Evening Star Newspaper, January 4, 1942, Page 23

A-22 BOOKS. Survey of Year’s Books Spotlights Great Novels Mikhail Sholokov’s Story of River Don Is Ranked First Among Works of Fiction By Mary-Carter Roberts. For the sake of her reputation as a ruthlessly keen observer from whom nothing can be hidden, the reviewer will open this summing-up of the books of last year by saying that, quantitatively, works on the war had a great edge. Then, having put herself on record, she will turn to the field of the novel, for that is still the field most people care about, be the publishing statistics what they mey. There were a few great novels in 1941. The foremost of these would be. in the reviewer's opinion, “The Don Flows Home to the Sea,” a trans- lation from the Russian of Mikhail Sholokhov. It is & work which is simple in theme and enormous in plan; it undertakes to show how war affected a countryside and its population—just that. For its demonstra- tion, it takes the country of the River Don, which was the home of one of the most censervative groups of all Russia—the Cossacks. On these peasant-fighters, whose collective life had been established for centuries, the new collectivism of the revolution was imposed by violence. The Cossacks reacted in a series of revolts, each weaker than the preceding one, until virtually all the strong members of the group were wiped out. The greatness of the novel lies in the rolling panoramic method of its development, the completeness with which it covers every aspect of the community affected and the vivid but dispassionate showing of the char- acteristics of the leaders of both sides. It is a sequel to “And Quiet Flows the Don,” which came out six years ago, and it carries on the “Tolstoyan” heritage which critics almost unanimousiy discerned in the earlier book. Effect Is One of Immensity. Another novel, also a translation, which is of huge scope and masterly execution. is “The World of the Thibaults.” by Roger Martin du Gard, the winner of the 1938 Nobel Novel Prize. It, too, is a study of social change but of change carried out naturally. Its demonstration ground is a single French family examined over three generations. At the turn of the century, the Thibaults are shown as a conservative, rich, bourgeois tribe. By the end of World War I, the sole surviving member is a revolutionary socialist. The author plainly holds that the trend of the future is toward socialism, but his book is not doctrinnaire. It is an objective portrayal. Its effect. like that of Sholokhov's work, is one of immensity. The whole of French society is reflected in the picture of the Thibault clan. War fiction, so far, has been noticeable almost exclusively for its quantity, but at least one excellent novel of the type has appeared—“This Above All” by Eric Knight. It is an attempt to set forth the point of view of the young Englishman who, after serving his country through the | fighting in France, decides that the corruption, stupidity and injustice of the English government is unworthy of his further support and purposes forthwith to desert from the army. Primarily, this book is a love story, and its great beauty derives from its hapless pair of lovers—the young man has a sweetheart who sees the war question from precisely the point of | view which he hates, that of old-school-tie idealism. Both are true to themselves and, since, in the light of facts, the young man's rebellion cannot be made to triumph. he is removed at the end by the deus ex machina in the convenient form of an air raid. Though this is wholly a | war novel, it seems likely to become a lasting piece of English literature. | Account of Young Man's Wandering. Frederic Prokosch, who, though he has been a long time developing, | still seems to be worth watching, also contributed a notable novel to the | year’s output—-The Skies of Europe.” Like “The Asiatics.” it is an account of a young man's wandering. From one country of pre-war Europe to another a somewhat formless hero drifts, with nothing much happening THE SUNDAY STAR, WASHINGTON, D. C, JANUARY 4, 1942. L CARL VON DOREN, “Secret History of the American Revolution.” —Wide World Photo. e H. L. MENCKEN, “Newspaper Days.” —A. P. Photo. Best Sellers (Compiled from information obtained in Washington by The Star and in New York, Boston, Chicago and San Francisco by the North American Newspaper Alliance.) and no memorable characters being introduced, but with a sense of im- pending doom steadily accumulating. Mr. Prokosch's vision of the world is essentially Teutonic; he revels in an atmosphere of gotterdammerung, | and pre-war Europe provided him with a splendid sctting for this par- ticular talent. The drive of his imagination and the poetic beauty of his style make him, however, unique among contemporary American novelists. John Cowper Powys, always interesting,.came out last summer with a huge historical novel on the life of Owen Glendower, a thing which | certainly cannot be passed by. Containing much bad writing, it is never- theless a great work. Its imaginative force is unforgettable, and the con- FICTION. The Keys of the Kingdom, by A. J. Cronin (Little, Brown). The Sun Is My Undoing, by Marguerite Steen (Viking) All That Glitters, by Frances Parkinson Keves (Messner) The Strange Woman, by Ben Ames Williams (Houghton, Mifflin). Saratoga Trunk, by Edna viction of the thing cannot be denied. Other novels which deserve mention in the vear's roll of honor are “The Battlers,” by Kylie Tennant, a Mark Twainish picaresque on the vagrant unemployed of Australia: “Delilah,” by Marcus Goodrich, one of the best sea stories in many vears: “Between Two Worlds,” by Upton | Sinclair, a somewhat slack continuance of the story of Europe’s u)clnll malaise begun in “World's End”; “The Keys of the Kingdom,” by A. J.| Cronin, a work on the Roman Catholic priesthood which suggests that the | idealist is not always appreciated here below; “The Transposed Heads.” by | Thomas Mann, & light ironical comedy on the impossibility of human happiness, told in terms of a supposed East Indian legend; “Reflections in | a Golden Eve.” by Carson McCullers, a suave and terrible study of the | failure of physical intimacy to establish spiritual communication between | human beings; “Between the Acts,” by the late Virginia Woolf. a novelette | designed to show that, within a group, there is a certain continuous per- sonality which all members of the group share and reflect back at one another: “A Leaf in the Storm,” by Lin Yutang, a story of China at war; “Broad and Alien Is the World,” by a young Peruvian writer, Ciro Alegria, a study of the injustice visited on the poor Andean Indians by their wealthy Wwhite neighbors, the landowners; “City of Illusion,” by Vardis Fisher, a thumping tale of Virginia City in its heyday, told in terms of the life of Eilly Bowers, the legendary seeress of the place; “Men Work- ing.” by John Faulkner, brother of William, a study of sharecroppers on W. P. A, remarkable in being completely unsentimental and devoid of | an axe to grind; and, finally, that gorgeous and irresponsibly romantic | ssing in the slave trade, “The Sun Is My Undoing.” by | —about 10 pounds of pure story without a word of | much, then, for the novel. | Biography That Isn't a Biography. Looking at biograohy for the past vear, but for one circumstance, one would say that the launching out of Aldous Huxley in that field was the great event. That circumstance is that Mr. Huxley's biographical ven‘ure turns out to be hardly a biography at all. Titled “Grey Emi- nence.” it is the story of Father Joseph of Paris, the Capuchin friar who guiced Cardinal Richelieu in his political career, but Mr. Huxley has simply used his subject as a text for a dissertation on the practical value of religious mysticism as a means of introducing sanity into human ffairs. It is a profound, wise and beautiful work which seems hardly to have been read at all. and which the reviewer recommends with all the seriousness of which she is capable. [ Under the head of biography in its more commonly accepted sense, ! | ( waste in it, Ferber (Doubleday. Doran). NON-FICTION. Berlin Diary, by William L. Shirer (Knopf). Washington Waltz, by Helen Lombard (Knopf). Reading I've Liked, by Clifton Fadiman (Simon & Schuster). Inside Latin America, by John Gunther (Harper). Reveille in Washington, Margaret Leech (Harper). by installed and ready to go. His JOSEPH E. DAVIES, ~Mission to Moscow.™ —Harris-Ewing Photo. MARQUIS JAMES, “Alfred I. du Pont” MARGARET LEECH, “Reveille in Washington.” 'Public Library Suggests ‘Books for Homemakers | By Dorothy J. Watkins, Readers' Adviser. Publie Library. In the new year homemakers will | be faced with the necessity of mak- |ing readjustments to maintain a home that continues to supply shel- ter, comfort, satisfaction and suffi- | cient food in times when prices soar | “Sewing for the Home: How to Make | Fabric Furnishings in a Professional Way" and in “Popular Home Decora- tion,” by Mary D. Gillies, associate editor of a national magazine for women, who answers hundreds of questions asked by homemakers. Alvin H. Kaplan's “You Can Fix It” and A. Frederick Collins’ “Keep- | “American impressions,” the palm journey. however, was made before and social and spiritual character, the war began. Events indicate that | are put to test. Recent books to aid his prognostications are not likely | the homemaker may be borrowed to be fulfilled. | from the Public Library, Eighth and Palm to Hindu. K}:lreev.s l:w s;Id its branches. omemakers will find practical As for travelers who came vismn“he]p in S. Agnes Donham'sl‘,‘spend— to our shores and duly wrote their |jng the Family Income.” Neva H. Radell's “Accounting for the Individ- | ual and Family” considers the budget | problems not only of the family, but of the bachelor and the professional woman, each managing & home alone, “Furniture for the Amateur Crafts- man,” by Earl Harmes, is a handbook on the whole process of furniture- making. from the selection of woods to the application of the finish. The amateur home decorator may find expert help in Mary B. Picken's ing Your Home in Repair” are two | handy volumes for the man of mod- erate means, especially noy, when skilled mechanics for odd jobs are not readily available. “Food Values at a Glance and How to Plan a Healthy Diet,” by Violet G. Plimmer, is a valuable aid to the feeder of the family made up of sev- eral ages with varying height and girth. There is a newly revised edi- tion of the old stand-by, “The Bo: ton Cooking School Cook Book.” by Fannie M. Farmer. Variety for the epicure and simple fare for the less exacting are offered in the books by Cora, Rose and Bob Brown, “The Vegetable Cook Book From Trowel to Table,” “Fish and Sea Food Cook Book.” and John H. Breland’s “Book of 52 Popular Souns.” the vear easily goes to Krish- nalal Shridharani, a young Hindu student whose “My {ndia, My America” is a charming thing. Mr. Shridharani, a distinguished poet in his own language, writes a first- rate colloquial American patois and seems likely to fulfill among us for India the same role of good-will salesman which Lin Yutang has taken so admirably for China. * It is to a traveler who was not looking for political implications, | however, that the credit for the year’s most utterly absorbing travel book must go, and that is Gontran de Poncins, a young Frenchman of of Within the Sound of These Waves By William H. Chickering. Harcourt, Brace & Co., New York. LOUIS FISCHER, “Men and Politics.” JAWAHARLAL NEHRU, “Toward Freedom.” —Wide World Photo. Brief Reviews ‘WAR BOOKS. Air Base, by Boone T. Guyton (Whittlesey)—A picture of the or- | dinary life in an air training sta- | tion. * Popularly presented. We Must Save the Republic, by Stephen A. Day (Shaw)—the Repre- | sentative-at-large from Illinois | writes in favor of keeping America | at peace—a commendable purpose, certainly, but nullified by the Japa- nese action of Deceinber 7. Armies on Wheels, by S. L. A. Marshall (Morrow)—A study of the campaigns since Dunkirk with the | purpose of examining mechanized | war and its strategy. Recommen- dations as to our own defense | plans, present and future. | Sea Power, by Capt. Russell | Grenfell (Doubleday, Doran)—A | book by a British naval officer | which states that England should | | keep out of Europe's continental | | wars, that a German-dominated | Europe would not necessarily be a threat to the British Empire and that it is unthinkable that the British should maintain that they are “defending American vital se- | curity.” - Bomber Command (Doubleday, | Doran)—The British Air Ministry’s | statement of the bombing offensive | against the Axis powers. Illustrat- BOOKS. Joseph E. Davies Reports On His Work in Russia Book by Former American Ambassador Makes Many Interesting Disclosures Mission to Moscow By Joseph E. Davies. Simon & Schuster, New York. President Roosevelt, in 1937, had a disarmament plan providing simply that no nation should manufacture armaments heavier than a man could carry on his shoulders, and he instructed his then Ambassador to Soviet Russia, Joseph E. Davies, to sound out the European governments on this proposa). Nothing came of it. ‘This disclosure is among the many in Mr. Davies’ eminently readable “Mission to Moscow.” The timeliness of the volume is attested by the extraordinary permission of the State Department for immediate publica- tion of “strictly confidential” dispatches years before they are printed in stodgy departmental reports. Mr. Davies is & rich man, and his- wife, the former Marjorie Post Hutton, & very richr woman. The appointment, in 1936, of this individ- ualistic lawyer and businessman to the American ambassadorship to Rus- sia caused considerable raising of Washington eyebrows, but in the light of developments, it is hard to conceive how Persident Roosevelt could have made a better selection. Retained Their Individualistic Convictions. Ambassador and Mrs. Davies were a tremendous success in Moscow, perhaps the most difficult American diplomatic post, with the possible exception of Berlin. Capitalistic to the core, they went to Russia with open minds and a determination to get the facts about the great so- cialistic experiment. They returned reinforceq in their individualistic convictions, but with a profound love for the Rllssian people and respect for what had been accomplished in a few short years. In addition to the official reports, the book contains numerous ex- cerpts from personal letters, the Ambassador’s journal and his personal diary. The chronological form selected by Mr. Davies allows great flexi- bility in the handling of diverse materials, and many quotations show how right was Maxim Litvinov, now the Russian Ambassador to this country, in his appraisal of world affairs when the growing menace of :fltl&flsm was feeding on the appeasement policies of Great Britain and ‘ance. Mr. Davies studied Soviet officials and Soviet life as a skilled lawyer studies his rival's case. Consequently, he was able to warn the State Department of the possibility of a German-Russian pact, and to report in detail on Soviet industry and armament. He was awarded the unusual privilege of & two-and-a-half hour conference with Stalin. In a letter to his daughter, he gives this intimate picture of the ruler of the Russians: “He greeted me cordially with a smile, and with great simplicity, but also with a real dignity. He gives the impression of a strong mind which is composed and wise. His brown eye is exceedingly kind and gentle, A child would like to sit on his lap, and & dog would sidle up to him. Personslity Is Opposite of Expectations. “It is difficult to associate his personality and this impression of kind« | ness and gentle simplicity with what has occurred here in connection with these purges and shootings of Red Army generals, and so forth. ¢ * ¢ “He has a sly humor. He has a very great mentality. It is sharp and shrewd, and, above all things else, wise, at least so it would appear to me. If you can picture a personality that is exactly opposite to what the most rabid anti-Stalinist anywhere could conceive, then you might picture this man. The conditions that I know exist here and his personality are just as far apart as the poles. The explanation, of course, may be found in the fact that men will do for religion or for a cause things that they would never do otherwise. It is the fanaticism of the world that has brought the greatest cruelties.” By the time of this interview, Mr. Davies had completed his survey of European Russia. Before that, as a trial lawyer, he had followed with interest the many purge trials. As to the purges, he is convinced that most of the men, including the generals such as Tukhachevsky, chief of staff of the Red Army, were guilty of plotting with Germany and Japan against their home land. From Moscow, Mr. Davies was transferred to Brussels as Ambassador to the Belgians. This is a less interesting part of the book, ard. obviously, some of the diplomatic correspondence and notes are too secret for pub- lication at this time. The diary is brought up to October 28, 1941, and the last heading is “Will Stalin Quit?” Mr. Davies answers his own ques- tion by saying: ‘The real question which is vital now is: ‘Will we force Stalin to make peace with Hitler again?’ We, or rather the European democracies, forced Stalin into Hitler’s arms in August of 1939. We—that is to say, England and America—could force Stalin into Hitler's arms again if Stalin were to believe that we were ready to let him down, use the Soviet Army merely as a cat’s paw and double-cross him in the way Chamberlain and Daladier did before and after Munich and up to the eve of Armageddon. Russians Will Not Tolerate Appeasement. “Stalin is a realist. Both he and the Russian people know that this is an ancient 400-year-old struggle of Teuton vs. Slav, and they know what fate has befallen their Slavic brethren in Czecho-Slovakia, Yugoslavia and Poland at the hands of Hitler's Nazis. Neither Stalin nor the Russian people, now aflame with the sacrifical spirit of Russian nationalism and fighting a desperate war in defense of their homes and mother Russia | ed with photographs. Interesting. | against Nazi invasion, would tolerate any appeasement in the Kremlin. * * * “We Made a Mistake,” by Lucien “If we would eliminate any possibility of another Russo-German Zacharoff (Appleton-Century)—A | treaty or a separate Russo-German peace * * * we must satisfy the Soviet study of the German campaign | Union that we practice what we preach as to the right of nations to self- against Russia and an analysis of | determination. This means that, during and after the war, we * * * why tactics used successfully else-|gaccord to them the right to decide what kind of government they want where have failed in that War. In- | for themselves. By so doing, We can * * * make clear our belief that teresting. | the American and Russian people can live as friends in a world devoted What the Citizen Should Know | {5 peace” About the Marines, by Capt. John| For the reader who knows little or nothing about Soviet Russia, this H. Craige (Norton)—History and or- | pook will serve as an excellent primer of present-day Russian affairs. Mr. ganization of the famous corps. In- pavies apparently knew little of the country en his arrival, and his reports formative. - and letters assumed that others were similarly placed. He's in the Army Now, by Capt. RAYMOND BRANDT. William H. Baumer, jr. (McBride)— Shol o S T G Nostradamus on Napoleon and Hitler and the Present Crisis W By Stewart Robb. Charles Scribner's Sons, New York. War Wings, by David C. Cooke (McBride)—An account in text and Of all the books on Nostradamus which the reviewer has read since photographs of the fighting planes | the outbreak of war in Europe brought the 16th century prophet back to of the democracies. Presupposes & the public attention, this one seems to make the most sense. Its author ‘knowledge of airplane structure. proceeds on the ground that Nostradamus was a true prophet, and that Are You Fit te Be a Pilot? by Er- his predictions are genuine foretellings of specific future events and not, min L. Ray, M. D, ang Stanley | as many critics have heid, obscure statements deliberately put in such Washburn (Funk)—Tests which you | ambiguous form that they can be interpreted to fit almost any happen- Mr. Chickering, in his first book, has found a new subject for a It is a detailed but well balanced account of the can take at home determining if | ing. But, in maintaining this contention, Mr. Robb does not deny that the foliowing works would seem to be among the year’s best: “Alfred I.| 1o 1 Mincobe’ tho capped a life of du Pont,” by Marquis Jam “Hernan Cortez,” by Salvador de Madariaga: | ¢ ondering by going off to King “Catharine of Aragon,” by Garrett Mattingly; “Barrie: The Story °”;I‘ulinm‘s Land and spending a year J. M. B.” by Denis Mackail; “Richard Burton’s Wife,” by Jean Burton: ', "o "pequimo village. “Kabloona” | “The Admirable Trumpeter,” by Thomas Robson and M. A. Werner, and | i’ 1o work which resulted, written #America’s Last King,” by Manfred S. Guttmacher. Autobiography seems to divide itself into two heads—works which in collaboration with Lewis Galan- tiere. To form an idea of the book, popular historical work. development of Hawaii from the time the first Polynesians came to its shores. Although the author apparently has intended his book to be primarily a factual history, the account leaves out none of the romance and glamour, drama and pageantry that are invariably associated with the | “magic” islands. The early history of Hawaii is based upon legends and incomplete have a political ax to grind and works which are played straight. In the | you must imagine the reactions of & | gheervations, and Mr. Chickering here uses opportunity to weave & nar- former class the most important vo! lume is the distinguished one by |cultivated Latin to squalid Esquimo | rative in which he appears to have captured the essence of the Hawaiian Jawaharlal Nehru, India’s leader in the independence movement, “Toward | primitivism. The effect is not &' qpirit More like & novel than a history at this point, the story gives & Freedom.” has written a volume of political memoirs, less polished than Mr. Nehru’s, | but possibly of great value to future historians, “Men and Politics.” “Out of the Night,” the confessions of the Communist spy, Jan Valtin, though vulgar and sensational, also must be mentioned. ‘Unpolitical memoirs that have been worth reading are “Newspaper Days.” by H. L. Mencken; “Exit Laughing,” by Irvin S. Cobb, and “An- other Part of the Forest,” by G. B. Stern. History Based on “Secret Papers.” In the field of history, Carl Van Doren’s “Secret History of the Amer- fean Revolution” deserves emphatic honorable mention. Based on the hitherto unpublicized “secret papers of Sir Henry Clinton,” it uncovers the efforts made by the British to crush the revolt of the American Colo- | nies by bribery. It reveals astonishing attempts on the honot of such | patriots as Robert Morris and Gen. Putnam. | | It also sets forth, for the | first time in complete detail, the story of Benedict Arnold’s treason, making | it clear that recent efforts to extenuate the classic traitor have been waste | motion. It is an authoritative and solidly factual work, casting genuinely. new light on America’s struggle for independence. Contrasting with Mr. Van Doren's highly orthodox findings, how- | ever, is Bernhard Knollenberg'’s “Washington and the Revolution,” a work | designed to prove that our first national hero has been spared much needed | criticism by past historians at the expense of Gens. Gates and Green and Col. Conway of the famous “cabal.” It undertakes to show that Wash- ington was not a good general and that he inclined to cast the blame for his own failures unjustly on the shoulders of his subordinates. Mr. Knollenberg builds up his case in an interesting manner. The Civil War, as it affected the city of Washington, is picturesquely and finely described in “Reveille in Washington,” by Margaret Leech. A somewhat more modern chapter in our country’s history, but one to which no one can deny importance, has been written by Harnett T. Kane under the title “Louisiana Hayride.” It tells the story of the Long regime, not only to the kiliing of the Kingfish, but on to the bitter end of the business in the prosecutions of Huey’s several successors. It is a gaudy thing, and the author was well equipped to write it. Traveling Authors Observe Political Conditions. Works of travel seem to fall into the heads which divide works of biography—we have the traveler who travels to observe political conditions and the one who does it for fun. This is particularly noticeable in the case of books on thé Latin American countries, whither a great many writing men and women have lately gone to learn, if that might be, the “extent of Axis penetration.” The greatest name among these roaming observers is, of ccurse, John Gunther, who has now added an “Inside Latin America” to his earlier “inside” volumes, a worthy successor and quite as readable. Other authors who have the right to speak with authority on Latin American affairs and who have done so recentlv zre Carleton Beals, with his “Pan America,” and Hubert Herring, with itis “Good Neighbors.” Mr. Beals attacks all our plans for hemisphere s y to date and offers, instead, a scheme of his own which rests largely on planned commereial relations which shall furnish us with indispensable raw materials and—so he says. at least—redound ‘to the prosperity of all peoples concerned. Mr. Herring writes more from the cultural angle and gets into his vol- ume more information than any other writer on the subject to date, unless it be Mr. Gunther. The production of books on America to the south has been simply prodigious during the past 12 months, but, for the most part, the works are obvious jobs done to order and create the suspicion, at least, of having been composed with liberal reference to ehamber of commerce handouts, A traveler who went into the once Dark Continent to look at politics (Axis penetration) there was the redoubtable Negley Farson. and an fmmensely entertaining but somewhat discouraging book resulted, “Be- ind Gods' Back.” Mr. Farson says he found the Axis pretty well \ L out-of-the-way places. And so one comes at last to books on the war. Out of the tremendous list, the reviewer offers these as likely to provide present enlighten- ment or future guidance: “Blood, Sweat and Tears” by Winston Falcon,” by Rebecca West; “My New Order.” the collected speeches by Hanson W. Baldwin; “German: Jekyll and Hyde,” by Sebastian Haffner; “Berlin Diary,” by William L. Shirer; “The Long Week End,” by Robert Graves and Alan Hodge; “America Prepares for Tomorrow,” by Willlam Dow Boutwell and others; “Digging for Mrs. Miller,” by John Strachey; “Spurs on the Boot,” by Thomas E. Morgan; “War and Diplomacy in Eastern Asia,” by Claude E. Buss; “Ambassador Dodd’s | Diary,” “A Thousand Shall Fall,” by Hans Habe, and “Scum of the Earth,” by Arthur Koestler, Only a Sampling. This list attempts to draw some- thing from every common category of war work—from those which out- line the international situation, those which deal in diplomatic his- tory, those which present popular- ized views of events and personal- ities, those which cover the plight of refugees and those which show the English people meeting the war in the air. It is only a sampling. The situation changes too rapidly to make s more lengthy choice seem profitable. One more volume the reviewer wishes to mention—“Let Us Now Praise Famous Men,” by James Agee and Walker Evans. She will put this under the head of social eon- science. It is a description of life among poor Southern sharecroppers, and it explains why everything else ‘which has been written on the sub- ject to date has seemed done to order. It is a revolt against spying on the unfortunate for the sake of getting material for articles, and it coffers a defense of the poor which is 50 unscientific and so unorthodox as to rest its case on the tenets of good manners and Christianity. In- cidentally,) the reviewsr, compiling her lists, put the work down on a separate sheet under the head “Fine ‘Writing.” Louis Fischer, the erstwhile Communist sympathizer, also|common one, even in books about | romgntic setting to the idolatry of the natives, and cloaks their every conquest with the sort of religious halo that transforms the barbarisms | |/of King Arthur's Round Table into proper stories for children. falls back upon early written accounts of the period and the narrative | becomes more detailed and complex. | The story, after this, loses some of its glamor. During the latter part of Kamehameha's reign, a series of internal disturbances arose, resulting | Churchill; “Black Lamb and GTeY | cien from too many European fingers in the pie. With the introduction | ‘i of firearms, the history of Hawaii degenerates into a debacle as distressing as the medieval period in Europe. With the white man came venereal |of Adolf Hitler; “United We Stand,” | 4 o0 e and most of the vices of tme “civilized” world, and the his- | tory of Hawaii from then on becomes 50 shoddy s to be quite ordinary. | Mr. Chickering closes his account with the arrival of the first Christian missionaries. GEORGE 8. WELLS. | History of the United States | Food Administration (1917-1919) By William Clinton Mullendore. Palo Alto, Calif. . This official history of the Food Administration, completed by Mr. | Mullendore in 1921, has been published by the Hoover-Library on War, | Revolution and Peace and the Stanford University Press. With food production again & world-wide problem, the record of the organization through which the American people co-operated to provide essential supplies for the Allies in World War I, and to feed all Europe after the Armistice, takes on added significance. Especially interesting, in view of the current rise in the cost of living, are the sections on stabilization of food prices. Herbert Hoover, who returned from relief work in Europe to serve as food administrator, prepared the introduction for Mr. Mullendore‘;! book. C. Stanjord University Press, ALDOUS HUXLEY, “Grey Eminence.” FREDERIC PROKOSCH, “The Skies of Burope.” L As soon as he reaches Capt. Cook's discoveries, however, the author | you have physical qualifications for | flying. SELF-HELP. Making the Most of Yourself, by | | James E. West (Appleton-Century) | | —The chief Scout executive of | | America writes of the methods used | | by the Boy Scouts to develop char- | acter and health. Admirable. Golden Yesterdays By Margaret Deland. Harper | & Bros., New York. Mrs. Deland, in the early years of the century, used to write im- mensely serious problem novels. She was the kind of novelist who is “re- spected.” She was dignified, and she was devoted to the highest ideals | and the sternest moralities. She | was a good craftsman, too, and her | books hung together and contained | situations of real dramatic power. It is somewhat astonishing, there- | fore, to discover, reading this, her autobiography, that Mrs. Deland never thought of herself as primarily a writer at all. She was, she tells us, before anything else, a wife, and & dear little foolish, adoring, cling- ing-vine wife at that. From her books, one would expect her to have been the Literary Lady of the period, | awesome and unapproachable. But from her own statement, she was about as near to David Copperfield's Dora as a human being could be. The revelation is inevitably some- thing of a shock. Indeed, Mrs. Deland, writing the history of her life, tells of her au- thorship only incidentally. The story of her marriage takes up al- most the whole of her work. She describes the poverty of its early years and the gay struggles that she made toward housekeeping. She relates how she shocked her hus- band’s grave New England relatives with her carefree madcap ways, and is very merry about her determihed efforts to budget, and so on. But as for her writing—that was something quite accidental. Rhymes popped into her head, and she scrawled them down on brown wrapping paper. She never consciously planned her literary work; she just bubbled along, and lo—after a while, there was a masterpiece, and no one was more astonished than the little woman herself. Or so it seems to her, looking back today, anyway. the obscurity exists. It is there, he says, and by design is not for man "to know what lies before him; therefore the prophet has purposefully concealed his meanings. After the event has taken place, however, the veiled meaning becomes clear. The undertaking of this book is to prove that, for events now in the past, Nostradamus’ prophecies were so exact that they could not possibly have been accidental. They give dates, places and even names, says Mr. Robb. And he takes up the verses concerned with Napoleon to prove this at some length. Napoleon’s actual name occurs, he points out, in an anagram which has no more complicated a basis than the reversal of the first and second syllables. And so on through Napoleon’s whole career. Coming to the period of Hitler's ascendancy, Mr. Robb finds the prophet likewise calling the name, changing only a single letter. “Hister” is the form given in the verse, and “Hister” says Mr. Robb, was an old name of the Danube, the river of Austris, Hitler's country. What more natural than to make a play on this word to indicate the Fuhrer? In like fashion, the book carries through the past events of the present embroilment. The fall of France and of Greece, the resistance of Gen. De Gaulle—and many other happenings are discerned in the prophets work. But as to what is stlll to come, that remains in obscurity. It was not Nostradamus’ intention that we should understand him to that extent. If you accept the validity of prophecy at all, this is a book to engage your attention. If you do mot,-it is, of course, just some more week- minded nonsense. M.-C.R. Mr. Bunting: In Peace and War By Robert Greenwood. Bobbs-Merrill Co., Irdianapolis. When published in England this book appeared in two sections. The first, in which the second World War plays no part, was very popular. Its wide reading was justified, because Mr. Bunting is, perhaps, the most likeable character which has been created in recent years. Mr. Greenwood's hero is a mild little man of 62, the manager of the ironmongery department in London's best department store. Born ins poor Camden town tenement, he has achieved a certain suecess in life. He has a house in the country, & soft-spoken wife and three typically modern children, Occasionally he becomes irate and gesticulates somewhat ridic- ulously with his umbrella. Occasionally he purchases a bottle of Bonnie Prince Charlie whiskey. For the most part, however, he contents himself with “reasonable 'conomy” and “’gitimate business,” to use his own ab- breviated language. The sequel to the first novel, which was written this year, tells what to Mr. Bunting’s family under the stress of the present conflict. Perhaps a little tog hurriedly put together, i is alightly inferior to its predecessor. But it is nevertheless very good reading. One does not tire of the simple little problems and adventures of the everyday man as presented in this book. This fact must be attributed to the literary skill of Mr. Greenweod, whose published work hereby ap- pears in America for the first time. He exhibits in his writing & humor- ous humaneness that is almost Dickensian. ~ TEMPLE HOLLCROFT. Recent America < By Henry Bamford Parks. Thomas Y. Crowell Co., New York. The start of the 20th century found America in the grip of titanic forces. But few persons who were alive at the dawn of the century which has seen the average man’'s ways of life change more than it had changed before in a thousand years, which in its first four decades has seen two unparralleled world struggles, and which may give rise to new orders of society, could have had any intimation of what was to come. In the year 1900 this was the best of all possible worlds, and America the best of all possible countries. The mold of life seemed fixed. In the future, there would be only minor changes. Folks laughed at predictions of sueh things as airplanes, radios and even cheap automobiles. America There is a good deal of uncon- scious irony in the work, and one can say, without flattery, that it throws much lgnt on literary his- tory in America during the period of Mrs. Deland’s ascendancy. M-C.R. was the melting pot of races and religions. That was excellent, for nobody had any doubt of the alloy that would come from the melting pot. Yet in the year 1900 were the germs of all the changes that have taken place since—germs of the First World War, viruses of the Second World War. Mr. Parks, in his volume, tells the story of these forces and their development into the America of today. ‘THOMAS R. HENRY. \