ARE WOMEN WRITING THE BEST NOVELS?

Otago Daily Times, Issue 19020, 16 November 1923, Page 8

ARE WOMEN WRITING THE BEST NOVELS?

AN AFFIRMATIVE ANSWER. The question put in the above heading is discussed in an article prominently placed in 0110 01 the London papers, the Daily Chronicle. The writer, wlio ctescnues himself or 1101 self—probably himseli—us "one ot the crowd,” places women’s books higner to-day than men’s. . The writer iias this to say ; ~ I am not alone. Begin at the circulating library with the novels that depict heroic ‘ doings in deserts or Pacific isalnds or imaginary kingdoms, the "love stories that end happily.” Whose go out the most? Women's: descendants of Scheherazade, who told a thousand and one, of Aphra Belin and “Uroonoku,” of Mrs Kadclitfe and the “Mysteries of Udolptio,” of Airs Henry iVood, and of Miss Braddon. in the deeper and more intimate novel woman again lias a longer genealogy of her own than in any other art, and is following the Flnglish tradition more truly than the men to-day. And if there is no outstanding genius, as when Walter Scott paid his generous tribute to Jane Austen, well, we have no Walter Scott, either. Besides, our younger men writers seem to htiV6 paused in their promise. Hugh Walpole®never did anything so good as "Mr Perrin and Mrs Traill,” Compton Mackenzie reached his highest in “Guy and Pauline,” and Mr Beresford in “Nineteen Impressions.” I could quote more. Whereas May Sinclair writes ns well as ever, so does Elizabeth Robins; but no, the writer of “The Magnetic North” could hardly reach that splendid level twice. It wouldn't be fair! Add to these and others the new writer, of whom Clemence Dane is (he most strikingly original, See with what amazing cleverness she has laid bare the heart and mind of an egoist, a schoolmistress, in “Regiment of Women,” and as contrast depicted the selfless love of a girl in “First the Blade.” And have her contemporaries among men done anything to compare with her “Legend” for beauty of writing and austerely perfect structure? Shall we like the future generations to judge England as it is painted in men’s novels to-day? We ourselves turn with relief from the’ ugliness to which they would seem to have condemned themselves, from tainted Cathedral air and Society vampires and unpleasant mothers—things that never were—to what we know is true, to life as given more buoyantly by women : to real human beings without sex obsessions or depressions. Turn to Sheila Kave Smith’s “Little Erg’niid” or “Sussex Gorse,” to her splendid farmers looking haek on a life’s struggle with (lie earHi and saying, “It wore worth it.” Read Miss Holme’s “Splendid Famine.” or. better still, her “Trumnet in the Dust” (for the first is a sludv of hate and the other of level, .where Mrs Olapham. charwoman, aired 65. starts a new lease of work, taking it 110 as a “sword burkled to a brave man’s side.” A beautiful hook, true, from the first page, when the sun rises, and through all the joyful, hours w© never for a moment lose the sense of imDendimr tragedy, but we also feel it will be nobly met. If you want life, as treated more intellectuall.v and with fecl’uga more tempered, read Ethel Sidgwick’s “Restoration,” where we ore planted in the midst of a large, pleasant house party and left to sort them out and watch their doings. And all so subtly, as if through a film of our own thoughts. Read, also, “Night and Morning,” by Virginia Woolf; “The Heir," by Miss Saekville West; “The Return of the Soldier.” by Rebecca West; “Old Crow.” by Alice Brown; “Wasf.rnlls,” by aStS Dawson Scott. See what a wide field they cover—war. peace, class-barriers, nature, the spirit, love—nil are treated vividly and with good plots and normal, living people. In “short stories.” (00, women are exe.filing: _ Katherine Mansfield has given us life in lightning flashes, plain and intense, hut Miss Colburn Mayne by a more delicate,, merciful light. And nowhere in these women’s hooks wu’ll you find the slip- | siiod sentences or difl'usonoss. or madden- I big eccentricities' you find in men's today. Day and evening dresses worn in England this autumn almost invariably show ribbon decoration in one form or another. Even (he most sober serge and doth gowns have a pleating or edge of gay ribbon, si itched and manipulated in a variety of wavs,' and cuffs and collars of ribbon-work, with belts am! fantastic girdles, form a favourite finish to the toilette. Sashes and “hustle” hows ate made in the wider and slitter ribbons, and flowers and stoles composed of ribbon often add fo the embellishment of the. linings of big cloth and fur wraps and capes. In fact, there seems no limit io the uses of ribbon. It, is a pretty fancy, associated with . the whims 'of a picturesque past, and one can only hope that it will not degenerate into a monotonous or bad style. Dr Chavasse. in his standard work.. “Advice to Mothers,” advises the use of M‘Clinton’s Colleen Soap fnr the washing o? habv. Mv’l in ton’s Colleen is British and absolutely pure. Is per tablet even whore.- Advt. '