Lost Jobs

To the Editors:

Since when must one be a head of household to be a breadwinner [Nov. 1]? I am a single woman with no dependents. I am not considered to be a household head by Government standards, but I most certainly am my own breadwinner. At least I was until three weeks ago when I lost my job.

Diane Lee Kohn Ann Arbor, Mich.

In the "New Math of Unemployment," you just tug at the Gordian knot of joblessness. The rate is high, you explain, because women are entering the labor force in record numbers. One is then led to believe that unemployment isn't as bad as it seems because male breadwinners are still working. This is a fallacy.

The main reason women seek work is that one paycheck is no longer enough. Women enter the work force to make up for lost purchasing power. When they lose their jobs their families are decidedly poorer. And this is what makes unemployment much worse for people than it appears to statisticians.

Iris Koranda Kew Gardens, N. Y.

Your article claims that "unemployment is no longer the national trauma it once was" because of extended jobless benefits. Your mathematician should stick to math.

You apparently have not studied psychology. Unemployment is demoralizing. People become alienated because they are no longer sharing the load. They are doubtful about themselves and their future; many feel rejection, shame and guilt. The employed too are affected by high unemployment. Their jobs become less secure. They are expected to do more, for if they don't, there is always some unemployed person who can and will take their place and work for less money.

Gilbert Hart San Francisco

Cheery News

It cheers me to learn that "world resources can support a growing population well into the 21st century" [Oct. 25]. Now what about the end of the 21st century and the centuries after that?

Jacqueline Murray Ann Arbor, Mich.

Now that Economist Wassily Leontief has assured us that we can support several billion more people on our planet, perhaps he can give us one good reason why we should.

Richard T. Walnut Vincentown, N.J.

"Cheer" because we may go on much as now for perhaps another 100 years! What depth of thought and moral concern! Do you expect that this will carry us safely through to the Second Coming and pie in the sky?

Conner Reed Seattle

King Kong (Contd.)

The new King Kong receives your royal treatment: cover story, color photographs--the works. The death and career of Edith Evans are succinctly reported in 22 lines. TIME must, of course, follow the best principles of commercial journalism. Still, I occasionally long for the more perfect world that owes, and gives proper and just attention.

Dale Silviria Burbank, Calif.

While De Laurentiis' technicians pay lip service to the original special effects of Willis O'Brien, their disdain for the old stop-motion techniques is thinly disguised. It saddens me that many superb technicians of stop-motion animation have found it increasingly difficult to work. The rationale has been that the slow, painstaking process of frame-by-frame photography has grown prohibitively expensive.

How ironic that when a big-talking film mogul comes up with a King Kong remake with 50 times the budget of the original, the only way he can think of to do the monster is as a full-size model clumsily driven by 20-odd motors that keep breaking down. It's only natural then that when that idea flops he resorts to a man in a gorilla suit. At the risk of denigrating the obvious care and hard work that De Laurentiis' technicians have put in, I must say that to have a stunt man cavorting about in a Halloween costume is an insult to Willis O'Brien and the Kong he gave us.

I greatly fear that the slogan for De Laurentiis' film, "There is still only one King Kong," will prove only too true. I could be wrong; this new Kong just might flap his arms and fly off to the moon.

Jim Lane Sacramento, Calif.

Hard-Sell Hoving

I strongly resent Robert Hughes' snide remarks concerning the Metropolitan Museum's retrospective show of Andrew Wyeth [Nov. 1].

Public museums are funded by and exist for the public. What, then, is so damning in offering that public an exhibit it wishes to see? With most American museums struggling to keep afloat financially, more exhibits that draw the paying public are desirable, indeed, necessary.

I applaud "Hard-Sell" Hoving. He, at least, has enough sense to realize that museums must sell, and that Wyeth's "small and somewhat predictable area of visual sensation" is vastly preferable to Jackson Pollock's large and somehow unpredictable area of dribbles and drops.

Pamela Haxton Detroit

The shrill tone in which Robert Hughes discussed Andrew Wyeth puzzled me at first until I realized that Wyeth is guilty of two unforgivable sins: he is popular with the people and his art is representational.

Unlike Hughes, I must confess to a vulgar taste. When I visit the National Gallery I don't seek modern American artists like Jackson Pollock, or modern European artists either. I find myself turning to the exhibits of Dutch and Flemish painters. Rembrandt could afford to be representational, but then he lived 300 years ago.

Audrey E. Dutton Bethesda, Md.

Repressive Regimes

Bicentennial Messages to America from antidemocratic authoritarians such as President Luis Echevarria Alvarez of Mexico and Prime Minister Indira Gandhi of India are inappropriate.

They are both leaders of repressive regimes, where press censorship and other violations of civil rights prevail.

Daniel Gleason Austin, Texas

Forgotten Legend

An early Christian legend said that Irishmen were so pious that a rich, beautiful maiden could travel the length of the island unmolested.

Today in Northern Ireland, women walking for peace [Oct. 25] are attacked with bricks and bottles by Irish children, teen-agers and men. Respect for women and love of neighbor are Christian virtues that seem to have been forgotten by these "patriots."

Joan Folger San Fernando, Calif.

Split-Level Coffins

Were it not for the fact that two of my bambini are native-born napoletani, I would not challenge the statement [Nov. 1] that Mafia Leader Joe Bonanno "is credited with inventing the split-level coffin."

In fact, just such a device--or one mighty similar to it--was specially ordered by Holy Peters in The Disappearance of Lady Frances Carfax, a Sherlock Holmes short story.

The heavily chloroformed Lady Carfax was discovered--in time's nick--by Holmes, who deduced the double occupancy, the second inhabitant being an old derelict female who had succumbed to natural causes.

Va bene?

Robert A. Otto Cincinnati

The Great Black Way

It was indeed gratifying to join TIME in the heartfelt "Welcome to the Great Black Way!" [Nov. 1] but it was also a little sad for this lifelong (54 years) fan and staunch supporter of the theater.

I am sad because it has taken TIME--and the people who control the legitimate theater--so long to realize what I have known all along, that black performers could indeed "enrich popular culture in all its manifestations."

However, I would like to raise this solitary voice in tribute to a hardy clan of black professionals who sowed the seeds and laid the groundwork for the success of no less than one-fourth of the current hits on Broadway.

Edward M. Murrain New York City

Hands Off

This is getting out of hand. For two weeks in a row [Oct. 25; Nov. 1], you have seen fit to depict prehensile appendages--the hands of man and beast--on your illustrious cover. Does this mean that the coveted Man of the Year award might perchance be replaced by an analogous honor for "Hand of the Year"? If so, I cast my vote for the ape.

And how about a similar series of covers illustrating feet? In this election year, more than one politician has managed to put his foot in his mouth--a newsworthy item indeed.

Cathy Zawacki Ann Arbor, Mich.

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