Evening star., 1938-09-11

suited to the temperament Of such
sneerers as the reviewer. But It reveals
unsuspected difficulties when one
comes to work it out.
For the names inside the groups are
chosen with little relation to one an
other. To be sure, there are names
OF stage people in one, radio perform
ers in another, writer's In another.
politicians, heroes Of sports, educators,
scientists, artists and so on. But this
Is only a very rough manner of CLASH
flcation.
Take the fiction writing group for
example; it contains the names of
John Steinbeck, Thomas Wolfe, Alex
ander Woollcott, James Farrell, Mar
garet Mitchell, Thornton Wilder, John
O'Hara and Robert Nathan. How.
please, are you going to compare those
in relation to their deserts in public
adulation? How put John O'Hara
against Robert Nathan, for one thing =
Or how Thomas Wolfe against Alexan-
der Woollcott? For the game, when
you begin to play it, resolves itself into
an answering Of the question-Which
one OF these do I like least? And.
unless you judge on the basis OF per-
sonalties, you have no standard of
comparison. The reviewer defies any
critic in the world to work out canons
by which the work of Margaret Mitch
ell can be set against that of James
Farrell. Or to take one more group.
the achievement of Mrs. Eleanor
Roosevelt against those of Albert Elm
stein.
But, Of course, any one can tell
which one he likes least.
Mrs. Roosevelt, Interestingly enough,
is the only person whose name an
pears more than once in the whole
collection. She is listed in Group XIV
among number of columnists and
then again in Group III with. as said,
DR.. Einsteln, the others Of III being
Chief Justice Hughes, the Quins
and Tom Mooney You can work
that out in your own mind. Or can
you? Anyway, as said, 1t offers a
nice opportunity for good, clean fun, or
something.
CCRIBNER'S, in its September issue.
the custom of publishing a short
1ull length novel, custom which it
promises us to observe in months to
come. On the basis of the novel selec-
ted for the initiation, however, the
reviewer cannot view the promise with
any optimism.
For the work is by that young-man-
Wlth-one-string -to-his- -bow-Mr. Je-
| rome Weldeman, whose novel, II Can
GetIt for You Wholesale" called forth
some critical tossing up Of hats last
year. This reviewer at the time was,
as usual, a meanie and utterly failed
10 see any merit in Mr. Weideman's
smart alecking. He wrote about a
tiresome young shyster in the garment
trades-lf you care about the garment
trades? And he wrote with monotonv
the like OF which can only be equalled
! by tone-deaf monotone child singing
My Country 'Tis Of Thee" because
his school teacher has ordered him to
sing 1t, Now, in Scribner's, he writes
some more about this same young
shyster and, from being merely mon
otonous, he has become both monoto-
nous and melooramauc. 1t makes a
pretty awful performance, tasteless
and cheap and no one but masochist
is likely to get through it. Or maybe
Flagpole Kelly, or some tree sitter,
looking for new worlds to conquer.
Scribner's once before published a
series of full-length noyels-or, as it
called them then, long short stories.
1t opened with the incomparably good
IS. S. San Pedro" and went on to the
no less distinguished Many Thousands
Gone None of the series was really
bad. That was when the magazine
wore its old formal and had not started
trying to combine the New Yorker.
the Atlantic Monthly Judge and Coro-
net in one set Of covers. That was
when the name Scribners carried some
prestige. The circulation, one hears.
has gone up immensely since the
polyglot Transformation has taken
place.