In This Presidents of the world's two largest democracies meet during Dr. Radhakrishnan's recent visit to the United States.
O:'-lE
HUl':DRI~D and eighty-seven years ago on July 4, 1776, the United States of America launched an experiment in government by the consent of the governed which became a continuing revolution. If this r<',·olution has possessed any hallmark, it has been the aim of frTedom of the individual: not only .freedom uf his person but freedom of opportunity to participate in his government and to achieve within his soci!"ty those benefits which might accrue from responsible exploitation of his own natural abilities. The right of each man to be himsdf is the definition given this principle in The Importance of the Individual by Dr. George l':. Shuster, a leading educator and author of a number of books. The implementation or- this right has been, and continues to be, the aim of the'"American revolution with the earnest endorsement· and support of the majority of its patriots. It is an aim which has· not yet been realized in lu[l for every individual. American citizen. There are places in the United States where the revolution is still in progress on behalf of Negro citizens and the nation as"a people will not rest until that aspect of the revolution is accomplished. The \"alidity of this national affirmation is attested bv the achievements of :\'egro citizens during the relatively <hort period of the past three decacIL-s. Typical of the contributions to their country and their government being made by "cgroes are "the careers cited in Trail Breakers." Perhaps the critical gear in the mechanism of continuing revolution by peacc!ul change is The Right of Dissent. I t is tha t gear in the machinerv of a li·ee soeiet y which ensures the forward motion of minority opinion to the tests of free expression, of appt"al to public j udgment, and of constitutional validity in the wisdom of the courts. According to D". Robert Iv1. lVlacI vcr, for many years professor of political phi"losophy and sociology at Columbia University, government in a free society "is ereat"d and constantly renewed by an appeal to the constitutional struggle between opposing opinion groups." And this principle in practice is graphically illustrated at the individual and local kvel by the story of l':ancy Brown's successful and almost singlehanded campaign for election to the State of Maryland's House of Delegates. How she won, in spite of ' her youth. inexptTience and a set of political objectives not popular with the more inAu('ntial political forces in her ('ounty, is related in pictmes and text in School!!irl Politician. But fr('('dom oi exprr:ssion means mot'e than just fre5x!om of political expression. The searching spirit of th •. scientist. the aesthetic revolt of the architecl, the probing inquisitiveness of the technologist, as exemplified in An·iL·al (if the Future, must be free. The codes of art dictated by a materialistic society, the fun(tionalizin~ of imagination to serve a deterministic state. restrict the freedom of the incli,"idual man and minimize his right to h,· himself. as well as the potential of his contribution lO his s<)ciety. Freedom of aesthetic expression, fr{'edum of scienlilic inquiry and of technological experimentation not only change the lace of the world to satisfy the endlessl)" aspiring human spirit, but also multiplv tlll" opportunities and possibilities for crossing the" c\Tr l1('V; frontiers of knowledge towards which we Illon' irresi$libl)" and beyond which lies increasing mastery of om physical environment. ,-\nd S(ie1!ce Stands at .Jwesolllc Thresholds, according to science writer Lawrence Gahon -thresholds here on earth ,'ven more awesome than the prospect of ,"oyages to distant Slars. In the end, am" successful revolution must first uf all feed its people. Freedom from wam, one of th<: four freedoms dcllned for the world by Franklin Roosevell, is a basic freedom. So. the rn-olulion by Iwacdul change has proceeded on the Jarms of c\rnerica al the same paee as in its legislature~. It is not the ingenious machines which appear on some . .'\mcrican la,~n~ (lllvelltion Sprouts OilCaLifornia Farms) which ha"" ach i(',·cd this revolution in agriculture. Rath(·r, as described by N. V. Sagar in /l1ore Food from Few£"( Farmers, it has been accomplished by the application of principle~ as ,·alid throughoUllhc world as are the rights of each human being to freedom from ,vant, li'eedom of every person to worship in his own way, li"eedo!11 of speech and expression. and freedom from fear of aggression by one nation against anolher .•
span G:::CJQDo~
~ • JULY 1963
3~
CONTENTS 4 INVENTION SPROUTS ON CALIFORNIA FARMS Photographs
by Joe Munroe
10 MORE FOOD FROM FEWER FARMERS by N. V. Sagar
14 THE IMPORTANCE OF THE INDIVIDUAL by George N. Shuster
16 THE RIGHT OF DISSENT by Robert M. Maciver
18 SCHOOLGIRL POLITICIAN Photographs
by Jack Lartz
24 ARRIVAL OF THE FUTURE Photographs
by Mark Kauffman
30 SCIENCE STANDS AT AWESOME THRESHOLDS by Lawrence Galton
36 THE SECRETARY'S VISIT TO DE'LHI Photographs
by Avinash C. Pas rich a
38 THE STRUGGLE IS AN INNER THING by Edward j. Joyce
41 TRAIL BREAKERS by Ingrid Anderson
46 NORMAN ROCKWELL: ILLUSTRATOR by V. S. Nanda
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The Struggle
FORGETTABLE PROSE is the common characteristic of most writers who are published today (alleged novelists, biographers, short story writers, political pundits, bad poets, candidates for doctorates, people who have the appalling gall to write their memoirs before they are 40 years old, popular psychiatrists, and slick-formula clergymen). The world reels from the millions of ill-chosen words with which it is pelted every minute of the day; the flood of words would inundate us all if it were not for the fact that relatively few people, really, read regularly or seriously. This refusal, or the simple inability, to read everything may be a conscious or unconscious act of self-preservation, and not necessarily a proof of anti-intellectual bias. Even if one had an unlimited amount of time, one couldn't read all that is printed, and one would not want to if one had any taste or perspicacity at all. The world is full of bad syntax, increasingly accepted as the norm: even the elect (nay, more, the elected) have on occasion been deceived-and it is difficult, if not impossible, for an ordinary, literate mortal to try to stem the tide of bad English (or American) by insisting on his hardly won, dearly cherish{:d rules of grammar and clear language. Yes, the struggle may be unequal, but we should not give it up. It is true, the more's the pity, that more and more people with the minimum requirements of literacy have discovered the joys of writing and of being published. More and more people, designed by God and nature to be readers have become, through an inversion of values and perversion of right order, writers. So many intellectual ciphers have paraded the emptiness of their minds and the hollowness of their souls before us in books that were clearly meant for burning! Constant exposure to this kind of reading experience might tempt us to give up reading altogether, and that. would be too bad, for then we should miss one of the most satisfying writers of our day, Jerome David Salinger. "Forgettable" is not a word you will use when you describe the writing of J. D. Salinger. Nor can he be accused of verbal diarrhoea, since his work is marked by economy of phrase, and his total output is relatively small-one novel, The Catcher in the Rye, a book of nine short stories entitled with possibly ostentatious simplicity Nine Stories, and some twenty other short stories. His last published work, Franny and Zoory (Little Brown, 1961), consists of two long related short stories, one of . which had appeared in the New Yorker magazine in 1955, the other in the same magazine in 1957. The sum of bad syntax in the world will find no
Is
Norman Rockwell III u stra"tor
ONE
OF America's most famous illustrators might have been a professional athlete if he had persevered with a programme of physical exercises which he took up as a boy of ten. But the programme proved too strenuous, with no visible improvement. So the boy, Norman Rockwell, gave up his ambition of becoming a weight-lifter and, instead of developing his muscles, concentrated on developing his talent in drawing. That this was a fortunate decision both for himself and for two generations of American readers is obvious from the unparalleled success and popularity Norman Rockwell has achieved as an illustrator. For almost five decades his pictures of the American scene-droll, sympathetic, penetrating, often idealistic-have attracted and amused vast numbers of magazine readers, both in the United States and around the world. Now sixty-nine and with an impressive record of achievement behind him, he is not content to rest on his laurels but continues to be an active artist. Not long ago he was in India to paint Prime Minister Nehru's portrait for the cover of the Saturday Even.ing Post, the American magazine to which he has contributed much of his work during the past fifty years. Among
other portraits of famous personalities he has painted are those of President Kennedy and Adlai Stevenson, U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations. An illustrator, no less than a writer or a creative artist or painter, reflects in his work his own varied experience of life, especially those ex.periences which he has felt intensely. But as Norman Rockwell pointed out when reminiscing in the columns of the Saturday Evening Post some time ago, there is one basic difference: while the fine arts painter has only to satisfy himself and there are no limitations on his time, choice of subject or technique, the illustrator must satisfy his client as well as himself and meet deadlines. His picture has to convey a specific idea which must be expressed clearly and intelligibly. Referring to an occasion when he was painting a picture of Johnny Appleseed (a well-known American pioneer and ascetic of a century and a half ago who devoted much of his life to planting apple trees), Norman Rockwell recalls his conversation with a Bohemian art student. Criticizing the painting, the student asked why Norman could not put more feeling into it, and proceeded to show how this could be done. He outlined a large rectangle, on which he drew
with light-brown chalk a shape "like a hawk's beak" to represent old Johnny's browned body. Above this he then filled in triangular patches of colour-red to symbolize the subject's physical being and white his spirit. Below the "hawk's beak" blue was rubbed in to indicate nature, and at the base of the rectangle red brown served for earth. A symbolic arm and hand casting seed completed this ultra-modern portrait of Johnny Appleseed! When Rockwell protested that no one would recognize it as such, the art student retorted: "So? What difference does it make about anybody else? Iknow it's old Johnny." And he brushed off Rockwell's protest that the proportions of the picture made it too tall for the book in which it was to appear by offering the sage advice: "So make the book tall." As an illustrator Norman Rockwell naturallv holds that communication is of prim~ importance to him, and he admits that he is not a modern artist nor will ever be one. Once or twice when, following his contacts with art circles in Europe and America, he dabbled in "dynamic symmetry" or tried to catch up with some other modernistic style in painting, the results were hardly gratifying. In 1936 he painted what he describes as a