Aunt Sallies in Our Alley

New Zealand Listener, Volume 25, Issue 630, 27 July 1951, Page 10

Aunt Sallies in Our Alley

O wad some pow’r the giftie gie us To shield ourselves as ithers slay us. ETER LLEWELLYN Looks at New Zealand having just concluded, it is now time for New Zealand to look at Peter Llewellyn, and no doubt that’s what New Zealand would have been doing, hurling its classic phrase "the self-appointed critic" at him, if he had been on the air at a /better time. But if more people go to church on Sunday than were at the pictures the night before then Sunday evening at seven is a bad time. That is a pity, too, because Mr. Llewellyn’s forthright opinions deserve more than apathy. What he said of civilised drinking as opposed to getting a "skinful" before closing time will find an echo in the minds of thousands of ex-Servicemen who, either in Italy or England, learned what leisured conversation over a glass might Mean, at the "casa" in St. Mark’s Square, or at an inn. Personally, but this is another point Mr. Llewellyn would probably agree with, I prefer drinking in the home tod any inn, precisely because I have no belief in the world of man as a separate entity. The home should be the centre of life, intellectual, convivial and general. In suggesting that because New Zealand women have a relatively easy time they should be more contented with their husbands, thus lowering our divorce rate, Mr. Llewellyn associated two thoughts which have little in common. Women, in general, neither stay with men nor leave them because they are under- or over-worked, but rather because they are finding an inadequate emotional release in their relationship. The divorce rate remaing high partly because of the ephemeral and unnatural ideas concerning "emancipation" which haunt the century. Women, mistaking the nature of the "strain" which they feel attribute it to insufficient dom" and too much work. Historically, the plea is absurd and I agree that, on the whole, the New Zealand woman has an easy time of it. ‘In his last talk, Mr. Llewellyn was over anxious to assure us of his affection. This resulted in a certain amount of sentimentality which undermined the value of his earlier sallies. Certainly "be it ever so humble there’s no place like home" and evidently New Zealand is Mr. Llewellyn’s new home, but that refrain sung too much has a lulling quality not really needed here. For the other rubs, for the honesty and courage it takes to say such things once having established relationships in a country, we must thank Mr. Llewellyn.