New-York tribune., 1922-11-12
A Bookman's Day Book
BY Burton .Rascoe


sits grinning in the seventh heaven Of
aeiagnt over the reviews Of his play.
its good play.
SATURDAY. NOVEMBER 1
), Charley Macarthur, Guy Holt, Ben
nay Aeaman, my wife and lunched
,sso-day at Frank Cases salon. All the
nteFary, theatrical and cinema world
seemed TO be there: Hugh WalpoIe. ID.
seph Hergesheimer, Douglas Fairbanks.
nichard Barthelmess, Irwin s. Cobb
George Barr McCutcheon, Konrad Ber-
covici, f. Scott Fitzgerald, Peggy Wood
Margola Gilmore, Mary Blair. IslluIah
bankhead, Louis Untermeyer. T
mith, Horace Liveright, Earle Balsch.
Robert G. Benchley, Samuel Merwln
no. as they say, others too numerous
20 mention. Louis Untermyer told me
nov, r1yalling Melha and Napoleon. I
got onto the menu for two days ,1,,.
ming, but that Frank Case had dasnaired
OF my coming TO see myself 40 hon.
cree and had discontinued IL. II seems
shat Mr. Case never reads the pauers.
out that Tallulah Bankhead had read
ny review Of his food and had thourhS
the word "execrable" meant sonething
awfuiiy complimentary, and had SO re.
ported. DIR. Case wanted to show his
appreciation for the ad, and put my
Mans 60 two OF the best dishes. The re-
view perked him and the chef up. and
to-day enjoyed not only the most er-
ceiient service. but quite az good food
as ever ate.
MONDAY, NOVEMBER 6
Went 60 lunch at the residence of
Charles Buchanan, the music critic.
and found there DIR. Henry X. Marks.
author OF "Peter Middleton" and
Harrison Smith, Of Harcourt, Brace e G
Go. Conversation opened with a dis
cussion Of my review Of Countess
Tolstoy's autobiography, and DR.. Marks
| said that Toistoy's confessions, his
conversion 60 fanatical doctrines and
his break with his wife after the wild
life he had led In his youth was but
the natural consequence Of the diminu-
ticn OF vital energy. "It is all mat
ter OF chemical action and reaction"
said Dr.. Marks. sand the state OF our
vitality Ia the principal factor In de-
termining our ideas and opinions -
That, think, Is true, knowing how my
own point Of view has undergone radi-
cal changes under special conditions at
various periods OF my life. To this I
would, and no doubt would Or. Marks
also, add environmental influences.
That Is why can see truth as rela-
tive shing only, and that is why
could not agree with Mr.. Buchanan in
the argument he began later on. He
started out by saying that he thought
that art and criticism had never been
in such parlous state since the
history OF the world as the state Il la
in now. agreed that contemporary
art and contemporary criticism had
definite characteristics which may be
described al bad mannered, exhibition
lstic, undisciplined, and even, from
certain point of view, vulgar; but that
they also have the characteristics of
vigor, warmth, curiosity, frankness
and enthusiasm, which are the con-
conitants Of the other qualities. This
art and this criticism are natural
products Of the socio-economic ccndi-
tions, plus our cultural inheritance
and our reaction to it, and the ten
dency in art toward the continual
slight novelty" To protest against
them is not only futile, but, as see it,
to protest against life itself. With
this Mr.. Buchanan violently diBagrees.
He says the age Is cursed by clever
ness and superfciality and fouting
Of standards; he believes in absolute
are myth, and stultifying myths at
that; and he told me that although
he loathed and ebominated and couldn't
sit through certain symphony (Which
l refrain from mentioning because it
would pain hin) but that he would not
say 30 because many great apprecia-
tors Of music had agreed that it is a
masterpiece, and he. would not aout
his idosyncracy in the face OF that
| opinion. This Is, think, to take ones
self far too seriously, and as Mr.,
Smith pointed cut, it is to aid In i'm
posing upon succeeding generations as
| inviolahia and sacrosanct something
which Is merely product of human
skill and imagination. II is the way
we have OF SO embalming classics in
the oils of JUNCTION that one is slever
tempted to find out what they are
really like. HazIitt was, think, the
greatest critic Of his century, because
he was the most personal (every life
Of Hazlitt Is made UP almost entirely
of quotations from his work., and GER
tainly he was as fallible as any. No
more fallible than Lemaitre or Sainte-
Beuve (who rnisjudged every one OF
Importance Of his own timel and other
critics who are afflicted with the
Jehovah complex and seek to be objec-
tive and remain unread. Who actually
reads .Ssinte Beuve nowadays? Mr..
Buchanan knows and enjoys music. He
is, or was, critic. If he should say
emphaticalIy that he does not like thai
symphony the heavens would not fall,
and perhaps he would give joy and re-
assurance TO hundreds Of ether music
lovers who Ioathe the symphony as
much rs he does. but endure 1t in
panied silence and clap their hands
and declare it Is wonderful-because
1t Is q classic.
WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 8
Louis Kantor brought Kenneth
BURKE to lunch to-day. Burke and
Edmund Wilson Jr. have stood out
in my mind among all the younger
critics as being the, best informed, the
most sensitive and most interesting.
Something curious has happened to
Burke. He, who in his efforts at story
writing has been most bizarre and ex-
prassionistic and even downright in
coherent, amazed me to-day by vague
discourse on the function OF criticism,
wherein he had the highest praise for
Paul Elmer More, Irving Babbitt. and
Matthew Arnold. He has definitely
turned against modernism" in arts
and letters, and seems to have swung
around entirely to didacticism and reg
imentation. He fnclines to the More
Babbitt theory that Rousseau is the
| root of all romantic evil. eve must
get away" he said "from that indiyi-
dualism by which sick man imposes
,,uor the world his yicarioua fulfill