Evening star., 1947-12-28
Reviewed BY
CARTER BROOKE JONES.

the arts during the turbulent years
since this century began. Perhaps
the arts were only catching up with
politics, which always has assumed
varied and vivid hues in that
harasSed country.
Some of the advance guard
schools, like dadaism, have been
forgotten except by antiquarlans
who dig into the Dos. Others strug-
gle on under one guiSe or another
Currently, of course, existentialiSm
and its messiah, Jean-Paul Sartre,
are in the spotlight. In music, the
atonalists are pretty we'll out OF
style. Yet a modernist in music,
Debussy. who certainly did not Scorn
melody, but whose use of the whole
toned scale and impressionism in
orchestration once were considered
daring, became a towering figure.
Thus, alongside of, though not
necessarily belonging to, new schools,
a few creative workers, like the
painter PicaSso, have won renoWn.
Never insecure.
Celine, too, is modernlSt, but ne
can't be pinned to any particular
movement, nor has he, like Sartre,
tried to found a philosophy. Cellne
is not hard to understand, unless
YOU seek an overall pattern to the
labyrinths of memories and reflec-
tions that make up his novels. He
Is often fantastic, but never obscure.
Since Death on the Installment
Plan" Is not new to American
readers-a translation was published
bv Little, Brown & Co. in 1938-lt
need not be reviewed. But its re-
issue by New Directions will arouse
fresh interest in the writer. Many
people who read Celine's Journey
to the End of the Night" literary
sensation of 1882, probably have
wondered what the author has been
doing in recent years. Milton Hin
dus, assistant professor of humanl-
ties at the University of Chicago
gives a partial explanation in his
introduction to the new edition.
Mr.. Hindus explains that Celine
was a prisoner of the Nazis in Den
mark for almost two years. After
the war the French government
tried to extradite Celine, charging
him with collaboration. The effort
failed. Celine described his atti-
tude toward the war as "abstention-
ist,' and, says Mr.. Hindus, "the
available evidence does not contra
dict this"
A New Debut.
However disillusioned Celine may
have been when this war broke out
he did not remain aloof from the
First World War. He fought and
was decorated for bravery and
wounded so seriously that he never
ho1 fully recovered. There was the
anti-Semitism which fared from
some of his writing, suggesting
Fascist leanings. but Andre Glide
who won the Nobel Prize the other
dqy. thought this satirical. Glide
aGmires Celine. When fascism was
rising in Europe in the '30s, Celine
once wrote: struggle against fas-
cism? One does not struggle with
q dinosaur. He dies his own death
and we die with him-in his belly"
Mr.. Hindus reports that in {
recent letter Celine said: Il mus
make my literary debut again before
a public this time infinitely hostile
But that does not frighten me.
know the music in the depths O
things. If it were necessary coult
make an alligator dance to the flutt
of Pan"
Those who read Death on tn
Installment Plan" with the care
deserves, Mr. Hindus adds, will no
think that he is eXaggerating.
Whatever your opinion of thi
book or of the previous Journey,
it will be generally admitted,
think, that Celine is one of tn
most original and provocative o
modern writer's. 1t is something
indeed. to have won praise from
such diverse critics as Glide, Thoma
Mann, Leon Daudet and Leon Trot
sky.