THE VOICE OF UNDER THIRTY [To the Editor of THE
SPECTATOR.] SIR,—It seems a pity that your paper, whose main attraction to me has always been that it steers clear of the popular supersti- tions of our day, has now slightly blemished this enviable reputation through the publication of the " Under Thirty " series. For is not the belief that the voice of youth is worth hearing just because it is the voice of youth just another supersti- tion ? Has youth any claim to be heard just because it is youth ? Has anyone any claim to be heard about anything unless he is qoalified to talk about it, that is to say, unless he has a certain amount of specialised knowledge or unusual experience ? And can youth be expected to have any such knowledge of the things it so dearly loves to talk about, life, society, religion, philosophy ?
The articles of the " Under Thirties " have, I think, abun- dantly proven that it cannot. The large majority of them have done no more than to show what everyone could have known, namely, that ordinary people of under thirty all share the same ordinary and perfectly human disillusionments and discon- tents, the same hopes and fears, the same ideals and cynicisms. Anyone who has ever frequented cocktail parties or student meetings, or any other occasion where ordinary people air their views on life and society, has heard the same sort of thing as The Spectator has been printing so lavishly a thousand times before. This is not to reproach the " Under Thirties " with the ordinariness of their ideas and complaints. What reason was there to expect that they would be anything else ?
One other thing. I doubt whether the voice of " Under Thirty " has been entirely representative. For as an.," Under Thirty " myself I would like to believe that the greater part of my generation has been modest enough to refrain from availing itself of your well-meant invitation in the belief that what it thinks of life and society has perhaps been thought before by one or two other people.—I am, Sir, your obedient
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