Page 11 Advertisements Column 3

Press, Volume LXV, Issue 19813, 28 December 1929, Page 11

"8.K.R." points out in "Everyman'' that on looking through any lint of titles, especially of novels and plays, "you will see that about one-third of them have been docked of the definite article." Ho quotes: "Journey's End," "Crusader's Coast," "i'irst Quarter," "Winter's Xight," "Cloud by Day," "Rome Haul," "Roman Hat Mystery," "Devil in Bronze," "Harlequinade," and concludes that the fashion is American. "I should guess that it has come by way of the news headline. If you were to object that Mr Compton Mackenzie began it long ago with 'Carnival,' I *hould accept the point; but there can be no doubt that we have adopted the trick from N'ew York. There is no sense iu it. The dropping of the article does not improve a title, rmd in nenrlv every case the omissiou is meaningless in English." letter from ;i recent number of "New Statesman '": AUTUMN" BOOK SUPPLEMENT. 0 the Editor of the •■New St.itessian ' " r - —The compiler of your list of book" ts roe with a work entitled "The JJissi t e. ' The book in question wear* the alluring title of "The Missing Mu»«." your error explains the pardonable con n of a library assistant who. on beir.jr 1 for the hook, enquired whether i! vn* lr Id&ar Wallace. From some point* of f tould \vi»h that it van Your». etc., PHILIP ijrtDAI.LA. form Club. Pall Mall, B.W. I.