Joseph A Wallace '07, and James Milton O'Neil '07. Longmans Green & Co. 1925.
Anyone who has taught English in a preparatory school (or in Freshman classes in a college) knows that the student who writes a theme usually goes through a long process of head-scratching before he digs up the subject for a theme. Assigning theme-topics is an objectionable practice, the teacher hates it and the student hates it, and yet when the subject is not assigned the student is sometimes at loss to know just where to turn for help. If no inspiration comes, he is likely to snatch up some stray idea out of an encyclopedia,— perhaps he turns into words some second hand speech that he has heard at a public lecture or fraternity house gathering,—perhaps he writes upon general subjects such as Goodness, or Virtue, or other abstract topics. Sometimes in despair he turns to old traditional theme topics which have been floating about in one form or another,—if he writes on such a subject, the theme is usually hackneyed, if he copies the theme directly from an old model he faces trouble with his instructor if the dishonest laziness is discovered.
Joseph A. Wallace, head of the English department at Durfee High School, Fall River, Mass., and James M. O'Neil formerly an instructor at Dartmouth, now Chairman of the Department of Speech in the University of Wisconsin, have just written and published a book Purposive Writing and Speaking, which is designed to furnish high school students with material for themes and speeches, and to present this material in such fashion that the student will feel that the theme is written or the speech is delivered for a definite purpose. It greatly increases the value of any creative work if the student doing the work can feel that .his efforts are directed toward some end, •—thus a business letter is much better written if the student feels that the letter will be sent, —a theme will be better written if the student feels that readers are waiting for it,—a speech will be better delivered if the student can know that an audience is waiting to hear the words that he has to say.
This brings much of the dramatic into play in the teaching of elementary English. The student is given a field, for example, the newspaper field,—and is told to write a story for newspaper readers. Subjects of a general nature are suggested. The student chooses his particular theme title. Likewise with the editorial —with subjects . which bring into play material under the old classification of description, narration, exposition, argument; the technical titles being so changed as to invite rather than to repel the student's interest. And all this as the writers say in the preface must affect the subject in such fashion that the theme "must have an end outside its.elf. . It must be a project undertaken for the accomplishment of a purpose." This applies of course to speaking as well as to writing. In the second part of the book is taken up the mechanics of writing.
As far as a book can help in teaching students to think and write, this book should certainly be effective. If its directions are followed, the student should get that benefit which is the aim of the writers,—a suggested field for theme topics and a purpose for writing.
E. P. K.
"Reports of Cases in the Vice Admiralty of the Province of New York and in the Court of Admiralty of the State of New York, 1715-1788 with an Historical Introduction and Apdendix; edited by Charles Merrill Hough, L.L.D., United States Circuit Judge. New Haven, Yale University Press. London Humphrey Milford Oxford University Press: 1925."
This is no ordinary volume of Law Reports, but one of unique character. Although not published until this year it has the distinction of being as the eminent editor, a graduate of Dartmouth College in the class of 1879, says in his preface "in one sense the oldest law book in North America." The explanation of this statement is that though there are older volumes of statutes,. Colonial and State, our first reports of decided cases were published in 1789, while the cases reported in this volume end before that year.
Further, though these cases were adjudged in the local Admiralty Courts, Provincial and State of New York, in the day of their small beginnings (1714-88), the ability, learning, independence, and force of character shown alike by the judges and proctors of these courts unite to give these cases some historical value to all who now administer our Admiralty Law. The circumstance that the Vice Admiralty Court of the Province of New York largely created its own simple procedure before the Revolution and-.that this procedure was, in large measure, passed on to all the admiralty courts of the United States, illustrates the large influence which New York as our principal maritime city has had in shaping the law of the rest of the country.
The salvage of the records and files of these cases from their dusty, worn and frayed obscurity, their reconditioning and publication is credited by the editor to the Bar of New York City, but it is clear that the initiative of the entire work as well as its scholarly execution was due to Judge Hough, whose mastery of admiralty law is well known to his profession. It must suffice to add of his work as editor of this unique law book, that it gives evidence throughout its pages of the same thorough research, w'ide knowledge, critical discrimination and sound judgment which distinguish alike his judicial opinions and his occasional essays upon legal topics.
A Midsummer Mystery," George Hall Gerould, '99, D. Appleton and Company 1925.
In his latest novel Professor Gerould offers a distinctly unusual mystery story, unusual because the reader's suspicions as to the identity of the murderer are proved correct. Nevertheless, this unusual feature does not weaken the appeal of the mystery since the case is so carefully pursued by the detectives that other possibly guilty parties are brought into prominent focus and the reader's confidence in his intuition is badly shaken. For this reason the tale maintains its interest right up to the last.
One of the chief virtues of the story is its absolute plausibility. The solution is worked out thoroly and the whole case is one which we might expect to find on the front page of any newspaper tomorrow. The characters, even the detectives, act naturally and the reader is not left with the feeling that it would never have happened except in a story book. For midsummer reading we heartily recommend "A Midsummer Mystery." D.
"Richard Drew Hall, 1904-1924" a record of a young son of Dartmouth of the class of 1927, dying in Sophomore year compiled by his father E. K. Hall '92, is so modest and genuine a memorial that it avoids the pitfalls of the difficult and delicate task, and succeeds in giving a true picture of the inner life of a Dartmouth undergraduate that is not only illuminating but reassuring. The letters Dick Hall wrote his father, his own ability to understand both the older and his own generation, his love for the Maine woods, quite as much as the just appreciation of his elders reveal a boyhood and young manhood so wholesome, sound and helpful in natural ways that it will leave both his father's and his own generation more hopeful.
The temperateness and balance, the omission of anything mournful or strained help to reproduce the spirit of unassuming cheerful helpfulness, comradeship, and good sportsmanship which the boy caught from family and college, which wrt looked to see him carry on in life and which the book serves to perpetuate. Dick Hall was so human and normal that he and this record alike reveal not merely the finer but the more fundamental things not appearing on the surface of American life. The book is more than a memorial for it unconsciously helps two generations to understand each other by interpreting, as did father and son, the best in each to the other.
"Digestibility of Oleomargarine" by Arthur D. Holmes '06 is the title of an article reprinted from the Boston Medical and SurgicalJournal for June 18, 1925.
The issue of the Survey for March IS, 1925 contains an article by Arthur H. Ruggles M.D. '02 "Why Mental Hygiene in Colleges?" "By the Mosque of Validah" a story by Ellis O. Briggs '21 appears in the May 1925 issue of McNaughts Monthly.
"Sunrise by the Sea" a poem by Julian R. Hovey 'l6 may be found in the June 1925 number of Rays from the Rose Cross.
A memorial address delivered at Burlington, Vermont, May 30, 1925 by Hon. John W. Gordon '83 has been published as a pamphlet of fourteen pages.
The May number of the U. S. Naval Medical Bulletin contains an article "Epidermophytosis" by Lt. Walter B. Wolfe, U. S. M., '21.
