Lois And Alexander Are By Far The

To Live Sanely In Los Angeles ... You Have To Cultivate The Art Of Staying Awake. You Must Learn To Resist (firmly But Not Tensely) The Unceasing Hypnotic Suggestions Of The Radio, The Billboards, The Movies And The Newspapers; Those Demon Voices Which Are Forever Whispering In Your Ear What You Should Desire, What You Should Fear, What You Should Wear And Eat And Drink And Enjoy, What You Should Think And Do And Be.

The Landscape, Like Los Angeles Itself, Is Transitional. Impermanence Haunts The City, With Its Mushroom Industries--the Aircraft Perpetually Becoming Obsolete, The Oil Which Must One Day Be Exhausted, The Movies Which Fill America's Theatres For Six Months And Are Forgotten. Many Of Its Houses--especially The Grander Ones--have A Curiously Disturbing Atmosphere, A Kind Of Psychological Dankness Which Smells Of Anxiety, Overdrafts, Uneasy Lust, Whisky, Divorce And Lies.

Sometimes Awful Things Have Their Own Beauty.

His Life Has Been Lived, So Far, Within Narrow Limits And He Is Quite Naïve About Most Kinds Of Experience; He Fears It And Yet Is Wildly Eager For It. To Reassure Himself, He Converts It Into Epic Myth As Fast As It Happens. He Is Forever Play-acting.

In Ten Minutes They Will Have Arrived On Campus. George Will Have To Be George; The George They Have Named And Will Recognise. So Now He Consciously Applies Himself To Thinking Their Thoughts, Getting Into Their Mood. With The Skill Of A Veteran, He Rapidly Puts On The Psychological Makeup For This Role He Must Play.