BOOK CORNER

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 79, Issue 305, 30 December 1935, Page 7

BOOK CORNER

REVIEWS

“LITTLE MEMORIES OF BIG PEOPLE,” by Max Montesole (Robertson and Mullens), pip. 121. The author has been one o£ those fortunate individuals who Lave been in many places, seen many people and sometimes talked with the great ones of the earth. There is enough of that which rings true in this collection of reminiscences to make up for those which the reader will dub of doubtful authenticity. But convincing or dubious alike arc intensely interesting. There is the effort to make a picture at almost any time, and the author tells of one incident when O. Henry dragged him across the Hudson River to see New York at daybreak rise majestic out of the night like a Lovely lady. Alright, to that of course. His pictures of Jack Dempsey and Gene Tunney ring true and this is particularly so of the Barrymore family. The glimpses of Norma Shearer and John Gilbert are excellent and not overdrawn. This reviewer doubts whether the author really met Horatio Bottomley, or if he did then Bottomley was very much, down the ladder. Bottomley has been mu'ch misrepresented. He was a rogue and he never was honest, but he had charm. He could not have done what he did had he not charm and a great command of language. He was one of the best writers in London for many a long day, and he was too astute to place himself so unreservedly in the author’s hands as the author would have his readers believe. The picture of Paul Robeson is poignant and reveals the underside of a coloured star. Strange to say the pic-ture of Gaiby Deslys does not ring true, it could have been written by any gossip of the Green Room columns but the portrait of the author Maurice Maeterlink is not only interesting, but convincing. This series of stories of the great is a mixed grill and each may choose what he will and enjoy himself according to his own desire. It is a very diverting collection of vignettes. “SOUTH COUNTRY FISHERMAN,” by Lancelot Peart (Johnathan Cape), pp. 283. Personally this reviewer would like to see the author write another book on the same subject, that is to say, of fishing. There is too much of the first person singular in this narrative, the reader can never get away from capital “I’s.” They swarm, they get in the way of the water, they obliterate the fish. Fish, and fishing tackle can be a bore to the non-fishing community, bat it can be an entrancing subject in the hands of one who knows what he is talking about and has a proper sense of what will interest his audience. Lancelot Peart should know that the. world is quite familiar with the little boy who goes out to fish in •charge of his nurse, who later goes out on his own with a bent pin, and lastly rises to the dignity of rod and line. Fisherman’s luck, what a lot eould be written about suc'h. a subject. It is not yet given to Lancelot Peart to know how to handle his material. A fisherman who is very keen may be interested in this book of how a man spends his life and never lands more than three pounds of fish at one time and yet is happy. ’Tlhe material is evidently there or here, but the hand is lacking. Try again Lancelot. “THE LITTLE . COLONEL STORIES,” by Annie Fellows Johnston (Angus and Robertson), pp. 280. There is another addition to the excellent library of children’s literature which this publishing house is building up. 'There is evidenced quite a flair on the part of somebody in Angus and Robertson’s for selecting good wholesome juvenile literature for which parents and friends of children have a very great deal to be thankful for. This book of stories can be recommended not only for its interest, but for its blend of whimsy, humour, and philosophy. :: :: :: “BORZOI,” by Igor Schwezoff (Hodder and Stoughton), pp. 441. When the publishers offered a prize of £lOOO on account of royalties for an autobiography in English, they could not, in the wildest dreams of their most hectic night have envisaged a young Russian ballet dancer of 31 years as the winner. Four hundred and eighty-four entries were submitted from

all parts of the worjd. What the. standard of excellence or otherwise they attained we have no means of knowing. We are simply told that “Borzoi” was the unhesitating choice. There can be no question of its outstanding quality in .this special sphere of literature. Readers of all types will find their interest held from beginning to end, for here we have first-hand impressions of pre-war Russia in the experience of a child, early days of the Revolution as known by a youth, the reactions to the working out of the Soviet regime as the youth decides upon his career and comes into the adventures of young manhood, and the retrospective vision of that young man after his escape through many perils into the wider world. Students of the enigma that is Russia should find these vivid pages of absorbing interest, while lovers of adventure will be thrilled again and again. Born in 1904, Igor Schwezoff is the son of a colonel in the crack Ismailovsky Regiment and of a mother whose parents were English on the maternal side and aristocratic Russian on the other, was an anachronism when the Revolution came. Between the boy and the father little affection was shown, although in after years the father made large claims upon the son’s loyalty, forbearance and support. Igor never let his father down. The mother was well-night worshipped by the boy, and her subsequent sufferings were a long sorrow to him. A sister was the companion and confidante of the years to manhood. They shared luxury and poverty, hunger and filth, high days and persecution together. An elder brother was the source of much anxiety, anguish and danger, while another was only intermittent in his fellowships. Other relatives are brought into the story with a keen appraisement of personality. The sense of the dramatic is rarely absent from any situation, but is never exploited for mere effect. Realism of a healthy kind pulsates throughout the simple narrative, told with the effective power of sincerity and candour. “He lives in the present, the embodiment of fitness, energy and grace. But his mind often slips back to the past, to his days in the land which he loves most of all. That is how he came to write this book. In “Borzoi” he has produced not only a true life story written with a tragic grace; but something yet more memorable, the picture of a great country in travail, painted by one who has seen her in every mood and who seeks neither to praise nor to condemn. Neither Tsarist nor Soviet propaganda finds any place in this book. He had started writing his biography before he ever heard of the competition, which gave him the impetus to finish it.” “Prologue in Ballet Shoes” introduces us to a young man of 26 years tramping the winter highway of Harbin with such incongruous footwear, and fear in his heart. There in a place which appeared, in comparison with the poverty of Russia, to be teeming with an enticing and almost offensive luxury, he began to think of his earliest childhood, before the Revolution and the beginning of the Soviet regime. “And those worn-out ballet shoes on my feet, having led me over mountains and through forests towards the conjectured El Dorado that was Europe, had become symbolic of the questing spirit that had led me into venturing so long and so irrevocable a journey. They were already symbolic of the endeavour and the ideals, the joys and the disappointments, so closely woven into my past life; each step I took in them was a confession of faith. Now, dirty and worn-out from the slow drudgery that nurtures the pure beauty of the classical dance, but from secret trudging by night and day—they seemed, having carried me actually on my flight, luring me onward into promises of a new life, to lead me back for a while into the past. As I looked down at them in the dusk of that winter evening in Harbin, they led me over many days and many nights, into times when I had not thought of dancing, to times when I had never even seen such a pair of shoes—back to my childhood.” The first section is introduced by an artistic essay on the symbolism of the Samovar, so typical of old Russia. It has gone the way of a hundred mightier institutions, yet remains an unfading memory in countless Russian minds. With vivid splashes of colour against a crowded background the story of the childhood years, up to the beginning of the Great War, is portrayed with charming naivete. The sickle is the symbol for the period 1914-16, followed

by the hammer for 1916-1920, with the shattering of the old life, utterly and irrevocably, beyond redemption or revival. From luxury Igor and his sister came to sharing a bathroom for a sleeping place, because it was the only room where the wind could not penetrate, except through a crack in the door. The filth and starvation, poverty and persecution, are well-nigh beyond imagination. With the resilience of youth they faced up to the situation and found much to amuse, and adventures to give zest to life. The problem of adaptation proved harder for their elders and insoluble to many of them. 1920-24 was a period of probation, as’ Igor took up dancing lessons to the consternation of his diehard aristocratic relatives. They stormed and raved, only to find him adamant. The means of livelihood became a constant struggle, and many were the shifts to which they came. Humour and pathos go hand in hand as brother and sister their lot. ‘ ‘ It was a crazy, drunk kind of period,’ ’he writes regarding a part of it. 1924-1926 deals with his progress in the dancing schools and the tragedy of his oldest brother, as well as his life in relation to the affairs of the times. From then on we are given a record of his trials and triumphs, his despairs and defeats in the career of a dancer. Again and again high success is jyithin his grasp, only to be snatched away by his championing some underdog and the taint of his aristocratic birth. He is brought to trial and we are given a moving story of a Soviet Court from the viewpoint of the accused. As one state is worse than the last a, reprieve from, trouble is sought by accepting a contract for Vladivostok. There plans are made to escape via Manchuria, and the resultant odyssey is one of the most remarkable pieces of writing in the book. After “Harlequinade in Harbin,” we come to the Epilogue in 1931 as Igor embarks for Marseilles. “In Russia, although they mistrusted me because I was a bourgeois, although I had no clothes, little food, no money, I could live for my dancing. And I thought, stupidly, that if I could but get out of Russia and come to Europe I could teach people to love the ballet. ... I should have stayed in Russia.” He loves Russia. “ROtIGH ISLAND STORY,” by Saxon Shore. Illustrated by Gilroy. (Metheun). Breathes there an Englishman with humour so dead that never to himself hath said, when pondering each page uf Punch, replete after a fulsome lunch, “this island may not be so sunny, but without doubt the British aro funny. If such there be, go mark him well* for him ,no kindly gills shall swell. But living ’neath the sorry rumour, of being born without good humour. For such an one (an one please printer!) ’twoud be a sin-ter shed his brains in battle gory or give to him ‘Rough Island Story.’ ” “Rough Island Story” is for men who love and laugh, and lose their money, who find life sweet as bees make honey, not find it in flowers

sunny. Humour is in mouths that take it, it evolves in minds that make it. Metheun’s is the House to break it. Break, yes sir, do not holler all for just a single dollar. If from the U.K. you’re out of range, Still buy the book—but add Exchange.