Exam Period

Exam period brings out the worst in us. Crimson editors have attempted over the years to express in words the feelings (desperation, hatred, nausea) that overcome Harvard students when we realize the amount of class work we have ignored during the semester.

Donald Carswell tried to capture those emotions, as well as offer some advice to exam-takers, in his article "Beating the System," for which he won the Dana Reed Prize in 1951 for excellence in undergraduate writing. The Crimson proudly re-ran the article every reading period until 1962, when one grader was annoyed enough to respond.

We reprint in their entirety both the original article and the response as a service to those who will soon fill a coven of blue-books.