Evening star., 1934-06-03

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Belgium. Col. House, John D. Rockefeller, J.
p. Morgan and many others. Rivera's best
qualities-his love and understanding of ma
chinery. his ability to handle large wall spaces
his strong. living fgures-apear in his Detroit
frescoes. With workers and machinery he is
most capable of expression. His symbolism,
which he introduces too often, always needs an
notation and is too fantastic to be convincing,
as the sunhowers In his Detroit aviation
mural, to symbolic plane motors resisting the
wind. However his symbolism is at least not
of the familiar pseudo classic type which has
so overtaxed the ample female figure with
RomaneSque drapery on the walls Of American
public buildings. Rivera's worst fault, or lack.
in his American murals is his failure to under
stand American life, because his knowledge Of
it is almost entirely academic.
JOURNEY TO THE END OF THE NIGHT.
BY Louis-Ferdinand Celine. Translated
from the French by John H. P. Marks.
Boston: Little. Brown d Co.
A NY who are able and wish to believe that
this Is "the best of all possible worlds
will do well to avoid reading this book Of a
French doctor whose real name Is Destouches.
1t is dark and bitter, melancholy and ironical,
and perhaps hopeless. though we are not sure.
Life Is a voyage in Winter and in the night"
Celine quotes from a song Of the Swiss Guards.
The journey of his Ferdinand Bardamu begins
when he rushes from the cafe where he is
sitting to follow a marching regiment and
join up In order to find out what war and
patriotic enthusiasm are like, and ends, with
q stop-over in a madhouse, when he completes
his medical course and begins the practice Of
medicine among the poor Of one Of the out
skirts of Paris. His journey is not one Of
gay adventure, like those Of Dumas heroes,
% 1efvx
spirit, like those of the heroes Of Fielding and
Smollett and Sterne and that Of Anthony
Adverse" 1t is forced journey, ate-driven.
from one form of suffering to another, with
ever-growing conviction Of the horror and
futility of life.
It Is first the horror of war. then the horror
Of "our malignant peace" Human greed and
selfishness oblterate all love- friendship, kind
hness beauty. After he is released from the
hospital Ferdinand goes to a fever-ridden
colony in Africa, where the blacks are the
victims of the whites and the whites are the
victims Of disease; then to America, where he
finds New York lonely city intoxicated with
its size, and Detroit, where he works in an
automobile factory, a city crazy with greed.
Celine's nightmare tale causes deep reflection,
but the reflection is not entirely in the direc-
tion in which he leads. The world is un-
doubtedly awry, but even in cruel, greedy
world there are many who, in spite of what
seem the unmerited buffetS Of fate and their
fellows, manage to keep out of the mire. And
there Is always the question as to what pro-
portion Of the buffets are the result of ones
own choice and acts. To make use Of the old
theological phraseology, is it all predestina
tion? Or, to be more modern, is it all the
fault of society?
Some Better Mysteries.
HOSTILE VALLEY. BY Ben Ames Williams
New York: E. P. Dutton & Co.
THE valley of sinister name lies back in the
Maine hills, where it should be a peace
full retreat, but has actually been almost aban-
doned for two generations because of its evil
reputation. Jim Saladne comes there one day
in Spring to fish for trout and is the last man
who speaks to very beautiful woman, Hubby
Ferrin, before her murder. Hubby is the kind
of woman who, in the words of big, simple
Luke Hills would make a man kind of lift
his comb, and strut like fighting COCK just
to look at her. Before the night is over Jim
sees her murder avenged by another murder.
Mr.. Williams has given himself ample ma
terial for an involved tale of mountain folk
whose passions shoulder for long and then
suddenly and Unexpectedly explode. When
Jim Saladine departs from the valley, he goes
at full speed, like one pursued but he returns,
for the valley has its fascination and draws
him back.
MR.. PTNKERTON GOES TO SCOTLAND
YARD. By David Frome. Illustrated by
Edward Calman. New York: Farrar &
Rinehart.
HE author of Scotland Yard Can Wait"
again presents Mr.. Pinkerton, the grey
little Welshman" who is Inspector Bulls as
sistant This time he gets himself into great
deal of work and trouble by betting the in
spector that there are cases OF murder which
Scotland Yard knows nothing about. The stake
is FLO. We wonder that the inspector does