Evening star., 1938-09-11

enough. Considering the limited num-
ber Of thoughts Of which the human
brain is capable. q reviewer sometimes
Is practically convinced that there are.
This is not the end Of Mrs. Ather-
tons enterprise in her present volume,
however, for she includes in it q num-
ber Of essays on other subjects. She
lights. rather hearteningly, on those
fellow authors of hers who see no merit
in any novel unless 1t treats Of boiler
factories, strikes, labor versus capital;
whatever deals with mass production
and the Machine Age; poor white trash
In the South" Such book, she says,
is always and estimably authentic.
but unrelieved by gleam of inborn
creative fire that might lift 1t into the
realms Of art-and, incidentally, make
it interesting" Well, she has some
thing there. If there has ever been q
drearier, awfuller, less inspired and
more grimly commercial set Of novels
than the recent procession of "prole-
tartan" ones (to say nothing of the
simultaneously passing procession of
autobiographies Of young authors who
have sympathising with the proletariat
for their own profersiou the reviewer
has never come across it. Mrs. Ather-
/ toms own novels were never very good,
but one can forgive her good deal for
her robust refusal to climb on this pres
ent royalty-chasing bandwagon.
She also writes of our schools, our
habit of working too hard, our tend
ency to escape the responsibilities OF
our individual lives by collectivizing
ourselves, and she has long queer
| piece at the end of her book about the
manner in which the Anglo-Saxon race
developed out Of the lost ten tribes of
Israel. One feels that she bounces
around rather too bouncingly, but she
is herself, at least, and not taking the
slightest hint from any one as to
trends. which is, this sorrowful day.
afvlrtue which extenuates almost any
SHINING.
THE SURVIVORS. BY Rene Behaine
Translated by Edward Crankshaw.
Boston: Houghton, Mifflin g. Co.
THIS is the first volume of M. Be-
haines story of the life of Cath.
erin de Laignes and, more Importantly.
OF whole class of French society. It
is the part of the work which covers
GATHERINGS education in the convent
to which she is sent from her parents
prosperous and sober home. 1t is a
grave and wonderful piece of writing,
a novel which, by a simple. uncom-
menting recital of day-to-day human
customs, builds up terrible case
against the folly of our species.
We are shown the background
| against which the child Catherine
grows up, the home of small noble
man, at once provincial and enlight-
ened, at once worldly and religious
/ Hypocrisy is the air the family
breathes, but without awareness; they
have been born and bred in it for
| generations and have acquired and
practiced certain admirable virtues the
! while. They are charitable, correct
and sensible. They have reverence for
family integrity. But they live life
/ OF complete INSTRUMENTATION, and
the institutions which they worship
require the shaping of their devotees
somewhat out of the pattern of ma
ture
The story here shows how Catherine
is subjected to the shaping process
going on her path toward adoles-
cence," as Ford Maddox Ford puts it
! IN his preface, lin q perpetual shower
OF little papers stamped with prayers
scapulars, papier-mache images, imi-
tation flowers for the decoration of
Shrines, and all the devices invented
by the lesser members of the church
for continually drawing back the pill
grim's mind toward the affairs OF
that church and instilling into her
otherworldliness that makes her COM
pletely ignore everything connected
with housekeeping or the regimenta-
ton of the household and the con-
troll of its helps" In other words, the
training of well-bred girl-by the
standards of this curious human
group.
Thus the child develops until her
friends begin to marry, and she, in
utter ignorance of the world outside
her conventual education, falls in love
herself. A better picture of the in
genious manner in which the human
kind can highly and holly justify its
foolish and cowardly conduct cannot
be found. The book is a fine. rare
thing, destined to remain a classic of
its period.
MARCH TO QUEBEC The journals
of the members of Arnold's expedi-
ton. Compiled and annotated by
Kenneth Roberts. Garden City:
Doubleday, Doran g. Co.
THIS is book for Kenneth Roberts
fans. 1t is a selection from
the source material which Mr.. Rob-
erts used in his admirable series Of
Arundel" novels. now made avail
able to his readers, so the publisher
tells us, by reason of "a new and in
sistent demand" It would seem, If
Messrs. Doubleday and Doran are to
be believed, that the public was SO
delightful with that heroic chapter of
Revolutionary history which was de-
picted by the Arundel Chronicles"
that it has expressed a wish to know
more about the matter. And so Mr..
Roberts, who assuredly Is an authority,
has obligingly published some of the
papers from which he gathered his
facts.
These papers are, as the title Of the
volume would indicate, journals kept
by members of Arnolds expedition.
They are not the whole number Of
such journals, for to publish them all