In Sight of Sever: Essays from Harvard

It would indeed be strange if this book by David McCord, poet, essayist, and fundraiser unique and extraordinary, did not interest the many readers, regardless of Harvard connections, who have come to relish his prose for its sharp reportorial clarity and for its very special qualities of urbanity, warmth, humor, and wisdom. These have nowhere been better displayed than here, whether he is describing the visit of Winston Churchill to Harvard in 1943, writing of the death of Franklin Roosevelt, making a parable for alumni out of the seasonal running of the Alewives along the Atlantic littoral, or telling the story of the beginnings of Radcliffe College. Covering a span of forty years, 1923-1963, there are pieces here about individuals, about occasions, and about unusual institutions. In presenting this delightful book, there is one concession certainly that should be made to the non-Harvard reader - a word about the title. "Sever" is not a verb, but a building - a big, homely, brick, Romanesque pile of classrooms in which all Harvard graduates once recited and about which they all hold rich if mixed memories.