AMUSING SATIRE

Evening Post, Volume CXXVI, Issue 50, 27 August 1938, Page 26

AMUSING SATIRE

"The Autobiography of a Cad," by A. G. MacDonell (Macmillan), is a clever bit of satire, poking fun at much of what goes on in high places. It is the story of forty years in the life of Edward Fox-Ingleby, told by himself. Mr. Fox-Ingleby was a rich, good-looking young man who lived a gay and idle life before the war, who devoted . his organising talents to Whitehall during the war, and to Parliament after it. During his career through life he was often misunderstood, and often maligned. He made many enemies and alienated many friends. But never once did he deserve the harsh words which were often spoken of him. For, as Mr. FoxIngleby himself makes perfectly clear over arid over again, ■he never once' was in the wrong over anything. And this contention is clearly proved by his resounding triumphs over his detractors. Mr. Fox-Ingleby is an undiluted cad, but he gets away with it, and finishes up by being Minister of Fine Arts in the Home Government.

human body through and through, whose anatomy will be correct not only in respect of the body, but of the mind. ■ The doctor has an excellent opportunity for mastering psychology as well as physiology. On the whole, '. especially in the later authors who.;_have turned from medicine to the peri^ this prognosis will be found correct. The medico writer is usually a realist with a deep sympathy for the frailties of human nature and a capacity for understanding and so of forgiving the external manifestations of human passions whose origins he knows. He will be interested more in the behaviour of man in society than in the structure of society itself. Of all persons the doctor is perhaps best qualified from his contacts with humanity to contribute to our knowledge of mankind through literature, but he is no doubt deterred by his sense of duty to his patients that their weaknesses shall hot be revealed even under other names. Perhaps it is as well; few of us like to know the worst.