Word: gripes
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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...MORE IMPORTANT than any specific institutional structure or tactic, is that students must develop a common consciousness. This consciousness is not just a pretty toy to toss around at midnight gripe sessions. Rather, it must be the inspiration and focus for all direct action at the University. Such common identification is necessary so that whenever students, in the assembly or in the streets, gather to protest any individual policy, or demand some specific redress, they will realize that the problem is much larger. The action they seek must ultimately not only right some immediate wrong, but also strengthen students' rights...
...imaginary invalid, Argan (Brian McCue), is a shameless hypochondriac who does nothing but whine about his "illness," pester his family and servants, and gripe about his exorbitant doctor bills. His only real illness is myopia--he cannot see beyond himself--and he cannot see the truth of anything that goes on around...
Other members gripe about the time that they must spend traveling to home districts and their lack of family life. Adds Vermont Senator Patrick Leahy, a first-term Democrat: "There is no time to think ahead on important issues. It's even impossible to think out just the political effects of a decision." Democratic Senator Lawton Chiles of Florida bemoans life in a fishbowl: "Half of the reporters in town are looking on you as a Pulitzer Prize waiting...
...Gripe number two: Not one member of the Harvard offensive line got so much as honorable mention. All you have to do is see Mike Clark play guard for one game and then hear Joe Restic talk about him for five minutes to realize that he is a blue-chipper up front. I think I'm going to buy Mike a bright orange game jersey for next season so the other coaches in the Ivies will notice him for a change when voting time comes around...
Marilyn French's first novel, The Women's Room, entwines all these overworked themes and setting. Only, as the frustrated reader surprisingly discovers, somehow it works. Just as you reach the point of nausea over a suburban kitchen dialogue, or read one more Harvard grad student gripe, French's narrator intervenes, letting you know that she too is bored...