AESOP’S FABULOUS BRIDGE

Press, Volume CXV, Issue 33775, 22 February 1975, Page 10

AESOP’S FABULOUS BRIDGE

Bridge in the Fourth Dimension. By Victor Mollo. Faber and Faber. 160 pp. N,Z. price $6.75. ■ (Reviewed by J.R.W.) Most of us at some time or. another have read Aesop’s fables. Some centuries later the French author La Fontaine followed the same format of exposing the foibles and weaknesses of mankind by using animalecharacters. Victor Mollo has adopted this formula and applied it to the bridge table. There are few more humorous writers than Mollo, who combines a quick appreciation of the ridjculoua Tind the prententious, with an amusing turn of phrase. Since he is also a very competent bridge writer-, able to explain quite advanced ideas clearly-., and lucidly, his books both entertain and instruct. “Bridge in the Fourth Dimension,” is a long overdue sequel to his “Bridge in the Menagerie” and peopled with the same characters plus a few new stars. Although most of the material has

appeared in various bridge magazines over the past few years, even to those re-reading the stories they are as fresh and delightful as ever. All the old cast appears on stage again — the Hideous Hog, insufferable and insuperable, contemptuous of partners, opponents and onlookers alike; the Rueful Rabbit bungling his way from one mistake to another to a happy conclusion; and Papa the Greek, the only man “capable of false-carding with a singleton.” They are joined by Colin the Corgi, snappy and cheeky, who with his habit of insulting his partners is regarded as true expert material; and by Walter the Walrus who would rather concede honourable defeat in a sound contract with the correct point,count than succeed in a speculative venture. . Thrown together at the Griffin’s Club they provide the material for a book that will amuse everyone who knows anything about bridge and many who do not.