Evening Star Newspaper, April 20, 1930, Page 90

THE SONDAVIASTAR, .(WASHINGTON; ‘D. €, APRIT. 20, 1930. CAPTAIN SCOTT. By Stephen Gwynn. New York: Harper & Brothers, E was a great hero, the man who died in the Antarctic snows, slow- ly freezing to death, his two com- panions dead beside him. Writing words -of comfort—"“Don’'t be un- happy. I'm not suffering”—till both hand and brain gave out, turned to ice. And so Capt. Scott died. He failed. Amundsen won. Byrd, not a discoverer of the South Pole, but a great and daring sxplorer, won, too. Yet, reading Stephen Gwynn's starkly simple story of Scott, one pays devoted homage, tearful homage, to the man who died so gallantly. And Scott won also in the universal adventure that all must go out to meet. A true epic. A great story. And to it Stephen Gwynn gives a straight telling, a rugged accounting, an unemotional summary of the years of this man, a fair ap- praisal of the conditions attending his search for the South Pole, an impartial pointing upon inherencies of the situation that might have caused the final defeat. Just these things are set down her: without emotionalism of any sort. And this upstanding attitude, strangely enough, only adds to the reader’s intimate en- tering into the tragic hours in the Antarctic snows. Mr. Gwynn understands. He knows Capt. Scott, has always known him. It is upon this basis of friendship, of professional com- radeship, of intuitive comprehension and warm feeling that he writes the story. A biography. A biography that is vital with character, with personality, with a career born of English blood and held in devotion to the soil of England. 8o, instead of a book, here is a life passed on to us for our own sake, not in the interest of Capt. Scott’s name, nor for his family, nor for the British Empire. It is a high adventure in great living and great dying—an unforget- table experience is any one’s who will read this simply related true story. LONG HUNT. By James Boyd, author of “Drums,” etc. New York: Charles Scrib- ner’'s Sons. TH.I Oregon trail movement is now reaching s its hundredth birthday. During this year there will be a line of commemorative cele- brations throughout the West in honor of men amd events that contributed to that epic ex- pansion in pioneering and settlement. Scat- tered along this trail there may be found, even yet, relics of the wilderness life which has, in the main, been supplanted by civilization. “Long Hunt” is a contribution to the spirit of that day which is this year to be renewed in graphic portrayals of various kinds for the In substance it is true history pioneer history, objectified in the life of Mur- free Rinnard—wilderness man, hunter, free man—and the occasional settlers with whom “Long Hunt” are among the novels—among the few novels—that give distinction to the fiction of this country in this day. By Mary Roberts New York: Farrar & Rinebart. Fovn murders and three assaults of murder- ous intent, such the substance of this novel, .as a good test of adroit management. . mystifying and A Biography of Capt. Scott, Who Died in the Antarctic—Novels by Mary Roberts Rinehart and James Boyd. Another sort of management is functioning here, A practiced hand is at work. A widely accepted storyteller is providing a new entertainment. A tidy-minded inventor is imparting plausibilty to the incredible. A goodu builder is lookng after ‘the ground plan, certain that this care will se- cure stability for the upper stories of the struc- ture. The first object is, to be sure, to produce a mystifying series of crimes for the sake of the subsequent detective skill, and a thriller of ad- venture. You will agree, I'm sure, that this ob- ject has been gained. Certalmly the last mo- ment, the climax of the to-do, is a sensation. A surprise so complete as to send one rather dazed reader pack to find the point at which the real criminal began to show any faint symp- tom, even, of the malady that was taking pos- session of him. That is looked upon, I'm told, The un- derlying idea of the invention is to make clear the element of chance that enters, not only into the criminal act itself, but that takes charge as well of much of the subsequent course of events —shielding the criminal, turning suspicion upon the most innocent, diverting the forces of the law into wrong channels and so on. Though lavish with her stock of crimes, Mrs. Rinehart, the careful manager, holds to a nar- row and seemingly open field of operations. Had she been extravagant in both—well, but she wouldn’t have been. So a single family serves the purpose—one family with its outlying in- laws and household staff of servants. People of more than the average intelligence and standing. Again, going to the bottom of things, this author makes money, an unfair last will and testament, the root of the matter. Very simple, very plausible, very well controlled—very . 'What more can the detective-story “addict” ask? AORWM«mmwMob- Jective is sensation, recoll and shock. And, in the main, it misses its mark by reason of loose workmanship and an absence of the sav- ing grace of sensibility on the part of the au- thor. Motive for the crime is too trivial for entertainment, save by lunatic or moron. Plans for carrying it out, for concealing the victim, for covering the tracks of this malefactor are of the jig-saw puzzle type, bearing not even a faint resemblance to any human foresight of procedure. There is the small-town pattern of outlook in the general setting of the crime, in its handling by the community at large, in the thin bucolic humers that gape and comment upon the grizzly affair. To be sure, there is a deal of slack work offered as detective story entertainment. This may be due, in part, to the fact that crime fictionists feel excused from real effort because of the generally avid interest in any sort of human errancy. And in a de- gree this is true. But, on the other hand, there is, once in a long while, a carefully imagined crime story which is a genuinely reconstructed crime in motive, in method, in pursuit, in de- tection and logical outcome. Not many of these. “The Murder” does not belong, in the judgment of eareful readers, to this small class of skillfully projected stories c€ crime. RECLAMATION: A Novel. By Edward T. Glover. Philadelphia. Dorrance & Co. Tnmmammnt project. Brings to mind the picture of some arid expanse of desert which has thirsted itself to death and utter unfruitfulness—unless, maybe, nhuthntmnmmfinyanhedlmd to serve its need, to restore to it & fecund and useful life. In one sense this is that kind of story—save that here is a man who, nearly mm.hn-mlnntemolm and reclaiming. It is the story of a young doc- tor, promising, successful. Then comes the moment of trial, with Rs defeat and the sequence uhnunthtm_mthewmmt o(themvelthhh,lnmmy.ustudyo(me ““So Wags the WOl‘ld”——B_y Will Rogers (3 Treasury in the way of ap- Then the more we can advertise T gg‘zsgg g ; 3§§§EE Hm ! i (Copyright, 1930.) psychology of habit—its unimportant start, its repetition and recurrence, its growth, finally, to the complete domination of its victim, This habit is that of drink—of making a drunkard out of a man. Rather hard reading. For Mr, Glover has created a likable and intelligent fellow, who is coming on in his profession very gratifyingly to all of us and to himself. We like him. Then comes trouble, a shock of dis- appointment to him. And he goes under—not in a minute, but completely at last. You are certain at this point to blame him, to call him a sentimentalist, to deny him nerve, to discount his earlier promise. Well, he is a sentimentalist, That’s nothing new. He is romantic in his dreams of love and youth and union. Many are. That, really, is not the point. The point is the course of this man under the new conviction that life holds noth- ing at all for him. Here is where the hard reading begins. He is very real. He is very near. Following along, one instinctively puts out a hand to keep him from this door or that one, where he is sure to drink up the place. A most communicable matter, wherein the reader takes an involuntary part about once a minute, Some of the Story makes its gloomy way in Cuba, but it does not brighten there. That comes later. A romantic novelist, who has written here in the motif of love, crossed, and who, still romantic, brings a climax to his psychological study by way of the ultimate requitement of that first adventure in young love. One wonders if the romance, as such, is not in the nature of a veneer. Wonders if the writer’s true concern is not with the intensive and trained study of the human mind under the stress of desire and the ultimate formation of an almost inexorable habit. Whether this second “wonder” be right or wrong, it is with that part of the matter that the deep interest of readers is sure to rest in a most anxious and personally perturbed state of mind, in an actually partaking share in the tragic course of his human experience. Books Received MY FRIEND THE BLACK BASS; With Strate tegy, Mechanics and Fair Play. By Harry B, Hawes, United States Senator. New York: New York: Payson & Clarke. THE NEW WORLD OF PHYSICAL DIS- COVERY. By Floyd L. Darrow, author of “The Story of Chemistry,” etc. Illus- trated. New York: Bobbs-Merrill Co. PFIFTH AVENUE; Twenty-eight X-rays of a Street. By Fred Rothermel. Illustrated by the author. New York: Harcourt, Brace. PRACTICAL LETTERING; Modern and For- eign. By Samuel Welo. Chicago: Frederick J. Drake. 5 THE AMERICAN RHYTHM; Studies and Re- expressions of Amerindian Songs. New and enlarged edition. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, BIRDS FLY SOUTH. By Ethel Hueston, au- thor of “The People of This Town,” etc. Indianapolis: Bobbs-Merrill. LORETTO; Sketches of a German War Vol- unteer. By Max Heinz. Translated by Charles Ashleigh. New York: Horace Live eright. Harcourt, Brace. .Breah'ng Out. “What's the lump on the front of your carp® “Oh, the radiator just had a boil.” Adwvice. “Advice to the lean—Don't eat fast.’ Adviee to the fat—'Don’t eat, fast.’” New Murder Mystery Novel by a Popular Washington Writer WMARKEp By NATALIE SUMNER LINCOLN In the hand of a murdered man is found a marriage license marked “cancelled.” With this beginning Miss _ Lincoln writes one of her most tightly-woven, briskly- paced stovies. $2.00. At _All Booksellers, or D. APPLETON and COMPANY Publishers 38 West 32nd St. New York