Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1906-12-08
DRAMATIC OPINIONS AND ESSAYS. BY

G, Bernard Shaw, containing well q
word on the dramatic opinions ana es
saws by James Huneker. Voiuihes
and H. New York: Brentaho ;
For ten years past, with unprecedeh'eo
nertinacitv and destination, l have been
DINING into the public head th~t l an.
an extraordinarily witty, brilliant ana
clever man. That is now part OF the pup
lie opinion of England So Shaw wrote
In making his valedictory a dramatic
critic in May 1928. Whatever may have
been the Shavian purpose in presenting
such a personal estimate, no one rises to-
day to dispute it's truth Then fame had
not singled him out. and his vocferous,
stunning and startling epgrams were lis
tened to with amusement and increduhty
as the Spasmodic CALCULATIONS of pos
turer at the footlights. Now since the
plays his philosophy. his pith, his puns
have the weight of oracfes.
The two volumes of his dramatic criti-
cisms selected from the London Saturday
Review of that Incompatible period OF three
years from 80 to '9S are more than foot
notes to his dramatic creed. He has the
power to confer in criticism immortality
upon the most feeting farce. That these
comments once created left him temporarily
invaded is logical; they are the life essence
of personality His own plays are ammo.
tated in them and complete technique of
the drama constructed.
What is most impressive in this rebabi-
tation of dead dramas which live in his
criticism is not their mere Insecurity,
their modernty, their humor. but their
transcendent honesty.
James Huneker asserts, to meet the
charge of Shaw being a syndicate, pen,
not human, that he has seen the man. He
SAYS: Shaw like the great god Pan, is
alive Surely the smile is apt in more
particulars than immortality, than present
existence. Not Pan himse4I was less CO.
creed by conditions and creeds than Shaw,
and these volumes OF his spontaneous PIP
ariS lolb1
note of his independence and sincerity
Moss New York: Henry Holt < Co.
Washington: Ballantynes.
The old theory that the cultivation of the
critical faculty destroys the creative in
stinct in literature is again disproved. This
time by Miss Mary Moss. whose careful
work in book-reviewing in the Atlantic
and elsewhere has not prevented her from
writing novel that is at once spontaneous
and thoughtful. 1t is an added gift that it
is fun of the most delightful humor. The
hero of the story, the poet, Felix Gwynne,
by the law of opposites, falls in love with
the beautiful daughter of conventional
and self-Satisfed race. His wider vision of
the world battles with her childish mar
rowness, his lawlessness-whichi is nothing
but the overflow of a sensitive AMI gener-
Gus nature-with her Puritancal conscience
The result is, of course, faction and an
approach to ruin. The solution, which is
one of the eternal compromises of life is
not allowed until the dangers of Felix's
attitude are made clear we'll as the
limitations of Adelaide's
Felix is a fine study of particularly win
ming representative of the artistic tempera-
ment. He is to be added to the gallery
wherein are already sequestred Barrie Tom
mic and Harvey O'Higgins Don Abrams.
The series of Observation-Disclosures would
be the better word-in which he figures are
fantastic and yet convincing. The rest of
the characters are amusing or pathetic, and
types as they are. they are yet very real
Old Mrs Lawrence is particularly fine in
her sane and sophisticated philosophy
BY Molly Elliot Seawen, author of
The Fortunes of Fiji With Illus
trations by Clarence F. Underwood
Indianapolis The Bobbs- Merrill Com
pany.
This is an attractive holiday book in
which Handsome Is as Handsome Does
and Beauty Is Only Skin-deep' might be
appropriate subheadings. The romance is
cast in Georgian England, and the heroes
are OF the race of sturdy seamen who won
with Nelson at Trafalgar Miss SeaWell
tells the story of their lady loves and the
varying fortunes that attended them with
grace and charm.
THE FLOCK. By Mary Austin author of
The Land of Little Rain" Illustrated
n.
York: Houghton, Mifflin & Co.
y quite unusual book of rare qualities is
given to the holiday world in THE Flock"
From the days when the shepherds watch
ed their hocks by night to our own time
a certain romance attaches to the patient
men who. alone under the stars are looked
to by their helpless charges In this case
II is the great California herds which she
celebrates and the men who herd them
While the history of the grazing industry
ana the technicallties of sheep culture have
been matters for study to the auhtor il is
the humors as well as the pathos and the
hardshps of the life that she celebrates
Only to the true artist would the posi-
bllitles of the theme be apparent and sure
ly only by an artist would they have been
so realized. The shifting scenes of shear
ing, the long trail" the lambing season
with its own particular manifestation of
the great mother-instinct-Mary Austin
touches them all with an indefinable charm
She shows to us the idiosyncracies of the
Mexican, French or Indian herders those
characteristics in which the herder is diff
ferent from every other man. She makes
us feel how one they and we are with the
larger life of nature.
BETTERNENT, INDIVIDUAL. SOCIAL
AND INDUSTRIAL; or, Highest Eff
cheney Through the Golden Rules of
Right Nutrition: Welfare Work and the
Higher Industrial Developments. BY E.
Wake Cook. New York: Frederick A.
Stokes Company.
Mr.. Cook is an enthusiast. and in speak
ling of Welfare Work shows the remark
able advance that has been made in i'm
proving factory conditions in the last few
years His book Is full of the suggestions
of practical organizers. not theorists The
chapters on nutrition are entertaining and
convincing. What he has to say of ''Hervic
Cure or Mature Cure" will also be found
timely and authoritative.
THE LAND OF ENCHANTMENT-Fro
Pixies Peak to the Pacific. BY Lillian
Whiting, author of The Florence of
Landor' With illustrations from pho
tographs Boston: Little Brown & Co
The scenic marves of the great south
west, with the mystery of the Grand Can
yon, the Petrified Forest and the Garden of
the Gods and all its remnants of prehis-
toric civilization, are here depicted with
skill and appreciation. The scope of the
book is shown in the chapter headings as
follows: With Western Skies and Sunsets
Denver the Beautiful The Picturesque Re-
gion of Pixies Peak, Summer Wanderngs
in Colorado, The Colorado Pioneers, The
Surprises of New Mexico, The Story of