"Pornographia"

(Ed. Note--The Crimson does not necessarily endorse opinions expressed in printed communications. No attention will be paid to anonymous letters and only under special conditions, at the request of the writer, will names be withheld.)

To the Editor of the CRIMSON:

I am as much displeased by yesterday's closing of the Lampoon, whatever may be the true story of the situation, as I am pleased with the last, namely, "Esquire" edition. From cover to cover I could find nothing which should be objectionable to an educated person. For a mind in the condition of true toleration and reason, nothing is shocking.

But what strikes me particularly is that the purpose of the whole publication seems to have missed fire. I remember reading in Mark Twain's Sketch Book not long ago a most gruesome (to the unsound of wit) story about "My Bloody Massacre." Briefly, it describes how Mark Twain wrote under the guise of a murder story a biting satire about a certain person, but no one who read the paper paid any attention to the little details that showed what a great fiction it all was As I remember one bit: "Gosh, Jim, he scalped his wife and b'iled his baby, and--dad-burned if I want any more breakfast!" It is in this connection that I wish to rebuke the short-sighted ones responsible for the censorship and padlocking. This last edition of the Lampoon was an expert slam at a magazine that dishes up weak-kneed sex pictures, pointless, time-wasting fiction, amid a pseudo-highbrow atmosphere, at 50 cents per dose, instead of, as was pointed out, the price of the tabloid with the same stuff.

And now if I may indulge in a little purely personal feeling, the censorship in the vicinity of Boston is to me detestable, narrow-minded and undoubtedly something that should have gone out with the stove-pipe hat and knee-britches. Furthermore, even were the articles in the Lampoon to be taken at face-value, I should find them faint-hearted, wishy-washy, just barely pornographic. As they were, I nearly died laughing. Ask any Harvard-man what he thinks of the last Lampoon, and if they are the same men I've asked, you will find them whole-heartedly in its praise. After all, they were eager to read it; the reading lightened their cares for a short time; the Lampoon had served its purpose.

So if any blue-nosed, inhibited, Watch-and-Warder wants the real hot-pants, he needn't go pestering the poor Lampoon boys; I have just what he wants in stock, and will make more to order; I write it myself, and I'm proud of it. Richard Martin '38.