73 “A G.S. Man,” Cornell Daily Sun (Letter to the Editor, 1958)*

To the Editor:

I wish to correct two misstatements in Mr. Metcalf’s article “Learning the Russian Language” (The Sun, Oct. 15):

The “one genuine Russian literature course” (Russian 317) is not offered this term [not] because of “lack of interest” but because of lack of grammar. The three bright and intelligent candidates who enrolled in this course after a year of Morrill Hall could not pass a simple test I gave them—proving that they had not been taught the most elementary rules of Russian.

I am not on the staff of the language and linguistics department as implied by the last paragraph of Mr. Metcalf’s article. My courses in Russian literature (315–16 and 317–18) are given under the jurisdiction of the Department of Romance Literature and my course in Russian literature (325–326) under that of the Division of Literature.

In other words I am strictly a Goldwin Smith man.1

Prof. Vladimir Nabokov