What London Is Reading

Auckland Star, Volume LXIX, Issue 136, 11 June 1938, Page 14 (Supplement)

What London Is Reading

ByCharles Pilgrim LONDON.

A BOOK which is of interest to everyone on account of the present international race in armaments is "The Whispering Gallery of Europe" (Collins), by Major-General A, C. Temperley. General Temperley represented the British Government at Geneva during 10 years and was also chief military adviser to the Foreign Office in that time. His book is mainly concerned with the League of Nations, and in particular the ill-fated Disarmament Conference which commenced its work in 1932. Oeneral Temperley proves himself a keen-eyed and well-balanced observer. He was behind the scenee of diplomatic intrigue and has a great deal to say about the conduct of the various f.'overnnients which made international agreement almost impossible. In this respect he haa a eharp word concerning French diplomacy and national selfishness, (iiven the facts which this author reveals with obvious avoidance of overstatement, one sees that the Disarmament (.'(inference was foredoomed. The various groups of delegates were intent on sectional advantage and raised dilliciilties on almost every point.

There is a very interesting and arresting comment on the subject of air armament and aerial bombing. General Temperley believes that to get rid of this menace against the whole of civilisation it would be necessary to 'make an end of aviation altogether. So long as civilian aeroplanes, with their rapid convertibility, remain, it were an idle effort to obtain any agreement prohibiting their use in war. Civilian and military machines muet go together or not at all. "Uncle Arthur" Another book with an intimate bearing on the Disarmament Conference is "Arthur Henderson: a Biography" (Heinemanu), by Mary Agnes Hamilton. Mrs. Hamilton has approached her subject in the spirit of clear-sighted admiration without any disabling idolatry. She tells the story of a simple, honest man of unusual ability and tenacity of purpose. Arthur Henderson was always a stern moralist and a -.tronj,' pillar of the Nonconformist science. Jt was this attitude which he Inought into political life and made him somewhat rare amongst political figures. We learn of his early days ae a Sunilay school teacher and lay preacher, of his steady work in building up and controlling the Labour party; of his terms nf office as Cabinet Minister, And finally of his devoted efforts to bring success to the (Jenevii Disarmament Conference over which he presided. Mrs. Hamilton's admiration cannot <|iiite hide from the iliscrimiiiating reader (he fact that Arthur Henderson's character and training were not sucli as to fit him for hi* position at (ieneva when he had to deal with a number of subtle minds representing national nnd racial approaches very different from his own. But milking all allowance for his limitations, one must see him me, a man worthy of n*peet in all he did. Quite us much as Philip Snowden, he desvrved the epithet "incorruptible." To some his incorruptibility might have appeared as obstinate narrowness, but it was an obstinacy which represented English doggednees and stood for something of the secret of English strength. The :iame "Uncle Arthur"' betokened al*o the sweetness of disposition and kindliness of heart which were the other side of his etern morality. Unhappy Undergraduate Mr. Humbert Wolfe is now known a? a distinguished poet and an important civil servant. He has reason to be satislied with his fortune, ltut looking back on his youth, he finds material for di«contulit. 11l '"The Upward Anguish"' (Cassell), he hae told the story of his discontent at Oxford, when he wont from Bradford full of sensitive hopes a;. 1 found himself in the mid*t of noisy and unsympathetic undergraduates. He was a Jew from Yorkshire, with not a little of self-conscious intellectual superiority and as much of an alien as was Shelley more than a century earlier. But gradually Oxford conquered. He met sympathetic companions and found means of self-expression. He brings an ironical and comic spirit to bear on 1/io Bufferings of the young intellectual and all those ri|>e literary gifte to which the matured Humbert Wolfe has accustomed us. Anglo-Japanese "This Solid Fltvh" (Bell), by Bradford Smith, is a tale of that racial mixture to which has been given the name Kuratsiail. An American girl marries a • Japanese gentleman in the United States. They are quite happy until his business needs take him back to Tokvo, where his wife ie plunged into the difficulties of a racial outcast. With especial heaviness do these difficulties fiill upon their daughter J{iith. The • lapjinese husband, too. has hi* share of the trouble*. He is divided between his intense and lasting love for his wife and his loyalty to the Japanese tradition. In the end the daughter marries an American and returns to her mother's native land. But we are given to understand that, even so, life will not be simple for her. There will remain the conflict of blood and the consciousness of a life not fully realisable anywhere. This novel is written with an intimate knowledge of Japan and a sympathetically objective attitude towards the probleme raised.