India's Indira

Sir: The choice of Indira Gandhi as Prime Minister of India [Jan. 28] is not only a tribute to the lady herself and her dedicated nation-building family, but also to all the women of India.

FRANCES S. BOND

Former President, Calcutta Y.W.C.A.

East Dover, Vt.

Sir: The newly elected Prime Minister has yet to convince the intellectuals of India of her own mettle. Until the death of Nehru, Indians accepted her as the daughter of a leading personality, and she continues to bask in that glory even today. The big bosses of Congress find it convenient to keep a compromising or a weak Prime Minister in New Delhi so that they can control the states. It.is to perpetuate this "reign of terror" that the Congress Party elected Mrs. Indira Gandhi.

R. K. IYENGAR

Pittsburgh

Sir: Your balanced story about Mrs. Indira Gandhi is so very unlike the tongue-in-cheek comments you continuously hurled against her more reputed father. Break all your traditions, look no more, you have your (Wo)Man of the Year.

K. BHASKARA RAO

New York City

Sir: Those who had any doubt of India's democratic values will certainly agree with you when you say: "It stands as a remarkable example in the eyes of the world and a clear alternative in Asia to Red China's Communism."

SEVAKLAL MASTER

Librarian, Columbia University

New York City

Earning a Need

Sir: Spain [Jan. 21] not only "needs recognition, acceptance, applause"; she has earned it.

JAIME SENDRA

Randolph-Macon College

Ashland, Va.

Sir: It was a pleasure to observe that you have caught up with the viewpoint of millions of Americans who have visited Spain in recent years and have seen for themselves the flowering of these dignified and wonderful people. Poor, proud, persevering, they are forging a good society. Would that some of our other American publications did not keep looking backward in anger.

CHARLES RODEN

New York City

Sir: Congratulations. At last a fair and excellent report on Spain.

THE COUNTESS OF QUINTANILLA

Madrid

Sir: I salute TIME for finally realizing that Spain, as a nation and people, can be numbered amongst the progressive allies of the U.S. dedicated to keeping the world free from Communism.

EDWARD KREISLER

Madrid

Sir: Thanks to Louis Glanzman for TIME's cover symbolizing the renaissance of Spain: new leaves on the old olive tree.

(Mrs.) SOCORRO GIRON DE SEGURA

Ponce, Puerto Rico

Sir: Not all the whitewash in TIME's apologia, nor all the paint on the cover will make me believe Franco is not a despot.

MRS. MARK L. ARONS

Ithaca, N.Y.

Sir: An excellent description of Spain's economic boom, but certainly a very poor description of the status of individual freedom there. Contrary to what you write, police still torture political suspects. Also, there is no freedom of speech any more than there is right to tax evasion in the U.S. We all take joy in what is good about Spain: its economic progress. However, it makes painful reading for democrats all over the world the way your editorial seems to absolve Franco and his associates of the responsibility toward humanity for crimes committed during and after the Civil War.

JOSEPH J. AZURZA

Caracas, Venezuela

Sir: As an American businessman in Spain, 1 can say from experience that you will receive a flood of mail from so-called Spanish liberals living in exile. They will say that what you say isn't so, and cry the usual charges of censorship, oppression, etc. I believe that if these liberals returned to their country, they would find your article accurate and their resentment and prejudices very wrong.

JAY SALBY

Madrid

Sir: You describe Opus Dei Member Rafael Calvo Serer as a liberal monarchist who is a prominent opponent of the Franco regime. Calvo Serer's principal quarrel with Franco is over the timetable for restoration of the monarchy. As for his alleged liberality, in his published writings Calvo Serer has called for a monarchy in which both the Cortes (parliament) and the Council of Realm would be only advisory and could, along with the President, be overruled by the King if he so desired. He opposes universal suffrage, would outlaw political parties. Only by ultraconservative criteria can such a concept of monarchy possibly be construed as liberal. One would like to think that TIME has other criteria.

DEAN PEERMAN

Managing Editor

The Christian Century

Chicago

-- Monarchist Calvo Serer has changed. In a treatise to be published soon, he calls for an adapted form of the British constitutional monarchy, complete with three major parties (Conservative, Christian Democrat and Socialist), representative Cortes--and universal suffrage.

Friedman & Keynes

Sir: You quote me [Dec. 31] as saying: "We are all Keynesians now." The quotation is correct, but taken out of context. As best I can recall it, the context was: "In one sense, we are all Keynesians now; in another, nobody is any longer a Keynesian." The second half is at least as important as the first.

MILTON FRIEDMAN

The University of Chicago

Chicago

The Art of Listening

Sir: At last someone has written, amusingly and accurately, about the appalling audiences of today [Jan. 21]. This article should be pinned on every seat in every concert hall in every country.

SUSAN HAYES

Blackheath, England

Sir: What mythical audience in never-never land do you have in mind when you complain about today's opera or concert audiences in America? They always applaud, even at the worst performances. The candy-munchers to whom you recommend bananas? In the 18th century they could buy oranges, but they might use them as weapons against the tenor. The score readers? In the 19th century, before the practice began of lowering the house lights during performances, people read the newspaper between arias. The latecomers? A hundred years ago it was normal to come late. The early leavers? During performances, people used to visit each other noisily, and ogle box holders with opera glasses from the main floor.

HENRY KNEPLER

Professor of English

Illinois Institute of Technology

Chicago

Starting Early

Sir: Morris Chafetz's proposal to curb alcoholism by the introduction of a drinking course into our educational system [Jan. 21] is about as absurd as initiating a practice sex program at an all-male school or college in order to curb the divorce rate.

ROBERT BRUCE KIRK '69

Nichols College

Dudley, Mass.

Sir: Dr. Chafetz's proposal is the most sensible thing I've heard in a long time. Drinking as part of the school curriculum may or may not prevent alcoholism, but it will give students a chance to learn physical and emotional reactions to liquor.

MARGOT J. FROMER

New York City

Sir: In the article concerning my remarks made before the New York Academy of Science, you chose French drinkers as an example of a culture where drinking is introduced early. This was unfortunate, since the attitudes of the French and their use of alcohol are as unhealthy as those of Americans. A better choice for cultural examples would be Italy, China or Lebanon, where alcohol is introduced to the young, where drinking is matter-of-fact, where intoxication and its correlates are negatively sanctioned, and where drinking is common and alcohol problems are not.

MORRIS E. CHAFETZ, M.D.

Massachusetts General Hospital

Boston

Truth or Trash?

Sir: As a psychotherapist, I resent your distorted article on homosexuality [Jan. 21]. Though you correctly quote a few experts, it is dreadful of you to sneer, and foolish to elaborate Catholic and Talmudic trash about an issue that is more rightfully a problem of psychological understanding than moral dogma.

CLARENCE A. TRIPP

New York City

Sir: The writer concludes that, above all, there must be "no pretense" that homosexuality "is anything but a pernicious sickness." This question of whether it is a sickness has been the subject of a controversy among highly respected professionals for the past quarter of a century and, unfortunately, it cannot be solved by editorial fiat. It is regrettable that a magazine like TIME should choose to ignore this controversy and to give the false impression that only "homophile opinion" rejects the notion that homosexuals are sick.

ISADORE RUBIN

Editor, Sexology Magazine

New York City

Sir: Congratulations on your Essay. Neither artistic blandishments nor attribution of "subcultural" status to homosexuality should distract us from the fact that such behavior remains basically a serious disorder.

SHAKE L. ZENIAN

Clinical Psychologist

State Hospital No. 1

Fulton, Mo.

Sir: Your solidly researched Essay notes the strong position taken by my husband, the late Edmund Bergler, M.D. Please be sure that he was equally strong on the issue of curability. He taught his method to several psychoanalysts, and these doctors now report curing seven out of ten patients.

MARIANNE BERGLER

New York City

Sir: I agree that a homosexual is a sick person, but something needs to be said about the sickness of a society in which homosexual relationships are so widespread.

DAVID JONES

San Francisco

Bing's Girls

Sir: In your "People" section [Dec. 21], you made reference to Kathryn's recent appearance in the musical version of Peter Pan in San Francisco. You said Jeanne Miller of the San Francisco Examiner panned Mrs. Crosby's performance and described the performance of our little daughter Mary Frances as stodgy.

The only thing that could possibly cause umbrage about Mrs. Crosby's performance was that Miss Miller said she was too girlish and too pretty to be "Peter Pan"--which is sort of a mixed criticism, I'm sure you'll agree.

The reference to Mary Frances as being stodgy was made about another performer in the cast. If Mary Frances is stodgy, then Sammy Davis is taciturn, moribund and laconic. For weeks at a time we have to keep her in a strait jacket.

BING CROSBY

Hollywood

Lambasting the Long Lines

Sir: The Japanese long line fishermen [Jan. 28] not only seriously jeopardize game fishing but also threaten the food supply for future generations in overpopulated areas of the world. We are widely disseminating your article among sportsmen and conservationists.

LUIS ZALAMENA

ED LOUYS

ALVARO CRUZ

Board Members, Caribbean Gamefishing Assn.

Bogota, Colombia

Credit Due

Sir: A collection of letters can be a grab bag--or a distinguished book. Sometimes the grab-bag approach results in your flaying the editor. Why not, then, celebrate the impeccable, imaginative editing that has produced Bernard Shaw: Collected Letters [Jan. 21]? Here the art of editing included the locating, sorting, choosing from and annotating the extant correspondence of history's most prolific letter writer, and creating a brilliant epistolary biography. Dan Laurence deserved more than merely having his name printed (in reduced type) with the descriptive matter at the head of your review.

RODELLE WEINTRAUB

Assistant Editor

The Shaw Review

University Park, Pa.

And Appreciated

Sir: Your Press section for Jan. 28 gives credit to Associated Press for excellent reporting at a time when it is most appreciated. For too long the wire services have been the whipping boys over the managed news being fed to newspaper readers today.

JOHN J. McGANN

Production Manager

The Ogden Group of Newspapers

Wheeling, W. Va.

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.