Evening star., 1945-08-12

OEHG4 EDW AMI i. w ALLACE.
telephone service. The individuality
itself, however, conformed to a pat
tern. A courthouse on a central
square, a row of stores which
served the men as clubs, two Prot
estant churches, schoolhouse, one
constable, a Masonic hall-there
we're thousands of these Barring
tons in the United States 40 years
ago. A large portion of our ma
tional life was lived in them. They
had their uniformity then, too,
though it was a different uniformity
from that which is bestowed by the
chain stores and filling stations.
I was particularly impressed by
this in reading Edward Tatum Wal
laces book because I was born in
such a Darlington myself and lived
there through the impressionable
years of childhood 1t was a long
way from Arkansas but Mr.. Wal
lace's Darlington could easily have
been mine. We had three churches
instead of two and a river instead
of a creek but otherwise I de-
tected little difference. A native
myself, I recognized the natives
touch.
A Broad Picture.
The picture which Mr.. Wallace
gives is wonderful for its breadth
and sensitivity. His sources have
obviously been his own boyhood
memories and the store of legend
which in those days of semi-isola-
tfon each little town possessed, a
store derived from local happenings
and personalities and having no ap-
plication outside the towns borders,
but binding all the inhabitants with
a tie of peculiar knowledge shared.
He does little more than set these
memories and legends down. His
work has no connected sequence OF
events-it is not a novel. But its
unity and completeness prevent one
from calling it properly a mere COL
lection of stories. I would call it a
portrait of village, physical, Splr-
itual, psychological.
Insofar as he makes use OF a
specific agent for this unity he re-
lies on the characters of Bart and
Debs Mackenzie, respectively the
hardware merchant and his son.
Bart is the man of superior intelli-
gence who sees his town in a per-
spective not granted to many OF its
citizens, but still without detach-
ment. He appreciates the dramas
of the place, but lives in them. His
is not the appreciation of the spec
tator. Debs supplies the supplement-
ing child's view of the place. The
actual stories are those small and
nearly imperceptible interchanges in
which character is expressed-richly
for the discerning eye, but so subtly
that the careless would miss 1t en-
tirely. Women in the Store" which
tells how a smart aleck salesman
was put down by three old wives
is a masterpiece of this kind of un-
derstated drama. What the People
Said," which discusses the origin of
certain local phrases, is another. ]
read both of these with a delight
which is seldom a book reviewers
portion.
Has Great Merit.
Practical jokes, sidewalk conver-
sations, Halloween pranks, deaths
gossips, the advent of drummers
with their wares, Valentine Day at
school, all these phenomena of the
place and time come into Mr.. Wal
lace's picture and are handled beau
tifully. This is his first book. He
is 80, a former reporter, now ser.
geant in the Army. 1t may be thai
the profound feeling which he obvi.
ously has for his subject has giver
Darlington" its great merit, anc
that, lacking so personal source
for other books, he will display les.
talent in the future. But until
see that happen I will consider hin
. writer likely to go far.