BOOKS AND BOOKMEN.

Otago Witness, Issue 3993, 23 September 1930, Page 69

BOOKS AND BOOKMEN.

The London Bookman, in open worldwide competition for June, has highly commended Mrs Douglas Blair’s lyric.

A copy of the second folio Shakespeare, printed in 1632, has been sold in London for £4OO.

Sir James Barrie will be installed as Chancellor of the University of Edinburgh at the graduation ceremony on October 25.

“ English Monasteries in the Middle is an illustrated survey by R. L. Palmer just published.

An edition by Mr E. F. Benson of a number of unpublished letters of Henry James to A. C. Benson and Auguste Monod is announced.

“ The Leacock Book,” is composed of passages from the works of Stephen Leacock, selected and arranged by Ben Travers.

Miss Elisabeth Wilkins Thomas, whose first novel, “ Ella,” was published recently, is an American who was born in Brookland, and grew up in Bay Ridge, Long Island. She graduated at Vassar University, and for several years was a schoolmistress.

The American income-tax authorities are claiming £420 from Mr Rudyard Kipling, which is alleged to be due on income derived from the sale of his works in the United States in 1924.

In a book entitled “ Pen Names and Personalities,” Mrs A. Russell Marble, traces the use of pseudonyms in all literatures, past and present.

Dr Rudolf Kircher, the London correspondent of the Frankfurter Zeitung, has written “ How They Do It in England,” which has been translated by Lady Warwick.

A sixteenth century manuscript describing the life and the voyages of the explorer Christopher Columbus, written by Anvers Barnaldez, the priest of a village near Seville, has been discovered in a Spanish Library. It has been bought by Dr A. S. W. Rosenbach, the American collector, and is said to be the greatest literary find of the generation.

The third volume of Professor Karl Pearson’s " Life, Letters and Labours of Francis Galton ” has been published in two parts.

The autograph manuscript of Tennyson’s “ The Princess,” consisting of 1200 lines, covering the first five parts of the poem as published, has been sold for £1750. A manuscript including this early play, “ The Devil and the Lady,” fetched £620.

Mr Noel Douglas will shortly publish “ Divorce,” a symposium of views by 11. G. Wells, Rebecca West, /Vndre Maurois, Warwick Deeping, Leon Feuchtwanger, Theodore Dreiser, Bertrand Russell, and Fannie Hurst.

Mr Henry Williamson has just published “ The Village Book,” which he completed in 1921, and which he has rewritten each year since. It deals with various aspects of village life, and though it was written in North Devon Mr Williamson says it should not be read as the history of any particular villager.

Mr A. P. Herbert, whose novel, “ The Water Gypsies,” was published recently,

has been writing the dialogue for a “ talkie ” called “ Windjammers.” Most of the work was done on his boat, the 'Ark, in which he is soon going to tour the canals of England.

Under the auspices of the “Friends of the Cathedral Church of Norwich,” there will be shortly published “An Introduction to the Obedientiary and Manor Rolls of Norwich Cathedral Priory,” by H. W. Saunders, D.Litt., F.R.H.S. The Dean of Norwich has written a foreword to the book.

An American author, poet, and critic, Mr Louis' Untermeyer, whose anthologies of Modern Verse are widely used in American Universities, has written a travel-book which bears the title “ Blue Rhine—Black Forest.”

Lord Grey of Fallodon has revised his book on " Fly-Fishing ” for an enlarged edition illustrated with wood-engraviugs by Eric Fitch Daglish. The additional matter includes a “ Retrospect,” which forms two new chapters.

“ Maritime Trade in War,” by Lord Eustace Percy, contains the lectures delivered by the author in America on “ The Freedom of the Seas,” with special bearing upon the League of Nations.

Among the sixteen new recipients of Civil List pensions of £lOO a year, granted in recognition of their literary work, are Mrs Mary St. JLeger Harrison, the youngest daughter of Charles Kingsley, who wrote numerous novels under the pen-name of “ Lucas Malet,” and Miss Beatrice Harraden, whose novels include “ Ships That Pass in the Night.”

Mr E. F. Benson’s reminiscences, covering a period from 1870 to 1914, are to be published under the title “ As We Are.” The. changes from Victorian to pre-war habits of life, the many celebrated or curious people he met, causes celebres of the past, and a collection of letters now’ for the first time published, are some of the interests promised Ui the book.

A tragic death that has passed almost unnoticed in the press is that of Mr Donald Stewart from consumption in a nursing home at Walmer, Kent. He was the author of a brilliant autobiographical novel (recently reviewed in our columns), “ Sanatorium,”-which described the life of a sufferer from this disease. He was only 27, and was at work on another novel at the time of his death.

The diaries and papers of the late Colonel Schwartzkoppen, one time German Military Attache in Paris, are to be published in an English translation. Among other things, they tell “ for the first time ” the truth about the Dreyfus case, the most sensational of all spy stories.

The publication of the first popular edition of “ The Home of the Blizzard,” by Sir Douglas Alawson, being the story of the Australasian Antarctic Expedition, is announced. Included are maps and 80 pages of unique illustrations, and the publication price is 12/6. When the original edition of this great story was published during the war it was acclaimed by experts as an almost ideal record of sublime adventure. The scientific results of the expedition exceeded the happiest expectations of its promoters, whilst the record of endurance, intrepid daring, and glorious self-sacri-fice of these men added a shining page to the records of the race. Sir Douglas Mawson’s story of the great venture of himself, Dr Mertz, and Lieutenant Ninnis, out of which Mawson staggered alone and scarcely alive, is one of those chapters which adds cubits to our stature. Busy as Sir Douglas was last year in arranging for his second expedition to the Antarctic, on which he is now engaged, he found time to prepare this popular edition in response to the wide demand that this story should be made available at a popular price. This is an abridgment of the original edition by deleting the more technical material. New pictures, however, have been added, and both in its appearance and matter this popular edition is one of those great and glorious books which keep alive in the heart of the race the spirit of fine adventure and the ability to lose life in order to find it.

"The whole of the South Island appears to have had a very Rood season for trout,” remarked the president of the Southland Acclimatisation Society (Mr James Robertson), at the monthly meeting of the council the other night when letters were read from several societies declining offers for brown trout ova (says the Southland Times). It was stated that although the society had at first believed that it could utilise all the ova collected in the district, it had been found that the numbers collected were much greater than had been anticipated, and supplies were offered to several societies which had been inquiring for ova earlier in the season. The best porters and attendants in a sanitarium are those people who have had treatment there and have been cured, according to Mr A. T. Smith, a member of the North Canterbury Hospital Board (states tlie Christchurch Sun). Speaking at the meeting of the Addington Burgesses’ Association the other evening, he said that wherever possible the board engaged expatients in ouch positions. These people had been through the treatment themselves, and understood how patients had to be handled.