The New York herald., 1921-01-16
SAN CRISTOBAL DE LA HABANA- B
Joseph Hergesheimer. Alfred A. Knopf
Reviewed by AURA WOODIN.


Reviewed by AURA WOODIN.
TO my ineffable delight. found that
Mr.. Hergesheimer has translated the
= rich romance of the city constructed
for night like lunar park of marble
and palms and open flooding radiapce'; has
written of it with sufficient beauty to satisfy
even Jeremy Taylor, and with a dignity no
one to my knowledge has given it save James
Huneker; and that he also saw life here as
IAN investment of memories" The record
he presents of his impressions has but one
lack: some Goya sketches to emphasize the
elusive, fascinating and wicked young citys
Eight, sharp emotion. of challenge and invi-
tation and surrender"
For literary purposes only he embraced,
despite puritan born prejudices, sparkling,
jewelled San Cristobal de la Habana and
indeed permitted her to claim him for her
own. He has caught her mystery It's
prismatic colors are In the pages Of his
book, whose flaming pigments vibrate
madder and gamboge. The underlying mean
ing Of her beauty and charm which so in
trigues the imagination, the conception Of
the spirit of the chromatic coloring of Cuba
which he so easily identifies as IAN authentic
part of my Inheritance" have been expressed
with the charm Of Daudet, Lott or
Merimee.
Listen to this first: Havana was a city
of balconies, of barred windows, Of houses
impenetrable blank, to the street, but open
ON the garden rooms of patios. And sud-
denly-while the moment before had been
impatient at the baroness resulting from
their absence-I was overwhelmingly con-
scious Of the pervading influence of charm
ing women. Here, with extreme fiat
terry women were regarded as dangerous, as
always desirable, and capable of folly. 1t
was a society where camellia caught in the
hair, brilliant glance across a powdered
cheek, lace drawn over a vivid mouth were
not for nothing. In the world from which
l had come these gestures, beauties, existed;
but they were general and meaningless
rather than Specialize expression of a
conventional vanity without warmth. . :.
For Havana, a woman was, in principle,
flower with delicate petals easily scattered
a perfume not to be rudely, indiscriminately
spent. (. And here, in addition to so much
else, was another shared attitude drawing
me toward Havana-an enormous preference
for women who had the courage of their
emotions over those completely circumspect
except in situations morally and financially
solid"
Here are women and flowers, brilliant side
lights his perceptivity of Cuban life,
elittering descriptions of the divinities which
preside over the emotions and sentiments
of this alien people in whose veins courses
the blood of the dark Moors and those born
in the shadow of the Alcazar-these slight
experiences etched delicately as a breath
yet lasting as the sunlight of Cuba, memories
On harsh yet as enthralling as the seductive
measures Of the music of Spain, exoticism
depicted without word banal false note or
an exaggerated summary of its scintilant
charm. Hergesheimer's pages are not with
out humor, yet this bears no relation what
soever to the smart cleverness of the profess
sional humorist taking literary snapshots
at a foreign country for the price of rail-
road ticket or a sea voyage, and pattering
them with American slang for the edification
of thoughtless readers. Americans from the
North are not entirely impervious to the
persuasive romance of the tropics, yet they
have been seduced from its real charm by
the vaudevillian laugh In every line" which
holds the Cubefios up, wriggling on their
respective pins. for all to look upon and to
laugh--and laugh unkindly, too, at every
thing from their politics to their unaffected
passion for expressing their emotions. so
strongly disapproved by my puritan country
Hergesheimer has told the truth with a boy
ish enjoyment of his own sensations ut be-
holding the fiapnting devilry of tho .sland
and marred by none of the restraint of the
average American writer trembling in fear
Of the blue pencil over some of his most sim
cerely true passages concerning its undeni-
able poetry.
offered Of the islands older periods, but these
are carefully authenticated and have his
torical value Most of them are given in
this manner: The early history of Cuba, L
remembered was inbound with the admin
istrative and protective powers of the
church; In 1916 the native Cubefios were
put In charge of the order of Jeronimtes
localized in la Espanola- Santo Domingo
The double motive of the Spanish Christian
kings in the western hemisphere had been
conversion and gold, but which Of these
was uppermost 1t was impossible to deter
mine. However. when the gold the tenn
poraI interest, decreased In one locality the
spiritual concern of Seville shifted to the
more productive regions. There was a
period, conquest. when a violent death
was greater blessing than living In state
of damnable heresy; and so, between the
saving Of their souls and the loss. of their
bodies In the kings mines, the natives were
thoroughly cared for"
One does not look in such a book for
dates. for any tendency to over detail. for
anything, in fact, that betokens the slightest
semblance Of pedantry or dulness. And all
of his comparisons between the little islands
customs and ideas, and that of his own
country. are drawn with anything but
odium, indeed, with extraordinary gentleness
rather. For instance: But the men Of
Havana, IL seemed, were quite contented to
talk. to sit In cafe over refrescos or in a
parque with nothing at all but cigars. and
discuss eternaly, with passionate interest,
the details OF their politics and city Their
contact with life at every point was vivid
and, In expression anyhow. forceful: they
argued In a positive tone to which compro-
mise. agreement appeared hopelesslv lost:
and there was in the background the possi-
bility OF death by quarrelling That in itself.
thrfr xryIA l., A.n~ L.