4.0070 ALLC/ACH Conference; Page Smith (30)

Elaine Brennan & Allen Renear (EDITORS@BROWNVM.BITNET)
Thu, 17 May 90 18:16:20 EDT

Humanist Discussion Group, Vol. 4, No. 0070. Thursday, 17 May 1990.


(1) Date: Thu, 17 May 90 07:35:46 EDT (11 lines)
From: Willard McCarty <MCCARTY@vm.epas.utoronto.ca>
Subject: getting together in Siegen

(2) Date: 16 May 90 18:02:46 EST (19 lines)
From: James O'Donnell <JODONNEL@PENNSAS>
Subject: Page Smith

(1) --------------------------------------------------------------------
Date: Thu, 17 May 90 07:35:46 EDT
From: Willard McCarty <MCCARTY@vm.epas.utoronto.ca>
Subject: getting together in Siegen

I have had a message from Manfred Kammer, an organizer of the ALLC/ICCH
conference in Siegen, that the initial get-together will be held
at the "Queens Hotel", Kaisergarten, Siegen, Monday, 4 June at 6 p.m.
The person to contact in Congress Partner is Cornelia Thiede, fax:
49 421 324344 (where 49 is the country-code, 421 the city-code, etc.).

Willard McCarty
(2) --------------------------------------------------------------24----
Date: 16 May 90 18:02:46 EST
From: James O'Donnell <JODONNEL@PENNSAS>
Subject: Page Smith

From: Jim O'Donnell (Penn, Classics)

I do, alas, have tenure (cf. Goethe, `und *leider* auch Theologie'),
which may not be relevant, but I found Page Smith's book every bit as
appalling in its leftish way as I found Allen Bloom in his rightish way,
and for that matter, as I found Henry Rosovsky's *The University: An
Owner's Manual*, in its centrist way. Smith in particular is
ill-informed and querulous, having had senior administrative office when
rather young (40ish), then having made enough money writing to get out
of academe completely by the time he was about 50, and he writes now 20
years later. By my count, he hasn't had a department chairman to argue
with (from below) since 1960, and the world has changed a bit since
then. Plenty wrong with our institutions, but kvetching and whining are
not specially apt remedies. I am coming to the conclusion that good
books about universities are like good books about baseball: scarcer
than hens' teeth. That doesn't keep from reading many too many of both.