To the Editors:
The following letter is being sent to President William McGill of Columbia University:
President William McGill
Columbia University
New York, N.Y. 10027
Dear Sir:
Having recently learned of proposals to curtail the offerings of the School of the Arts at Columbia, we, as a group of American artists having no connection with the University, write to call your attention to the consequence of such plans. As artists, we know what it means to have a deficit; we are aware of Columbia’s financial problems. At the same time, we believe that disproportionate cuts in one of the most vigorous parts of the University would impair Columbia’s ability to emerge from its present difficulties as a serious institution.
All over America students are turning to the arts to make sense of their lives. No longer satisfied with a passive appreciation of the arts, they want to try to make something of their own. They are concerned with the problems of the present, and in their poems, plays, novels, paintings and films they are trying to confront today’s reality and to help preserve civilization in America. For that reason, it is essential that Columbia, of all the universities in America, located in the cultural center of the country, encourage rather than discourage the arts. We urge that you do all that you can to ensure the permanence of the School of the Arts as an essential part of Columbia’s curriculum.
W.H. Auden
John Berryman
Elizabeth Bishop
Hortense Calisher
James Dickey
Richard Eberhart
Isabella Gardner
Elizabeth Hardwick
Anthony Hecht
Richard Howard
Barbara Howes
Alfred Kazin
Galway Kinnell
Arthur Miller
N. Scott Momaday
Howard Nemerov
Reynolds Price
Gregory Rabassa
Isaac Bashevis Singer
William Jay Smith
Jean Stafford
George Steiner
Allen Tate
Willard R. Trask
Richard Wilbur
John A. Williams
James Wright
This Issue
January 7, 1971