Comment by Alastair Reid. A flinty old friend of ours from the country writes: I was persuaded by my family the other day to attend the graduation of a grandniece of mine from Yale, pretty much against my will, for college is something I left firmly behind me, and, besides, I keep a close...

Musical Events Apollonian Pursuit by Andrew Porter.

The Talk of the Town Walk Across the Bronx by Andrea Lee. Long Talk story about a 7 1/2-mile west-to-east walk across the Bronx (from the Harlem River to City Island) sponsored by the Bronx County Historical Society in honor of Bronx Week. Writer describes the outing by telling the times they arrived at various places, what they saw...

A Reporter at Large ARMS AND ORTHODOXY by John Newhouse. REPORTER AT LARGE about arms control. President Reagan's plans for managing nuclear arms have been rudely shaken. He arrived in Washington convinced that it was his duty to enlarge and improve the country's nuclear forces before turning to arms control. But the country, instead of worrying about Soviet intentions and...

The Theatre GROWING UP by Brendan Gill.

Fiction On Each Other's Time by Penelope Gilliatt. Mark and Constance Rowlett had always lived somewhere in Cumberland, England. They had moved and moved, to escape unpaid telephone bills and other bills. Mark was a well-known satirist, and Constance was a mathematician and a breeder of local sheep. They had four grown children, two of whom were...

Books Chomolungma by Jeremy Bernstein.

U. S. Journal THOUGHTS ON THE SHAPE OF NEIGHBORHOOD HISTORY by Calvin Trillin. U.S. JOURNAL: GREENWICH VILLAGE about what the Village is like these days. Writer realized recently that the Cornelia St. Cafe goes about its business under the assumption that the Village is still the Village, i.e., that it is still "the gay bohemian Left Bank of New York." Writer still likes...

The Art World (The Art Galleries) Seminar by Calvin Tomkins.

Jazz by Whitney Balliett. Obituary of the great jazz trumpeter Bill Coleman, who died late last summer, at the age of 77. Tells about his life and his career...

Fiction Deaths of Distant Friends by John Updike. Narrator tells of the deaths of two people and one dog who he was friendly with before his divorce and during the time when he was between marriages. He remembers that time as being a disarray that preoccupied him completely. The first person who died was a man named Len...

Poetry Snapshot by Sheldon Flory. From the third floor looking north...

Poetry The Spire by Ellen Bryant Voigt. In the Bavarian steeple, on the hour...