April is the cruellest month, breeding Lilacs out of the dead land, mixing Memory and desire, string Dull roots with spring rain. T.S. Eliot, The Wask Land

DURING THE past month the Harvard-Radcliffe community has been saddened--even desolated--by two suicides. On March 24 an Adams House sophomore, John Neumann, jumped to his death from the Criminal Courts building in Manhattan. According to The Harvard Crimson, friends described Neumann as "cheerful, outgoing and laid back," although he had been depressed for a few days before leaving for New York. He often traveled to New York to engage in meditation sessions with Sri Chinmoy, of whom Leonard Bernstein had written: "What power is in this man's music. My spirit is very, very deeply impressed." A security guard at Adams House, Robert McLaughlin, who himself became despondent when John Neuman took his life, has told me again and again how giving and caring John was. He tried to encourage Bob to make the most of his not inconsiderable talents. John, according to Bob, was a very spiritual person.

On April 11 Ru Selle Diana Harwood, a Mather House senior, also plunged to her death from the Mather House tower. Ru Selle was a bright Economics concentrator with good grades She was a popular clarinetist in the Harvard Band, whom the band manager described as "an extraordinarily intelligent and talented woman." "A member of the Mather House Committee characterized Ru Selle as "a well-put together person who was organized and extremely intelligent," she was prominent in Harvard Student Agencies, as treasurer and head bookkeeper, a demanding role which necessitated a great deal of hard work Ru Selle was also active in the Mather House women's issues table.

Ru Selle Harwood's suicide appears to have been carefully planned. She closed her bank account, did her laundry, cleaned her room and then got up early the next morning, left eight suicide notes for friends and family, then leaped to her death.

A service of thanksgiving for Ru Selle's life was held on April 26th in Memorial Church Professor Patricia Herlihy, co-master of Mather House, was, like most everyone, almost at a loss for words. "What can be said about a 21-year-old who died?" Like John Neumann, Ru Selle was an idealist of powerful commitments who found it difficult to reconcile her enthusiasms with the world she saw around her. In high school, she was devoted to her church and in college most generous to her friends. The quotation from Ru Selle which was chosen to appear on the program of the memorial service was "The right things have been said before, but not enough have listened."

At the reception in the Mather House Master's Residence afterwards, a number of students said: "She kept it all in." The same was true of John Neumann. While seemingly surrounded by many friends and acquaintances, both Ru Selle and John appear to have been profoundly lonely. No one had a real clue that they would do themselves in. There was not that one special person to confide in who might have been able to calm their darkest fears--and possibly prevent far too young death.

From my experiences as a resident tutor in Dunster House, my association with Mather House and in teaching undergraduate courses, loneliness seems to be an enormous problem at Harvard and Radcliffe. There are many opportunities to meet people here--foremost at meals in the co-ed Houses, in organizations like the Collegium Musicum, the Harvard Gilbert and Sullivand Players, The Crimson and Lampoon, and Harvard and Radcliffe Hillel and the Catholic Student Center. As an undergraduate myself, I participated in many activities, yet was so insecure and shy that I hardly ever dated. I felt at the time that I was along in this predicament. Subsequent experience with students indicates that it is commonplace.

One can never know the reasons for a suicide--or understand the complex maze of fears and emotions that go into the act. But the deaths of Ru Selle Harwood and John Neumann must memorably raise anew the question of loneliness at Harvard-Radcliffe in the daily rush of exempts, papers, and LSAT preparations they are a stark reminder of the ongoing need for the most important qualities those of compassion and friendship.

IN A FAMOUS article, "Loneliness At Harvard," which appeared in the Harvard Alumni Bullerin in May 1967, Dr. Graham B. Blaine '40 tried to examine the causes of student isolation. What he said then seems to me very true today I paraphrases much of his article with his permission.

Students come to Harvard and Radcliffe, according to Dr. Blaine, when they are passing through a complex stage of their development.

There are three principal underlying conflicts that make the student more vulnerable and insecure. First, the wish to be independent conflicts with lingering feelings of childish dependency. The other two conflicts are best described by Frik Frikson, the most through and maginative student of students. He defines one as the opposing forces pulling on the one hand towards identity formation, and on the other towards a diffusion of role, and the second as a wish to develop intimacy opposed by a conflicting pull towards isolation.

Almost every student who has passed through Harvard realizes the critical importance of the House system. A House is a protective environment which allows, through the House Committees, an opportunity for self government and through drama societies and musical organizations, for creativity. But it is also a principal but work against loneliness. unfortunately not strong enough in the case of John Neumann and Ru Selle Harwood.

"Loneliness," as Graham Blaine's article makes clear, is chiefly "related to the third basic task of the young adult-the achievement of intimacy and the avoidance of isolation Intimate relationships in the Eriksonian sense, cannot be established until identity formation is complete. Intimacy occurs, according to Erikson, when two people of the opposite sex share trust which enables them to develop individual and mutual patterns of work, procreation and recreation. A feeling of the need for achievement of such relationship usually follows quickly upon the attainment of identity, and opportunities for gaining it should be easily found in the ideal college community. With Harvard and Radcliffe as enmeshed as they are, such opportunities should be many."

Why, then, is there so much loneliness and isolation--and recently suicide--in the Houses? Dr. Blaine attributes it primarily to the very competitive nature of the College, particularly over gaining the grades necessary for admission to prestigious law, medical or graduate schools. Even though I graduate with high honors from the College, the series of perfectionism which Harvard (and the earlier training which produces students who gain admission to Harvard and Radcliffe) engenders made me feel almost continually like a failure. My experience at Harvard Law School was even worse. For most of my class, the formation of intimate friendships was few and far between, subsequent experience has shown that this is still true in the College.

One of the most physically attractive and successful Harvard undergraduates I know has recently written me: