University Politics And Intrigue

Press, Volume CI, Issue 29798, 14 April 1962, Page 3

University Politics And Intrigue

A Pound of Saffron. By M. K. Joseph. Gollancz and Paul. 253 pp.

The appearance of Professor Joseph’s second novel promises to be something of a literary event in New Zea--land. It will probably cause a flurry in Auckland—it is .set in and around the university there—although the author insists that no refer- , ence to staff members is made. “A Pound of Saffron" ■is all about academic politics and intrigue; but readers will, .in fact, soon come to the •conclusion that no plots or ‘spells even of the most , Machiavellian professor in ■ this country are likely to be ■attended by so much adult‘ery. blackmail, fornication .and attempted murder. Professor Joseph is writing a \ sensational novel this time; .and those who admired its .predecessor, “I’ll Soldier No •More." must expect something different here.

. James Rankin is professor of European Drama at Auckland; but a post in a comparative backwater is not good enough for him. He has his eye on a United Nations executive job in Paris—the ■ supreme control of the International Drama Project <UNIDRAP<. To impress appointing authority, he plans to produce “Antony and Cleopatra.’’ with an outstanding student cast It will be bis diploma piece. To succeed, the play, he decides, must noticeably reflect his own distinctive qualities as an artistic director. His Cleo-

patra is a remarkably beautiful half-cast Maori girl, Linda Chenault; and for his own purposes Rankin encourages the love-affair between her and Terry Hollis, a student of the wealthy playboy type. The play, in the new open-air theatre, is a great success.

Linda, however, discovers she is pregnant just at the time when Terry’s mother prevails on her son to take an extended trip to Europe. Linda attempts suicide, and her brother attacks Terry in a restaurant and almost succeeds in murdering him. None of this would really upset Rankin’s plans; it is his own disreputable private life that wrecks everything in the end. At a party given to celebrate his successful production. the dipsomaniac wife of a university colleague—she has also been Rankin’s mistress—puts in an unwelcome appearance Her revelations. sometimes strident, sometimes maudlin, shatter academic propriety and Rankin's future with deadly finality. The rest of the book is concerned with tidying up loose ends.

It is not always possible to believe in Professor Rankin; nor is the author very successful in creating academic types who are not ponderous or downright dull. He is much happier with young people; and Linda and Stan Chenault and Terry Hollis and his friend Tom are the characters who really carry this curiously uneven novel along