Evening star., 1937-02-10
NEW BOOKS
AT RANDOM
CITIES OF REFUGE. BY Philip Gibbs.
New York: Doubleday, Doran g. Co.
BY. MARARET GERMOND.

This is Gods lunatic asylum"
The words are from the lips Of an
elderly man, spoken to young news
paper man in the sanctuary of an Eng
lish farmhouse in which Herr Rosenthal,
q violinist of international renown, has
sought peace and rest after years OF
wandering in q world gone mad. Herr
Rosenthals pronouncement expresses
what he believes to be the answer to
the appalling state Of turmoil into which
the postwar generation has plunged the
peoples of this planet in its zest for the
creation of a new civilization. Four
friends have gathered at the farmhouse
for an evening of music and Of happy
companionship. The newspaper man Is
Oliver Alden, an Englishman whose task
1t Is to tell, in these pages, the truth
about many people and about countries.
His wife. Betty Browne, in the early part
of the story Is English governess and
general manager of the Markov family
in Russia. Michael Markov, violinist,
and Vera Sokolova, dancer, are exiles,
refugees from the red terror that once
was Russia. Herr Rosenthal, also an
exile, fled from Germany in time to
escape the first edict Of Adolf Hitler
ordering wholesale slaughter of the Jews.
Through the experiences of these five
major characters. together with those Of
Tania and Olga Markov and their
mother, Sacha Dolin, and others. Sir
Philip Gibbs presents pageant Of the
world during these past twenty years Of
chaos with its accompanying destruction
of ideals and of faith in the intelligence
of the human race. From the revolu-
tion Of 1917 which destroyed Russia to
the New Deal in this country, Sir Philip
tears away the wells of sham and hy-
pocrisy and reveals in all of its groteSque
uglineSs and misery the net results of
the social, economic and political chaos
which for some inexplicable reason is
called the new civilization" Commu-
nism, Fascism, Naziism and New Dealism,
differing but slightly under the skin, are
reversions to ancient methods and prac-
tices which led leaders to their doom and
nations to their ruin. But the postwar
generation. confused, disappointed, rest
less and inexperienced. has not yet real
lied that, as Sir Philip so potently
puts it:
Intolerance became q new gospel in
millions of minds. Youth, upon which
so many hopes of elder minds had been
set . dressed themselves in different
colored shirts and beat up any fellow
citizen who refused to acknowledge their
article Of faith, their badges and slogans.
They spat upon the idea of liberty for
which their forefathers had struggled
and died. They denied the right of free
speech. They repudiated the use Of in
telligence. They proclaimed their belief
in brutality. They had no use at all for
such weakness as pity or charity. They
put their faith in the cudgel, the rubber
truncheon and the ungloved fiSt-best of
all in the machine gun, which is un-
answerable as an argument.
For two thousand years of history
European civilization had fought its way
through tyrannies toward forms of
democratic rule in which the individual
might have some measure of expression
and some claim to his own liberty OF
life. Revolutions had been fought and
won for this cause. 1t had had its
martyrs and heroes. They had suffered
death and imprisonment and torture
because of their demand for a free
parliament, free press and freedom
from tyrant rulers. All that had been
q mistake, It seemed. These men had
died and suffered for q false creed, for
a silly illusion, for an absurdity. De-
mocracy was a failure. Parliament was
q talking shop for half-wits. Liberty,
said Mr.. Mussolini, was q sinking
corpse
Men had worshipped some spiritual
idea of God according to their standard
of intelligence or inherited belief. For
all the span of the Christian era they
had been taught to live as far as human
frailty would allow, in the love of Christ.
European culture, all its traditions of
beauty and art, had been inspired by
the Christian spirit, often violated but
always an ideal of perfection. Another
mistake, another illusion. another abb
ssurdity according to the new leaders and
their recruits"
1t is into this maelstrom of crumbling
empires and nations that the Markov
family is catapulted with countless thou
sands of Russian refugees fleeing before
the ruthless, murder mad Bolshevik
horde which forced the retreat of Gen.
Wrangel and brought to an end the
resistance of the White army. At Sebas-
topol, crowded to suffocation by terror
stricken fugitives, Betty Browne wins
the support of Oliver Alden in her effort
to place her charges upon one of the
British ships assigned to rescue duty in
that area. On the Island of Prinkipo in
the Bosphorus they find refuge'until the
British government concludes that it
can no longer provide food and shelter
for the exiles. ConStantinople is the
next city of refuge, but Mustapha Kemal
is on the march, with every intention of
wrestling Turkey from Greece. Again
they flee for their lives after witnessing
the burning of Smyrna.
Vienna, the girlhood home Of Anna
Markov, affords a resting place for a
time, but Austria is in the unhappy posi-
ton of being entirely dependent upon
the bounty of the League of Nations.
There is no work and little food for most
of its subjects. and nothing in the way
of employment or even hope for the
exiled Markovs. Tania succeeds in get
ting q small position in medical clinic
and remains in Vienna when the other
members Of the family find them
selves once more amid the fiotsam and
jetsam of homeless humanity. National
disintegration has preceded them into
Germany, where hunger, degradation
and despair impose their heavy toll upon
physical and spiritual resources already
drained of their capacity to endure.
From Germany into France the two
younger Markovs and their mother go
in search of peace and security. Paris
is overrun with Russian refugees seek
ing employment, but they manage to
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