A NEW VIEW J.L.R S. 5tticl)ael s Chronicle Vol. X No. 8 December, 1948 Price 2j* CONTENTS. Page Page Editorial Scientific Society.. .. .. 17 School Notes .. 3 Music Club .. .. 19 Chapel Notes .. 6 Literary Section .. .. .. 21 Entertainments .. 9 Rugby .. .. 27 Lectures .. 12 Hockey .. .. 42 Debating Society .. 12 Squash .. .. 46 Photographic Society.. .. 15 Old Boys' Section .. .. 49 EDITORIAL "THE PLAY'S THE THING" The Union is Play starved and the Union especially needs "The Play" in her national life. In South Africa Secondary Education, by and large, is largely a matter of cramming facts for ultimate disgorgement on the Matriculation Answer Book. This educational process is perhaps the most serious menace that the white population faces: ultimately more dangerous than any imagined "black wave" or "raped earth." It trains the minds of the boys and girls to "remember": to accept the 2 S. MICHAEL'S CHRONICLE ..st • authority of the text book or the teacher who can best reproduce the Text Book, as the surest means to Matric. success: to remember, but not to think. The passion of the young for notes that they can "learn" (i.e. remember) and their bewilder- ment when first such spoon-feeding is commonly withheld is evidence of this. The ultimate outcome of this mind training may well be a race that accepts the dictates of authority if they are i . .,j v\. •; promulgated with sufficient of that Olympian air commonly assumed by a Matriculation Text Book. All unwittingly the white race is most busy training itself to receive dictatorship, be it personal or bureaucratic. The Theatre (provided it never becomes a State Propaganda Machine) is one of the things that blows sky high and reveals the inadequacy of the "remember" process of education. It was a most heartening experience to stand recently in the foyer of the Grand Theatre and listen to the scholars of Pietermaritzburg, as they came out, reacting aloud to the Laurence Olivier production of Shakespeare's Hamlet. They were letting their minds work: thinking on cultural matters with the same freedom and enthusiasm they show in their sports or the games about the farm. They were wholly alive, and a "Shakespeare Play" (lifted from the damning environment of an annotated Edition on a class room desk) was the subject of their conversation. Character, plot, production: all these elements were freely discussed. Thought, not the memory of things learnt, was finding words. This is what a film production of a Play can do. The "Play 'is the thing": the Play on the stage preferably, that can act, as much almost as anything can, as a corrective to national cramming until a new concept of educational process is a conscious part of South Africa's policy. J.B.C. S. MICHAEL'S CHRONICLE 3 SCHOOL NOTES The Rector and Mrs. F. R. Snell are at present on long leave in England. They will make their first official appearance, it is understood, on Speech Day. Messrs. A. R. Chapman and J. L. Robinson are going on leave at the end of the year. Their wives and little ones will accompany them to England. i Messrs. C. J. Vermaak, J. G. Haupt and J. S. Theron are leaving us at the end of the year. The two former will be continuing their studies. We wish them all every good fortune. We welcome Mr. G. P. Ward who, after Cambridge, served for three and a half years in the Royal Navy (Air Branch) and was for a while teaching at Clifton College before he came to us. Sister Johnstone returned at the end of July from her long leave in England. Mrs. Byrne retired from the post of Housekeeper after seven years of service. She has always been ready to step into the breach in the School's many emergencies, and we are ah truly grateful to her. Her rest from duties is well deserved. From the Bursary Staff Miss Valerie Jeudwine left us to get married to the Rev. John Vance Gason in St. Peter's Church, Pietermaritzburg. A large contingent of the Michaelhouse womenfolk attended the wedding and the reception at the Country Club. We wish the Rev. and Mrs. Gason every good fortune as they sail to their home in Australia. We welcome to the Bursary Staff Miss Munton, who comes to us as Bookkeeper from the Maritzburg Technical College, and to the Domestic Staff Mrs. Tabler, as Assistant Matron, who arrived in June, and Miss Langston, as the new House- keeper, who arrived in August. v; . •» Our congratulations go to Mr. and Mrs. Cangley on the birth of their daughter, June Patricia, on 8th June, 1948. The School has, since the last issue, received visits from Mr. C. W. Hannah, who preached a farewell sermon on the eve of his departure for England; the Rev. and Mrs. Cyril Birks, who appeared to be in fine fettle. They had left their daughter in Nairobi and come to visit old friends in the Union. Sir John and Lady Tyscn also paid the School a visit, and Sir John was kind enough to show in the Dining Hall his excellent colour films of India, those of Kashmir being particularly beautiful. Probably the outstanding event of the decade, as far'as the boys were concerned, was the "Snow Holiday" which the Acting Rector so graciously granted on Wednesday, September 22nd. The hills around the School were thick with snow, apd the boys soon scattered over them to fun and frolic in the unaccustomed whiteness. The views from the top of the Beacon and other high places were breathtaking in their loveliness: from the Dargle to the line of the Drakensberg was a mantle of white. 4 S. MICHAEL'S CHRONICLE (H.C.) SNOW HOLIDAY, 1948. SNOWBALLING AT BALGOWAN. S. MICHAEL'S CHRONICLE 5 On the Tuesday, while the snow was falling, the School was in fact in Pietermaritzburg, whither they had been taken by a special train to see Laurence Olivier's production of Hamlet, which, from the point of view of enjoyment, was perhaps the most successful classical play the boys have ever seen. Boys of all ages volunteered their delight in the play. The Annual Prefects' Dance was held in the School Hall in the Michaelmas Quarter. The New Look looked better and newer than it normally does, on the person of the young girls, and the mittens in evidence gave an impression of demureness that was delightful. Stove pipe trousers and buffalo-horn moustaches worn by the boys would have completed the illusion that we were back in the (not so) dim, dear days beyond recall" of the Edwardian era: a charming illusion. "Kentucky Blue" grass is now being planted in the Quad by order of the Grounds Committee. Surely grass with such a "Title" might inspire the Musical Society to compositions of a light nature. Blue rhymes so well too! The grass is said, like our noses in Balgowan, to remain blue in the winter. The Tuck Shop is conducting a "cold" trade with its customers. Freezers to keep Coco-Colas and ice creams at the right temperature have been installed. The trade is tre- mendous, and the Editor is only gradually recovering from the sight of a junior putting back furiously what he described as "A couple of Cokes and three Hokey Pokeys"! The new additions to East are rapidly taking shape. The new Day Room is finished, and very soon the old Prefects' Room will be available as a small dormitory and the new Prefects' Room be completed. Full accounts of Speech Day, which is late this year, will be reported in our next issue. The School has received the gift of a very handsome Aumbry from Mr. Mortimer Moir in memory of his'son, John. The Aumbry will in due course be suitably installed in the Chapel building. All at Michaelhouse respectfully offer their sympathy to the Vice-Chairman of the Board of Governors, Canon Heywood Harris, and his family on the death of Mrs. Heywood Harris. SCHOOL PREFECTS J. D. C. Macleod (Head of the School); A. C. Soffe, P. M. B. Hutt (Captain of Athletics, Swimming and Squash); A. L. Hull; M. F. Chance (Captain of Hockey and Gym.); G. Trebble, M. Simmons. HOUSE CAPTAINS Tatliam: J. D. C. Macleod. West: A. C. Soffe. East: P. M. B. Hutt. Pascoe: A. L. Hull. Farfield: M. F. Chance. Founders: G. Trebble. 6 S. MICHAEL'S CHRONICLE HOUSE PREFECTS Tatham: D. S. Barry, K. Y. Browne (till Sept.), M. N. Harvey, W. B. Kramer, A. S. K. Pitman. West: T. Binnie, A. Hart (till Sept.), I. B. Marx (Captain of Cricket), R. Scott Brown, D. L. Stewart (Captain of Rugby). East: R. S. R. Armstrong, M. R. Butcher (Captain of Tennis), D. P. Kimber, T. Maske M. A. McMaster. Pascoe: A. R. Black, R. M. Greene, P. B. S. Lissaman N. G. Matthews* J. E. Smithyman, J. S. Stranack. Farfield: A. N. Curry, S. D. Hart-Davis, N. J. R. James, D. H. M. Purcocks, F. A. S. Roberts. Founders: H. M. Fraser, R. S. Gifford, G. M. C. Le Roux, P. K. Moberley, J. E. P. Stevenson. VALETE September, 1948: K. M. Y. Browne, A. Hart. SALVETE August, 1948: J. Axe, C. M. Dalgarno N. v. R. Hoets, J. N Marshall, A. J. C. E. Rellie, C. J. Williams. October, 1948: R. C. Bromley, A. C. Dawson, D. Drakeford Lewis, G. Martin, R. Martin. CHAPEL LECTORS K. M. Y. Browne, M. F. Chance, A. L. Hull, P. M, B. Hutt, P.