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Review Articles 

Graduate Education 
Graduate Education in the United States. 

By Bernard Berelson. New York: McGraw-
Hill Book Company, Inc., 1960. 346p. 
$6.95. 

"As I began this study, I sought advice 
from experienced graduate deans as to the 
kind of study and report that would be most 
helpful to the field at this time. One dean 
advised me to 'write a short, concise report 
with ciear recommendations'. Another ad-
vised me to 'go out on a limb' in saying 
what ought to be done. T h e third advised 
me to 'stick to the facts'. I have tried to 
follow the advice of all three." These are the 
concluding sentences in the author's intro-
duction to this book, and in the opinion of 
this reviewer Berelson has suceeded admir-
ably in following the advice he received. 

Nine books in the Carnegie Series in 
American Education have resulted from 
studies supported by grants from the Car-
negie Corporation of New York, and this 
latest one has the potential for the most sig-
nificant effects of any in this series which in-
cludes Conant's much-discussed The Ameri-
can High School Today. 

T h e book consists of three parts. T h e first 
is a review in thirty-seven pages of the his-
tory of graduate education in this country 
over the past century or so and establishes 
that the issues in this area have had an im-
pressive historical vitality. 

T h e second part, in 173 pages, is an analysis 
of the details of the important topics now in 
active controversy, a setting out of the prob-
lems and values involved, and a marshalling 
of the arguments and the facts. Major head-
ings are: (1) the purposes, (2) the institu-
tions, (3) the students, and (4) the programs. 

Conclusions, commentary, and recommen-
dations constitute the forty-six pages of the 
third part, and the final eighty-three pages 
consist of appendices. 

Berelson does not hesitate "to go out on a 
limb" in expressing trenchantly the opinions 
he holds concerning the problems and values 
he has considered. In regard to the numbers 

of doctorates which will be needed to staff 
higher education he concludes that "the 
overall situation seems to be not a capital-C 
Crisis, but rather a small-p problems," and 
that "the sense of Crisis that makes discus-
sion of graduate education sound shrill these 
days is unwarranted and misleading," (p. 79). 
He points out that "A substantial propor-
tion of teachers will be needed in fields that 
are not typically considered to require the 
doctorate, at least in the same amounts, e. g., 
music, industrial and vocational arts, physi-
cal and health education, and perhaps home 
economics, library science, the health sci-
ences, and speech and drama," (p. 77). 

An interesting analysis of the problem of 
professionalization leads to his statement 
that "the 'ivory tower' is hard to find in a 
large university these days—and so are some 
professors," (p. 84). T h e concluding sentence 
in the section on the purposes of graduate 
training is: " T h e debate is a mixture of dedi-
cated conviction, alleged facts, cliches and 
prejudices, differences by field and type of 
institution, solid arguments, low motives and 
high ideals," (p. 92). 

One of the interesting facts brought out in 
his section on the students is that "Over a 
quarter of today's doctoral students in the 
arts and sciences have a total income of over 
$5,400 for the academic year, and a similar 
proportion have from $3,600 to $5,400. As 
the crowning irony to an earlier generation, 
two-thirds own cars," (p. 150). 

T h e section devoted to conclusions consists 
of forty-six "major facts that must be taken 
into account in current appraisals or pro-
posed reforms, together with a running com-
mentary on their meaning and significance," 
(p. 216). Berelson finds that "By and large, 
the graduate school is doing a reasonably 
good job or better, as judged by both the 
students and the employers. As for the train-
ers themselves, even they think that things 
are better today than they were in 'the good 
old days' when they were being trained," (p. 
232). 

Berelson's recommendations consist of 
nineteen proposals, submitted with his opin-
ion that "If they were put into effect, I be-

J U L Y 1 9 6 1 307 



lieve they would make a genuine improve-
ment in the state of graduate education. In 
that sense, I shall claim that they are bold; 
naturally, I think they are sound," (p. 234). 

This reviewer concurs with Berelson's 
opinion of his recommendations. However, 
another study supported by the Carnegie 
Corporation and published in the last days 
of 1959 should be kept in mind as one con-
siders Berelson's recommendations. Earl J . 
McGrath, author of The Graduate School 
and the Decline of Liberal Education, a 
sixty-five page publication of the Institute 
of Higher Education, concludes that the 
locus of power in the academic enterprise 
"resides in the graduate faculties of the uni-
versities and in their offspring in the inde-
pendent colleges. No amount of reason—and 
it has been sincere, vigorous, cogent, and 
prolonged—has yet been able to unhorse 
this directive academic class. 

"Many proposals made by scholars of wis-
dom and integrity for the correction of the 
present crying shortcomings of graduate edu-
cation have been almost totally disregarded 
by the group which controls its policies and 
shapes its character, and this fact foreshad-
ows the extreme difficulty of accomplishing 
even the most obviously needed reforms. 
Until different influences are brought to 
bear on the policies which prevent colleges 
from fully discharging their proper functions, 
new attempts at persuasion by fact or logic 
are unlikely to fare any better than their 
predecessors," (p. 50). 

There is not a dull page in Berelson's 
book. It will unquestionably provoke wide 
discussion and debate which should be par-
ticipated in by academic librarians. It will 
be interesting to see what changes, if any, 
will be made in graduate education as a 
result of this study.—Eugene H. Wilson, 
University of Colorado. 

Inside Bentley 
A Victorian Publisher; A Study of the Bent-

ley Papers. By Royal A. Gettmann. New 
York: Cambridge University Press, 1960. 
272p. $7.50. 

In general, the literature of publishing 
consists of a long series of house histories 

usually written with eulogistic overtones. 
Such books contain a useable quantity of in-
formation about significant events in the 
chronology of each firm, but they commonly 
lack the facts most valuable to the student 
of literary and cultural history. T h a t is, they 
omit data about manufacturing costs, author-
publisher relationships, publicity methods, 
and even sales figures. No one is more aware 
of this than Professor Gettmann who, in this 
handsome volume, devotes only one chapter 
to the history of the Bentley firm, and then 
proceeds to study "the problems of nine-
teenth-century publishing as they are em-
bedded in the records of Richard Bentley 
and Son." 

Fortunately, Professor Gettmann has had 
a vast archive to exploit: the correspondence 
files of the firm at the University of Illinois, 
the letter-books and ledgers at the British 
Museum, plus other collections at the Bod-
leian and the New York Public Library. Be-
cause the Bentleys occupied a major place in 
British publishing from the 1830's to the 
1890's, this study contributes much to our 
knowledge of publishing during this period. 
It also illustrates the advantages and value 
of a specific approach to the history of pub-
lishing. 

In an unusually skillful manner, the author 
synthesizes his material so that, for the first 
time, one can easily learn, among other es-
sential things, about the variety of author-
publisher contracts of the period, the sums 
earned by major and minor writers, the ways 
publishers secured favorable reviews as well 
as book notices, and the influence of the 
editor on the text. Moreover, since this was 
the age of the three-decker, he has recorded 
its growth and decline. In these chapters, 
one vignette follows another: the sums 
George Gissing earned, a publisher's reader's 
opinion of The Cloister and the Hearth, the 
shrewd contracts drawn by the author of 
East Lynne. This insight into the Victorian 
publisher at work will be required reading 
in many a literature and bibliography course. 

Now that this survey of the Bentley papers 
is finished, much more detailed investigation 
remains to be done. Some aspects of publish-
ing, such as details on the cost of illustra-
tions, are merely suggested, others not men-
tioned. It would be rewarding, for example, 
to compare the costs in the Bentley papers 
with those in The Cost Books of Ticknor and 

308 C O L L E G E A N D R E S E A R C H L I B R A R I E S