The Birmingham age-herald., 1921-09-07
JAnss molrcrateof FlAGe
lAuIEs OLNE1 CU1WOoR


 once upon a time makes copy of its tribulations" and this Is exactly what Floyd Dell has done in transcribing to paper the character of his hero,
 Felix Fay-the Moon Calf of his novel of that name.
 An idealist, pure and simple-a sen sitive idealist at that, which may be
 superfluous for all idealists I fancy are sensitive--Felix Fay is thrown into contact with the brusque, hard, cold, work day, world--and from his boyhood to the very end of the chapter, his temperament--his per sonality--vivid and intense-draw us to him and those "dreamers" among us must, in spite of everything, sym pathize with him in his struggles and his tribulations.
 The badges Of Felix Fays "Moon Selfishness" are chosen with unerr- ing judgment and consistency. The
 boys quick response to sympathy, his capacity for living within him. self, his preference for books over games, his indifference to worldly. values, his ability to make plans and inability to handle a saw or plane, his good scholarship in all his les sons except arithmetic, his loath'ng recoil from business, all are stressed by the author in paying to Felix the | tribute of "a sigh which is not sob, a smile which is not a grin" Felixs development in youth is brought out by a narrative account of his loves. These loves are as often abstract ideas as they are girls, and usually the love of ideals or loy- | alty to ideals is the stronger passion with lFelix, who Is what the French | call an cerebral. When the Very | Improbable She-the girl who could | be kissed on the roller coaster but , still had the capacity for sharing | Felixs enjoyment of Shaw play | teasingly asks him, 'If you had to | choose between your sweetheart and your principles. which would you choose? Felix unhesitatingly re-
 plies, My principles" And when
 the time for choice comes it is the principles that triumph. That these i "principles' in which Felix be- lieves are unorthodox is of no mo- ment in review. What must be | set down to the authors credit is the fact that he keeps evangelism at arms length throughout his story. In the last quarter of the book Felix faces the question of whether 1 or not marriage Is a stultifying insti- l tuition. There Is no compromise be- tween his attitude in the matter and | the course of action he follows. Perhaps if MT. Dell were writing for continental publication there would be a corresponding decisiveness in l Felixs verbal championship of his credo. There is instead an anti eli | maetic and slightly vague chapter, remiscent of the last page in "Sanine," in which Arzibashef has his individualist drop off moving train and stride out of the story to- ward the sunrise
 The real climax to my way of the last chapter but one when Felix | Dell tells 1t this way;
 | It was dark on the way home, and
 Felix sat little apart from Joyce. and he had the curious illusion that
 instead of a steering wheel she was bent softly over a child--the child that should have been hers and his. | "Goodbye."
 Goodbye"
 l The "Flaming Forest" by James Oliver Curwood sreathes of the great out-of- 5oors which is no surprise to l the reader who has ever read any of MT. Curwood's previous novels, which wreack of the great Canadian north west, ,Ndown by the Three Rivers" The splendid romantic. big, genuine | real life in 'the open" in the mar vicious northwest country, is told by MT. Curwood as none other tells it, and in 'The Flaming Forest" he has | done a masterful bit of word paint
 ing" which is gripping and thrilling 1 to degree.