INDIAN PUBLIC OPINION

Dominion, Volume 33, Issue 283, 24 August 1940, Page 15

INDIAN PUBLIC OPINION

“The Indian Press,” by Margarita Barns (Loudon: Allen and Unwin).

In writing a history of the Indian Press from the earliest days of newspapers to the present, Margarita Barns provides a comprehensive view of the growth of public opinion in India. It is a fine study, fully documented, of the struggle that has taken place for liberty of expression, and it contributes also to the history of political consciousness in the country. The Indian Press today, in spite of the restrictive powers possessed by the Central Government, has in practice as much freedom of expression as the Press of any other country. It is the author’s fervent hope that this liberty so hardly won may never be curtailed.

Allan Villiers, now in England on war service, has completed the manuscript of “Sons of Sindbad, in which lie describes his experiences during 10,000 miles of voyaging with the Arabs in their dhows on the Red Sea and the Persian Gulf. Mr. Villiers shipped on the 115-ton dhow “Triumph of Righteousness,” whose crew consisted of twenty-seven skirted Arabs and whose master was a wily Arab or No'jd, who <li<l not know how to navignte. The voyage lasted six months. “Sous of Sindbnd” will be tilled with the author's photographs taken during the voyage.

Gertrude "stein lias completed the first, forty pages of a new novol to be calle'd “Ida,” and has forwarded the manuscript to her American publishers. The book is written in Miss Stein’s usual cryptic style. The publishers wrote to the author and asked her: “Do you think that a novel culled ‘lda’ by Gertrude Stein is just what the world needs right now?” Miss Stein, who is able to write good English when she really wishes to be understood, replied: “My novel, ‘lda,’ could not, be more timely. It; is all about the Duchess of-Windsor.”