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The members of your staff whom I met for the many interviews were all so charming and very kind that the whole experience was interesting and such fun to do.
AUDREY HEPBURN
Hollywood, Calif.
One Short at Dinner
Sir:
TIME'S Sept. 7 review of Maugham's Choice of Kipling's Best leaves unclear the reason why the Indian member of a polo team visiting the officers of another regiment (in The Man Who Was) ". . . could not, of course, eat with the mess." This might lead some readers to infer that it was because of British insularity or snobbishness. The reason was that the Indian officer's caste might be broken if he ate with nonbelievers in his religion.
The same situation is touched upon in Kipling's poem The Mother-Lodge, where the membership, in addition to Protestant Anglo-Indians, a Jew and a Catholic, included a Hindu, a Mohammedan and a Sikh, so "we dursn't give no banquits / Lest a Brother's caste were broke" . . .
J. A. MCNEIL Toronto, Canada
Sir:
... Tell your reviewer to check back, and I'll bet a complete set of Kipling against a 3¢ stamp he'll find it was the Ressaldar's prejudices — not those of the mess—that prevented their eating together.
J. CHARLES THOMPSON
Falls Church, Va.
Sir:
... In The Man Who Was Kipling wrote: ". . . There entered a native officer who had played for the Lushkar team. He could not, of course, eat with the alien . . ." His own choice; not that of his hosts. His religion would not have permitted him to eat the alien's food, drink his wine. Altering "alien" to "mess" clearly implies Kipling meant the native had been excluded, perhaps by racial prejudice . . .
J. VALE DOWNIE
Beaver Falls, Pa.
¶ Kipling also believed that there was ambiguity in the phrase "he could not ... eat with the mess"; he therefore altered "mess" to "alien" in later editions. Editor Maugham's version was set from early editions.— ED.
Who Taught Teacher?
Sir:
Your report [Sept. 7] on Albert Lynd's sizzling new book Quackery in the Public Schools is a cheering note of hope to those who are justifiably alarmed at the incredible stupidity and totalitarian tactics of some of the "educators" to whose care they must entrust the training of their children . . .
But, at the same time, another article (in the same section), mentions a new high school where, "through an elaborate closed TV circuit, observers can tune in on any classroom at any time." This is something right out of George Orwell's 1984 ... It's going to be a long pull, Brother Lynd.
IRA M. FREEMAN
New Brunswick, N.J.
Sir: