The Birmingham age-herald., 1920-09-19

always celebrated with a little poem from "Eleanor." In school on "Exhi- bition Days" her part was singing or playing or acting, though all the while she was longing to be asked to write.
 TAINTED MEADOWS" By Sophie Kerr. George H. Doran
 Company, Publishers, New York City.
 The title of Sophie Kerr's new novel, Painted Meadows" is explained in a quotation from Loves Labor Lost:" When daisies pied and violets blue
 And lady smocks all silver white And cuckoo birds of every hue
 So paint the meadows with delight. The cuckoo then, on every tree
 Mocks married men," The story is set in quaint old southern town. The time is in the mid dle nineties, era of "big sleeves" and high collars, buggy rides, homemade cake, the two-step, free silver argu- ment. "Whistling Rufus" and Sweet principals in the story, two men and a girl. are the highly individualized figures of Annas father, thumbing over the mortgages upon half the towns real estate; Seth's mother a re- markable portrait of the intensely pos sessive parent, and the other men and women and young people whose lives are indirectly affected by ths drama of love and marriage which the author unfolds with intimate knowledge of life in such a town. The contrast between the old gar den quietude of the background bright ened by flashes of infectious humor, and the emotional and intensely dra- matic conflict of the characters is an achievement of finely controlled pow CT.
 editor of the Woman's Home Com panion, has impressed upon this story the two qualities of her mind which have made her work of growing in- terest for several years. The one a natural, direct, unaffected realism; the other very keen sense of dramatic values
 The author was born near Denton, Md. She describes the town as "a mar row, kind-hearted, conventional,l self respecting community, not very enter prising-an average little semi-south- ern town" and just such a one as she describes in this book. She has written for magazines since her early teens, has done journalistic work on the Pittsburg Gazette, and has worked her self up to her present position during the past ten years. Sne IS the du thor of several other novels. 'LANCELOT"
 By Edwin Arlington Robinson. Thomas
 Seltzer, Publishers, New York City. Edwin Arlington Robinson, who is one of Americas interesting poets. has writ ten an absorbing "poem' which he en- titles "Lancelot.''
 Though the these is ancient, Robinson's s fy.an Nf icth thn,- tyy,1 ,nda and full of meaning for us today. The Arthurian legend is here used to l.y bare the profoundest death of the tragedy of our time The mediaeval atmosphere of war and strife furnishes the author an excellent vehicle for the poetic in- depreciation of the questions and issues that have agitated us during rne war and since the cessation of the war
 Apart from it's poetic and timely value. "Lancelot' is a readable and highly in- teresting story.
 The opening lines of "Lancelot' fol- low:
 Gawaine, aware again of Lanceros In the Kings garden, coughed and fol-
 lowed him;
 Whereat he turned and stood with foieed
 arms
 And weary-waiting eyes. cold and half Hard eyes. where doubts at war with
 memories
 Famed a sad wrath. Why frown upon
 a friend?
 Few live that have too many" Gawaine
 said,
 And wished unsaid. so thinly came the
 light
 Between the narrowing lids at which he
 gazed.
 And who of us are they. that name their
 friends?"
 Lancelot said. "They live that have not
 any.
 Why do they live. Gawaine? Ask why.
 and answer"
 CRAY DUSK'' By Octavus Roy Cohen. Dodd Mead and Company, Publishers. New York City.
 Of the many reviews which have been