The sun. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1916-1920, 1919-06-29
Java Head" Again
By GEORGE GORDON.

hears a phrase only 10 repeat it malaprO-
pos and TO no purpose, 'very drolP-l
quote from Chicago rviewer's review of
my review of Mr.. Barrett III. Clark's re-
view of Sir James Barrie's The Admir-
able Crichton. l take it that | am too
loud in the expression of my own Opin-
ions, too short with the opinions of any
other-and in especial (perhaps) with the
opinions Of Mr.. Burton Rascoe, the
Chicago reviewer above referred TO.
L am apparently getting into deep
water. | am, at any rate, completely at
sea concerning lara Head, Mr.. Joseph
Hergesheimer's latest novel. But l shall
not be too forward with my own opinion.
Mr. .IIergesheimcr himself believes lara
Head TO be the best Of his books to date.
And it is undoubtedly fine, though the
least bit disappointing. The Lay anthony
was the most intriguing first novel Of our
generation. The Three Black PennyS,
showing real advance in style and tech
nique, went far 10 fulfill the promise of
the earlier volume. lara Head comes as
something of an anti-climaX. The scene
is laid i'll Salem during the eighteen ffties,
when that New England city was a port
of some Importance, rich with the COM
merce of the fast growing American mer-
chant marine. Mr.. Hergcsheimer read
some fifteen hundred volumes in prepare
tion for his writing--he read too much.
sary nautical phrases; it is heavy with
reference TO this voyage and that about
the southern seas. Mr.. Hergesheimer
seems to be showing off an Improbable
and easy learning. Mr.. Hergesheimer, to
the dismay Of his admirers, is instructing
us with the details Of long, past life.
His story wanders forlornly through ex-
otic inconsequenoes 10 simple and proper
conclusion. His characters are only half
realized; they range about the room with
no more life than cut flowers in vase
upon the mantel; they are not complex,
vivid with the reality of actual existence,
but simple as death or the charm of
opium. Taou Yuen, the Manchu wife of
Gerritt Ammidon, glorious in silks and
satins, escapes from between the lines as
inscrutable as the painted mask upon her
face; she has no greater hold upon the
emotions than "the pierced stone brace
lets hung about her delicate wrists" And
Roger Brevard, bachelor of forty, seems
to have no reason for being-his love for
Sidsall Gerrits niece, is an apparent
sfterthought-and why drag in lay figures
if they are not to stand out from the page
with an appeal and purpose of their Ownf
All this reads like no faint damning
with praise, but the wholesale condemna-
ton Of disgust. 1t is neither. So far as
know Mr.. Hergesheimer alone among
American novelists could have written
lara Head-but he forces comparison
with Joseph Conrad and suffers. No tour
list coming by inland waterways to pleas
ant acquaintance with the sea along a
eharted coast dare force such a compar-
ison.
But Mr. Hergesheimer is well aware of
our dissatisfaction. "Jara Head" he
writes in answer TO letter of mine, "has
created some current disturbance, prin-
cipally because the disturbed look for
something different-always dangerous
frame of mind. Complaint has reached
me that nothing happens you
think that something had happened if you
suddenly discovered that quietly your
sand had seeped from you as from a
cracked glass? And am certain that the
unavoidable exotic quality of Taou Yuen
gave her an adventitious value in the
Judgment of rapid minds"
That nothing happens truth
TO tell sufficient happens TO account for
the Sudden death of Taou Yuen and of
Gerrit's fathe"-would be neither here
Jnor there; nothing (save the Typhoon)
happens in Mr.. Conrad's TyphoOn, yet it