Evening star., 1934-02-25

plays were entirely excluded from the stage.
they would still make him famous. They are
for the library armchair and reading lamp as
well as for the footlights. He always has some
doctrine or some question he wishes through
satire to put before his public In Too True
to be Good an invalid victim of fond and
foolish mother and of the doctors (as in THE
Doctors Dilemma he takes fling at doc
tors), becomes under the influence of burglar,
a superwoman. This is only the beginning.
Shaw calls the play "a political extravaganza"
and the Interpretation Is any ones, though he
indicates in his preface that his general mean
ing is that lit is all up with the old Anarchist
Liberal parliamentary system" and suggests
that democracy needs a trustworthy an
thropometric machine for the selection OF quail
1hed rulers specifically the formation of panels
OF tested persons eligible for the different
grades in the government hierarchy Under
such panel the voters would lose their liberty
to return totally unfit candidates
ON the Rocks is called "a political comedy"
and deals with the troubles of Sir Arthur
Chavender, prime minister; his secretary Miss
Hilda Hanways, and Sir Broadfoot Basham,
chief commissioner of police, in unemployed
London. Sir Broadfoot has an unfortunate
name for the office he holds, Sir Arthur OBJ
serves; it is likely to antagonize public feeling.
The commissioners theory of popular control
has two alternatives: Keep the people amused
by encouraging tub-thumping representatives of
talking societies to keep Trafalgar Square
going night and day." or turn on the machine
guns. The political necessity of killing undeSir-
ables gives Shaw the theme for his preface in
which he indulges in some of his most Swiftian
satire. determination as political function lis
beyond question by any thoughtful person" 1t
has been and is being practised all over the
world In Germany it is suggested that the
Nordic race should eXterminate the Latin race.
The determination of the peasant is in
active progress in Russia, where the extermna-
tion of the class of ladies and gentlemen of So
called independent means has already been
accomplished Outside Russia the extermin-
alton of Communists is widely advocated; and
there is movement in the British Empire and
the United States for the determination Of
Fascists. In India the impulse of MoslemS
ana Hlndus to exterminate another is COM
pllcated by the impulse of the British Empire
to externnate both when they happen to be
militant Nationalists." In connection with
races and classes determination may be ac-
comphshed by other means than actual killing
After his many examples, it is logical that Shaw =
has one section on federation Mostly ulusory"
Some shrewd satire in the play is expended on
the necessity of world conferences to provide
relief and recreation and the opportunity to
collect bric-a-brac for premiers and other
statesmen. The plays in this volume are far
below the level of Shaws best; the prefaces are
the equal of any he has wri. ten
THE WELL OF DAYS BY Ivan Bunin Trans
lated from the Russian by Gleb Struve and
Hamish Miles. New York: Alfred A. Knopf.
IVAN BUNIN, living in exile in France since
the bolshevist revolution, has been well
known in Russia one of the best of the
modern Russian novelists, but, of course has
now no influence there, and is almost a stranger
in this country. The recent award to him of
he OH i,,
ably cause the translation of others of his
works in addition to this one. Though in the
form OF novel, the narrative of the boyhood
and youth of Alexey Alexandrovich Arseniev it
Is probably more or less the autobiography of
Bunin himself. ArSeniev was, like Bunin, the
son Of landowners descended from ancient
nobility, who lived on the estate called
kamenka In the story, near a city which is
perhaps the prototype of Bunins city of birth,
Voronezh. His boyhood was passed in the COM
pany of his family and the peasants who
worked on the estate. 1t was monotonous but
happy, varied by visits to relatives and neigh
bors, concerned with all the activities and
interests of farm during the four seasons.
The first shock of his life, which he was
never to forget, came when his older brother
was arrested for clandestine activities in a
revolutionary group and carried away by
two bearded gendarmes. His fathers attempt
at reinsurance, that life in a Siberian town
might be no worse than in Russian town
and that "after all, everything's stuff and nom
sense The evil will pass and the good will
pass everything will pass!" did not,
strangely, allay his panic He felt that per
maps everything was really nonsense, but that
nonsense was my life," just the practical
realiSt will always feel when confronted by
the intangible comforts of philosophy. From
that time his youth waned. The process was
hastened by the change in his father. who
seemed to have "thrOWn nm he to he