Evening star. [volume], February 14, 1932, Image 73

About Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972

Image provided by: Library of Congress, Washington, DC

                
Features j Fiction
ArtNotes jfflagajine
PART 7. WASHING iTOW D. C, FEBRUARY 14, 1932._20 PAUKS.
Britain’s Call to Youth
JVith the Prince of IVales Leading the
Appeal\ England Is Setting Oat to
Rally Its Youth to a Nezv Standard
of Service—Her Cynical Post
lVar Youth, Flouting the Island's
Traditions, Has Become One of
\ -
Her Great Problems.
Illustrated hy
IDDiSON BURBANK.
“Fathers talk about the beauties of ambiti-on and hard work—but Youtfi says, ‘What’s the use-?’”
ENGLAND has been worried about
her younger generation, very wor
ried. So two weeks ago she issued
a great call to youth. The sound
ing board was London’s biggest
hall, and the radio, the “talkies” and the
newspapers carried the reverberations to
every corner of the island.
Only one man could put that call over
as it had to be put if it was to catch all
ears and register on the minds served
thereby. Young England would have
laughed at Bernard Shaw, discounted
the vehement empire-crusader, Lord
Beaverbrook; booed the millionaire press
lord. Rothermere. Winston Churchill
is too class-oriented and would have put
youth’s back up; and youth would have
thrown old tomatoes at his complacent
son, Randolph. Oswald Mosley would
have received a whole aviary of birds,
Ramsay MacDonald would have touched
no young heart (his oratory is for middle
age) and Stanley Baldwin, though hon
est and blunt, is a party politician and
arouses no large enthusiasm in the breast
of youth; while his cousin, Kipling, once
youth’s idol, is uninspiring in the flesh
and in these days appeals only to the
young of the jingo and vested imperial
interests classes.
The Prince of Wales had to do it. He
is the one person in the island everybody
listens to, approves and exempts from
Any suspicion of having an ax of either
By C. Patrick Thompson
party, private interests, politics or per
sonal prejudice to grind.
And the Prince of Wales did it. It was
a difficult task, and it was made still
more difficult by the heckling of a group
of women who greeted the Prince’s ref
erence to British interests abroad with
shouts of “Withdraw the forces from
India!”
DUT the Prince put it across. He called
^ upon the 10,000 boys and girls packed
into Albert Hall, in London, and the
hundreds of thousands more who sat by
their radios throughout the island to end
the depression by ending apathy.
“Depression and apathy are the devil’s
own—they’re not English!” he cried.
“Away with them!”
And the vast hall rang with youthful
cheers.
It was a personal plea from the Prince
of Wales to England’s youth; and the
Prince brought himself, his own oppor
tunities, his own efforts, his own failures
—into that plea.
“As far as my part is concerned,” he
said, “many paths in life are closed to
me. Much I would like to do that I can
not. But I have tried to bring more
closely together the people of the em
pire, to bring more closely together the
English-speaking peoples and to further
our interests abroad. I have had my
failures, I know, but in these years, with
few precedents to guide us, to have no
failures is to have attempted nothing.”
Will youth accept that challenge? It is
too early to tell. The call may have sunk
like a stone tossed into a pool, sending
out ripples which presently smooth out
and leave the pool calm as it was before.
On the other hand, it may—to change
the metaphor—have scattered over fer
tile soil seeds which will germinate and
fructify mightily in the days to oome.
This youth business is a world phe
nomenon. But since we are beae dealing
with the British aspect of it, we may sur
vey it from the island angle.
England has been through g tough
and demoralizing phase. The war bred
cynicism and lack of faith hi traditions,
ideals, everything. It robbed Britain of
a million men, the flower of her young
manhood. It made women spoil hoys
and youths in the post-war yean. Vie
churches lost their hold on the young.
“Debunking” became the favorite ycufbb
sport of the day.
England has been without rallying
points and opportunities for youth |q
find a vent for Hs animal spirits and
energies. There have been attempts to
form branches of the political parties—
Young Tories, Young Liberals, Young
Socialists. All have been a joke. Poli
tics in England since the war have be
come too discredited, and Parliament it
self, until recent events, had lost much
of its old prestige.
For a time it looked as if a leader
might rally disgruntled British youth to
a big and vital political movement. Bui
either the right leader was not forthcom
ing or British youth has no real ambi
tions in that direction.
Sir Oswald Mosley showed how the
wind blew there. He has been a young
man in revolt himself, making it hot in
Parliament fat his father-in-law, the
august Lord Ouraon, as a critic of foreign
policy. Then he split with the Tories
tad went over to the Socialists in an
ticipation of rapid promotion, and for a
while was to be heard attacking the
banks and the capitalistic system which
keep his own and his wife’s money safe
and fruitful. But the Labor old guard
was suspicious of the sincerity of their
vociferous recruit, and pretty soon, tired
of waiting tor promotion and disillu
sioned about Labor’s political future, he
got out and formed a political party of
his own, the New Party.
ft was to rally youth against the effete
'and futile old gang of politicians in the
best Mussolini manner. It had no use
tot pftHtirfq-nfl anyway, and little use for
Pa*iWWii which it dubbed the “Talk