CRITICISM RESENTED.

Auckland Star, Volume LXIII, Issue 124, 27 May 1932, Page 6

CRITICISM RESENTED.

Because of indiscreet remarks about Afrikanders, a lecturer in French at Pretoria University was tarred and feathered and dumped in the centre of the city clad only in bathing trunks. Relatively primitive communities apparently resent any adverse criticism far more than older countries do. Of all countries England is perhaps the most tolerant of criticism, whether by foreigners or her own children. The caricatures oP John Bull, in which many Continental papers delight, only cansTS amusement to English readers, who seem to take a pleasure in seeing their foibles and idiosyncrasies held up to caricature. Perhaps the "English are too sure of themselves to mind a little fun being made of their peculiarities, and also the foreigner generally respects foxhunting, cricket and other things which are really sacred to any properly brought up Briton. It is quite permissible to make fun of English cooking and England's one sauce, and many diversities of faith, of the tourist, with his Baedeker and his opera glass, gazing at the Madeleine, oblivious of traffic, of his heroic struggle with foreign tongaies, and even of his eccentricities of attire. But younger communities are apt to resent any suggestion that they are not just "it." The unfortunate South African lecturer who was tarred and feathered seems to have made some disparaging remarks on the tawdry finery of the wives of mine magnates. The French comic papers are always poking fun at the way some Englishwomen dress, and Englishwomen laugh over their portraits so depicted. Two characteristics of the English are that they have a sense of humour and they are incapable of hate. It has been said that an Englishman never hates a foreigner; he merely regards him as funny. "Aren't they funny little people, jabbering away so fast that nobody can understand them?" is the usual comment of the average English tourist on all foreigners, except Germans and Scandinavians. These last are merely "heavy." Even the "Hymn of Hate" appeared to the English as just funny. But a lecturer at a seat of learning like Pretoria ought not to have written a book with such a title as "War, Wine and Women." It savours too much of levity for one engaged in educating the inhabitant of the veldt in the mysteries of French grammar and pronunciation. Perhaps he will call his next book "Voortrekkers and Voodooism." —W.M.