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present, he looks for the violet between the rocks. Sometimes his op–
timism mounts up to a harmless but unnerving mania, as in the com–
parison of the move to the suburbs with the exploration and settlement
of the frontier. "But frontier towns are not usually very' attractive. And
frontier behavior is awkward: people have not yet learned to behave
comfortably in the new surroundings." The pioneer woman is recognized
by the touch of oregano she puts in the casserole. "Among men par–
ticularly, the demand that one must enjoy food, and not simply stow
it away, is relatively new, and again these pioneers are awkwardly self–
conscious."
These cool-eyed scouts tracking the forests of Suburbia, moving on
to new "frontiers of consumption" are no doubt singing to the accom–
paniment of an electric guitar during the long, lonesome evenings.
"Some Observations on Intellectual Freedom," which Riesman
published in 1953, is his most extravagant and lover-like address to our
present situation. (True, there is an enormous eye winking over the
reader's head.
In
a later postcript Riesman more or less repudiates the
main text.) Answering an article in which Archibald MacLeish ex–
pressed certain fears for the freedom of the intellectual in America,
Riesman takes a passionate stand against such unhealthy imaginings.
" . . . The naming of evils, intended as a magical warding-off, can have
the opposite effect." By taking a positive attitude, looking for the best,
Riesman hopes to comfort and reshape the diseased extremity like a
corrective shoe. MacLeish was disturbed by a growing disrespect for the
intellectual, but Riesman thinks: "In a way, the attention that the in–
tellectuals are getting these days, though much of it is venomous and
indecent, testifies to the great improvement in our status over that of
an earlier day. What might not Henry Adams have given for such signs
of recognition!"
There is some of the cheerful impudence here of a press agent
who thinks his client's arrest is better than nothing.... That were some
love, but little policy.
