The Visitors

After a good many years of taking criticism by distinguished visiting scholars from Britain and Europe, Philosopher Douglas N. Morgan of Northwestern University decided it was time to complain. Last week, in a letter to the Manchester Guardian, he talked back. Fond as the U.S. is of visitors, said he, too many"come to America armed with a conviction that we are infants, that our academic degrees -- not earned at Oxford or Cambridge -- are travesties, and that even our graduate students are merely overgrown addicts of football and television.

"Frankly . . . we do resent being treated as moderately wayward children, wantonly ignorant of the most elementary historical, cultural, and philosophical truths. Permit me to cite a few instances, with names deleted and subjects disguised, but in no measure overdrawn.

"Professor A is . . . one of the world's outstanding authorities on the historical relation between a people's theology and its society . . . We anticipate his visit. We introduce a problem of interpretation which concerns us." And what sort of answer comes? "Professor A patiently explains to us that Aristotle's essences differ from Plato's forms, that Origen was an important figure in early Christian philosophy, and that Augustine took the problem of evil seriously.

"Campus-wide publicity announces the lecture of Professor B from the Sorbonne. No one can pretend to an understanding of modern French painting unless he has read B's books, as-- believe it or not -- we have . . . We hurry to his illustrated lecture on 'Pre-Picasso Picasso.' And we learn, to our stupefaction, that French impressionism had its antecedents in earlier painting, that shadows are coloured, and that Cezanne painted solid objects.

"The music critic of an important European journal lectures to our faculty and student body. He wants to 'make a good impression' and not to appear 'too highbrow.' So instead of moving on from his latest brilliant book on microtonality, he boldly suggests that music did not end with Chopin and Wagner . . .

"Quite honestly," says Morgan, "we can and do read. We can and do see paintings and hear music . . . During the past few years, American universities have paid out thousands of dollars to bring scholars. To speak bluntly, these scholars have all too often insulted our students and ourselves by presenting lectures which the most naive young instructor on our staff could give without any preparation . . . We cannot feel happy about spending our money to bring a distinguished guest one hundred or three thousand miles to hear him recite the alphabet . . ."

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