LETTERS

Gentlemen:

As one who has been sharply critical of ONE and its content, I want now, after reading the January and February editions, to extend my warmest congratulations. Your art work, which has been improving steadily, is really superb. Format is greatly enhanced by the larger page. The January cover was really fine, and that for February a close second.

I liked Sam Kidd's story, "Anyway They Asked For It," in January. It deals with real people in real life situations-people and situations close enough to any American Dorian to make it both powerful and infuriating. "I Built A Castle" (February) is, in my opinion, one of the very best poems to have been printed in ONE. Sten Russell's "Letter To A Newcomer" struck me as sensitive and deeply moving.

Finally, I shall look forward to reading the entire novel from which "An Episode" was excerpted-and to all the splendid, forthcoming editions of ONE, TWO, and GAY.

Dear Sirs:

Los Angeles, Calif.

The "all-girl" edition just published puts all earlier editions to shame. Being a male, I am a bit ashamed. Some of the articles in the edition are full of good heavy material and that is wonderful for all of us. But here once again we strike a snag-for when such a worthwhile edition comes out, we are naturally anxious to spread the word. How can you spread the word to nonsubscribers to pick up a copy when there are no copies on the newsstands to pick up?

Dear Editors:

New York City

I have just read the Feb. issue of ONE, and I would like to congratulate the fine job of "feminine editing" done. The artwork in this issue I thought particularly effective, although the quality certainly varied, as it did in the fiction and poetry presented. I would especially like to thank ONE for introducing Maria Werder to me in the very striking photograph of hers. May I say that now that you have presented an all-feminine issue I hope you will stop printing those letters-to-the-editor asking for a feminine influence in your magazine.

Berkeley, Calif.

Gentlemen:

Although Dr. Kinsey has done much to expose the essential hypocrisy of our sexual mores, I am very doubtful of seeing, in my time at least, any sane approach to the problem on the part of the State or the Church. One cannot be done without the other. All that one who lives as a homosexual can do is to conduct himself discreetly and hope against hope that he will not come within the grasp of the vice squad.

By and large we as a nation need to grow up, not only in matters of sex, but culturally. In contrast to other nations we are still in our adolescence, which may be responsible for much of our hypocrisy. Only when we have reached the maturity of such countries as France, Switzerland and Sweden, can we expect a radical change in our laws. This is not meant to discourage any propaganda toward that end, but merely a warning to those who might indulge in wishful thinking.

Dear Sir:

Boston, Mass.

George Kennan, former Chairman of the State Department's policy planning staff, has recently sounded off in a way that I think. merits acclamation from ONE and all its read-

ers.

Speaking at Princeton last December, Mr. Kennan at first requested that his remarks be kept off the record. He repeated the address very recently, however, at the annual Christian Conference on the Relevance of Religious Belief to Problems of Everyday Living, and changed his mind about no publicity, permitfing the Princeton Alumni Weekly to print his speech in its issue of February 12th.

The pertinent part of Mr. Kennan's address follows: "Let us, for the love of God, keep out of the ranks of the finger-pointing holier than thous-the people who sublimate their own sex urge in the peculiarly nasty and sadistic practice of snooping on others and exploiting the failures and embarrassments of others in this most excruciating of problems.

"In particular, let us not fall into the sort of immature Philistinism that seems to have taken possession of our government in its latter-day preoccupation with the morals of the public servant. What has gone on in Washington in these recent months in this regard has brought the greatest dismay and disgust to many of us older civil servants, not only because it seems to us to rest on a very faulty understanding of human nature, but because it implies the existence in our midst of angels, disguised as security officers, equipped to pass judgments on the sinful remainder of mankind. Surely nothing could be more un-Christian than this."

And later:

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