PETER JAI' A man may be ignorant of history and
slip- shod in his mode of expression, as C. P. Snow often is, and yet be able to state an important truth, while another may display vast learning and great powers of analysis, like Dr. Leavis, and totally miss the point.
The fact is that society is becoming increas- ingly dominated by science and technology, but our educational system tends to produce two distinct kinds of people: those who understand science and those who do not. Many of the former are extremely limited outside - their specialist field, while some of the latter are deeply cultured in a way of which Dr. Leavis would approve, but in so far as each type of person is ignorant of the attitudes which shape the other he is incapable of taking his full place in society, and society itself is stunted.
It is no more criticism of this thesis to say that Snow writes bad novels than it would be of Leavis's to point out that he has made it the occasion for an offensive and personal attack on his opponent. The point is not whether Leavis is right or wrong in the particular things that he has said, but that nearly all of them are irrelevant to the main issue.
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