Reasoning Together

Reasoning Together 497 Reasoning Together Gene D. Phillips, S. J., writes: "To paraphrase Peter Ohlin's review of my book on Ernest Hemingway and film [15/1] (it would be easier to parody it). his longwinded piece seems to be the work of someone who wants to increase hispublishing record by inflating what should have been a review of modest proportions into an overblown essay covering my own and another similar book in ludicrously pompous and captious language. To paraphrase Mr. Ohlin further, his publisher has a ·complementary greed' to foist all kinds of material on innocent subscribers across the continent. If my assumptions about the reviewer and his publisher seem gratuitous, compare them to his sophomoric remarks about me and my publisher: they are the same. That he should write and you should publish such a smart-alee piece of writing will surely cheapen the image of your journal in the scholarly community. To borrow again from Mr. Ohlin: this is a disgrace." Peter Ohlin replies: ''In saying that Gene Phillips' book was 'born out of the professional need of film and English teachers to get themselves into print. and the complementary greed of publishers hoping to foist all kinds of materials on innocent film courses across the continent' I did not in fact attribute the 'professional need' specifically to Fr. Phillips, nor the ·complementary greed' specifically to his publishers (or to him). I do not know anything about his motives, or those of his publishers, in producing the book; and I have no particular desire to speculate about them. If I gave the impression of imputing certain personal motives to Fr. Phillips and his publishers, I do indeed apologize. What I meant to say was that, regardless of motives, the book seemed to me a prime example of the kind of book which, from what I have seen in the past few years, is likely to be born out of the circumstances I named and I supported my negative view of this particular book with a number of critical comments, none of which, I note, Fr. Phillips refutes." Charles R. Steele writes: "In a review essay in the Spring 1984issue of this journal [15/1](see "Heaped Words in the Void: Some Recent Criticism of Emily Dickinson") I mistakenly, and inadvertently, attributed in my opening paragraph a survey of Dickinson criticism to Willis J. Buckingham and his Emily Dickinson. An Annotated Bibliography which should instead have been attributed to Sheila T. Clendenning (now Sheila Taylor) and her EmiZv Dickinson. A Bibliography 1850-1966 (Kent State University Press, 1968).My sincere apologies are owing to Professors Taylor and Buckingham (to the latter as well for having misidentified him as Willis T. rather than Willis]. Buckingham).'' ...