A NOTABLE GERMAN NOVEL

Evening Post, Volume CX, Issue 47, 23 August 1930, Page 21

A NOTABLE GERMAN NOVEL

"The Maurizius Case." By Jacob Wassermann. London: George Allen and Unwin.

Wassermann's latest novel, "The Maurizius Case" is rather a lengthy German commentary on the human dispensation of justice as it is understood today in Europe. In effect the author questions whether human judicature and justice in its essence are identical. For the purposes of his theses in the case of a life-sentenced prisoner for murder found guilty on a perfect chain of circumstantial evidence, Wassermann finds that they are not identical. Like many translations of German novels this book provides an immense amount of detail, so that to some readers it may become wearisome. But the German in all things is nothing if not thorough. "The Maurizius Case" affords a clear insight into the German legal machinery which obviously does not differ a great much from the British system. In parts of the book Wassermann rises to great heights as a writer of literature and nowhere is he better than in. his description of tho effects of gaol life made to come hesitatingly from the mouth of a prisoner after his nineteen years of incarceration. There are sections in the book that will disturb the sensitive reader, even in these frank times, and "The Maurizius Case" is not a book for every shelf. It is a story of a conflict between the younger and elder school of thought, the elder being represented by the Attorney-General, Freiherr yon Andergast, and the younger by his son, Btzel. The latter is extraordinarily precocious, even for a German boy, in his working against his august father on behalf of tho prisoner Maurizius. Other peculiar characters are introduced, one might label them offensive, but it must be remembered that the story has been primarily written by a German from the rather broad Continental point of view. The book is not an entertainment, but it is something for the thoughtful to con over, even though they may not agree with all that Wassermann, a firstclass writer, may assert.