Untitled

Timaru Herald, Volume CXLVIII, Issue 21575, 10 February 1940, Page 10

D 1) arrangement with His Majesty s D Stationery Office, Penguin Books Ltd. have been able to issue, as one of their special volumes the British Government’s Blue Book of documents concerning German-Polish relations and the outbreak of hostilities between Britain and Germany. It was announced recently that the sale of this book in its original form had passed the half-million mark, placing it among the best-sellers of the day. As a Penguin Special the volume is assured of wide circulation, for through it readers are given what might be described as a key-hole view of history in the making. In it will be found the full story, as contained in dispatches

from Sir Nevile Henderson in Berlin

and other representatives elsewhere, of the last British efforts for peace. The interviews with Hitler, Goering and Ribbentrop will make readers wonder to what extent their villainy is outweighed by their stupidity, but what makes the book so interesting is that the chief figures in the negotiations leading up to the calamitous climax of war are shown in their natural state. The only one of the Nazis W’ith anything like a touch of humanity is Goering, who besought Sir Nevile Henderson, while the fate of Europe was m the balance, to share his enthusiasm for the nude tapestries with which he was going to decorate a new home. In its latest and most handy form the Blue Book should be in the hands of all interested in events leading up to the outbreak of war.