Detroit evening times. (Detroit, Mich) 1921-1958, 1941-07-05
DeCasseres
On Magic
Rug Of Books
Fight for Pacific Praised
for Many Details
BY BENJAMIN DE CASSERES
nANCIN' around on the magic
carpet Of books:

carpet Of books:
How strong is Japan? What
defenses have we in Alaska?
What is our status in the Dutch
East Indies and in the Philip
pines?
These are the questions that
are put 10 us in Mark j. Gayn's
THE Fight For the Pacific"
Morrow. Mr.. Gayn knows
whereof he speaks, for he was
born in a tiny Mongol-Chinese
town.
His first memory is that OF
Chinese soldiers coming down a
road with the heads of Chinese
bandits swinging by their long
queues from bamboo poles. Not
nice nerve-food TO raise a child
on.
Mr.. Gayn has spent most OF
his years in the Orient either as
a newspaper correspondent or a
traveller. His book of nearly 400
pages is needed with details on
almost every question you can
ask about the Orient.
Like the sound observer that
he is. he does net answer all his
own questions. Only time has
the answer 10 the problems OF
the Pacific.
The Fight For the Pacific"
is a oook you ought TO have IL
you want 10 know what's what
in the Orient.
no you ever read the pub
~ fishers "blurbs" on the
dust Jackets of books? If not,
do so. They are a great mental
adventure. / have read tons OF
them. They arc, comic. dra-
matte. truthful, fibby, hgh-ho
and lowbrow.
Sometimes these ''blurbs" will
tell YOU that some cow-town
rhymSter is another Poe. that
an almost illiteTate fictioneer Is
another Balzac" and that n
manufacturer of snoopy bro
midcS is another Bernard
Shaw
But the Satire writer OF
AblurbS" is rare. However. I've
discovered this unusual warbler
on the dust Jacket OF 80
Poems" by +. +. Cummings.
He says:
To-day Cummings II a finer
poet than ever before" Before
what?)
And Uiihom ,Cas II minus and
shall be unreasonable happen
less unnoG shuts more than open
could that erery tree or than al
life more death begins 10 Droic.
You're reading that paragraph
over. and naturally think I've
gone cuckoo. No That is
merely one stanza from a Cum
mings poem.
We can now see what the
"blurb" writer meant when he
said that +. +. Cummings rs
finer poet than ever before.
If he wasn't really Satirical,
he means before the last before,
which Is of course before there
was ever that or this or an
upon.
Louis Untermeycr gets into
this "blurb" also. Re asks us
10 criticize T.. r. with "detach-
ment" Detached from what?
from our sanity?
WHY am /. who am not re-
w ligiouS in the sense OF SUBJ
scribing TO any Church or Greed,
moved TO the very foundations
of my being by me SINGING ot
the old-time hymns?
asked myself that question
when looking through the
bcautif ully printed 'Favorite
Hymns" illustrated by Gustav
Tenggren. with simplified piano
arrangements. that the Garden
City Publishing Company has
just got out
Here are all those master
pieces LEAD. Kindly Light
1T Came Upon Midnight
Clear" Nearer, My God To
Thee "a hymn that always
makes me weep, "Hark, Tho
Herald Angels Sing" and score
of others.
All these hymns have the
power Of lifting us right out OF
our blowSy little egoS into the
domain Of the infinite. They are
call for help, BY waits who
find themselves stranded on n
bit of starduSt in an ocean Of
boundlcsS space.
Those lost waits. who know
not what they are or why they
are here are YOU and me. And
our hymns and psalms are the
pathetic S O S that we send out
10 the hidden Spirit of the Uni
verse.
The Atheist says there Is no
answer 10 the S O S. The answer
is the hymn. For when / hear
these great hymns sung. I feel
the answer in the strange peace
that descends on me.