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Kiwi 1948.Pdf Annual Magazine of the Students' Association Auckland University College, New Zealand Editor: Maurice Duggan Assistant Editors: John Ellis and Tom Wells Business Manager: A. P. Postlewaite, o. B. E., A. P. A. N. Z. Advertising Manager: Dorothy Wilshere Circulation Manager: Elza Charles PUBLISHED BY THE AUCKLAND UNIVERSITY COLLEGE STUDENTS* ASSOCIATION PRINTED BY THE PELORUS PRESS, 2A SEVERN STREET, AUCKLAND, C.3 TABLE OF CONTENTS On Government Departments that invent Inspiring Slogans Denis Glover 4 Note on Ecology 5 Grasping the Nettle A. R. D. Fairburn 7 The Outcast David Ballantyne 14 The Forty-hour Week S.M. 22 The Small House Bill Wilson 27 Four Poems by J. K. Baxter 23 Return John Reece Cole 34 Four Poems by Kendrick Smithyman 42 Front Seat ]. B. Raphael 45 Look Thy Last on All Things Lovely Every Hour S.M. 49 Four Poems by Lily H. Trowern 50 Listen to the Mocking Bird N.H. 54 Vox mea ad Dominum Peter Cape 59 Three Poems by A. R. D. Fairburn 60 Luscious Dahlias W. O. Droescher 61 A University Primer Tom Wells 63 Love of Two Hands Keith Sinclair 69 Four Poems by Denis Glover 70 Two Stories about a Friend G. R. Gilbert 71 Song of the Dry Orange Tree Lorca (trs. Texidor) 75 Sunbrown Maurice Duggan 76 Episode : The School John Ellis 81 Tangi John Kelly 91 Notes on Contributors 96 On Govt. Departments That Invent Inspiriting Slogans Confronted by the bush on every side The moa gave its country up and died; 1 he Kiwi stretched its stunted wings in vain, But took no flight and sank to earth again. Here's heavy sadness only. Like a pall Rain and security descend on all. Onward New Zealand! Kiwi, essay to soar! Be clothed you moa bones! Don't be a bore! Well made, New Zealand! Let's call this moral tale 'The whitebait with the ambition of a whale.' denis glover TV l\ annual magazine of the auckland university college students' association: volume xliii: November 1948 NOTE ON ECOLOGY UNIVERSITY JOURNAL may be anything from a house- magazine to a serious review of literature, philosophy, art and poli- tics. The new editorial policy of Kiwi is directed away from nar- rowly domestic affairs (with which its sister journal Craccum is quite able to cope) toward matters of more general interest. If this policy needs any justification, it must be made very largely on what, for want of a better term, we may call ecological grounds. The University has its own tradition, and its own functions (which must not be allowed to become diluted or obscured—no, not even to serve the sgo' d of Urn- versal Popular Education). The parts, process, institutions and functions of society are not potatoes in a bag. They are related 'in unity and in diversity.' Since it exists in society, the University must establish a meaningful context. How can a University journal best help in the realisation of this end? First let us glance at certain further ends. We gather experience into ourselves that we may enlarge our sympathy and our knowledge, that we may the better control life in real (not necessarily realist) terms. The imaginative rearrangement of our experience of life provides verisimilitude, not a facsimile. Our formulation of that imaginative statement depends, in turn, on experience. The two things interact. We have at all times to deal, not only with the work of art (or other human construct), but also with the experience that we bring to it. This is true whether we are considering Shakespeare or, say, Roderick Finlayson. The University, because of its highly specialised functions, suffers always from a tendency to detach itself from the full context of life; to turn away from the immediate reality of its environment. Our wisdom, if we have any, will keep 5 us aware of that danger, and impel us deliberately to maintain the context. The job is not to examine Thrasymachus in vacuo, but rather to relate him ojr his work to the immediate and banal reality of this twentieth century life in its par- ticular colonial aspect, without breaking the continuity of the general tradition. What 3oes it mean if you can recite Eliot, but can't replace a burnt-out electric fuse, or pitch camp efficiently? A further question suggests itself: What ddes Eliot, or William Shakespeare, mean to the bricklayer who helps to build the municipal theatre or the new public library? If you want a picture to have any sort of definition, or meaning, it's generally accepted that you should frame it. If you want the academic activity to have a similar definition and meaning you must frame it also. Note that in framing it you do not detach it from life. You make possible a meaningful relationship with life, the establishment of a context. Frame it, give it shape and definition, give it a relationship to the wider context (as a picture has to the room it is in) ; but don't expect to establish a genuine connection with the life of society by means of (say) extension courses, or the incorporation of more and more 'practical subjects.' Kiwi can help in the process of definition, and in the establishment of a true context. To do this it must be free to publish, not only the work of University students, but also of writers who are interested in the same things as are Univer- sity people. For in the proper hierarchy of society the University sodality and the artists (of all kinds) should find themselves rubbing shoulders and com- paring notes. Eliot, the poet, may not mean anything to the bricklayer. But what Eliot represents, and is a part of, can mean something to him, and probably does. It is the bricklayer's insight into life through his own experience that makes it possible for Eliot, Shakespeare and himself to belong to the same context, even though the connection is not immediately evident to the bricklayer himself. The part to be played by the University in a society in which common assumptions rule beneath the diversity of the social order should be obvious on a little reflection. And the part that a University journal such as this might, and should, serve, in keeping the context in order should also be clear. 6 GRASPING THE NETTLE Now maris great day is almost done, the colonels and the touts depart; still Lingers tiny on the Down, a kike conversing with a tart. The crammed last bus, last Hope, is gone, and we, benighted, squeamish girls, coldly regard how, darkly blown, the crowd's foul pleasure-litter whirls. edgell rickword. ULGING RACE TRAMS disgorge the punters on to the streets of Megalopolis, where discarded tram and tote tickets are blowing along the gutters, along with the crumpled paper flowers of yesterday's celebration of the Milennium. Among these subdued pleasure seekers there are, almost for certain, one or two academic people who have tried out infallible mathematical systems and, unaccountably, have come back to town lighter in the pocket. They are as disillusioned as the rest; like the rest, they are very thoughtful, and shiver slightly in the rising wind: bad luck behind, bad weather before them. It is small wonder that their morning hopes have given place to anxiety and a kind of thin despair. For even the most cloistral of their colleagues, those who have never walked down the hill and taken a ticket in the great gamble, are dis- turbed and apprehensive. Cold winds are blowing from far away, stirring the local dust. In the weather sky is a rash of cirrus, hinting at storms to come. The barometer is still falling steadily. Rheumatic twinges in the joints provide evidence that is subjective, and therefore the more convincing, that there are difficult days ahead. What are the purposes of the University? What is its proper relationship to society? University people all over the western world are debating these questions more anxiously as time goes on. Small wonder if (dropping all metaphor) we find that the more thoughtful of them are filled with apprehension. For the question that begins to obtrude itself is not whether salaries will be increased, or the new build- ing scheme set in motion. The real question that has to be faced is whether the 7 University will be able to exist at all in the kind of society toward which we are moving. I do not wish my meaning to be mistaken. Undoubtedly, if we survive the impact of the atomic age, we shall have large buildings of one sort or another in which the techniques of applied physics, bookkeeping, dental surgery, 'news- presentation,' social hygiene and town planning are practised and taught. Scholastic study will still be allowed to go on in a few odd corners, mainly for purposes of ornament and prestige. These places will still, no doubt, out of reverence for dead tradition, be called 'Universities.' But if we find that their entire nature and purpose have been changed, honesty may perhaps compel us in the end to find a name for them that is less misleading. The harsh truth must be taken into the mind and endured: certain tendencies thai; in the past have been discussed as more or less remote possibilities have come to wear a more frightening look. They appear, not as possibilities, but as proba- bilities. It now seems likely that the 'closed' society, in one form or another, will come to be established. The drift of events and of social processes is bearing ms steadily in that direction.
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