Modern Monks

THE HILL OF HAPPINESS-- George N. Bhuster--Appleton ($1.75), The Franciscan monastery of these quaint tales might as well be in Renaissance Perugia as where it is in fact, modern California. Ineredible as it may seem, no modern note steals in, unless a circus, wet concrete or an ichthyosaurus may be called modern. St. Bonaventure's is as little concerned with the outside world as it is with the early lives of its members -- now all disguised as Brother Benedict, Brother Cosmos and the like (no Brothers Pete, Mike, Joe or Henry). The village, where the author grew up, is of a similar unworldliness -- perhaps a thought too Arcadian since the villagers oscillate between the modern vernacular and a strong resemblance to Hans the blacksmith, ; Schwartz the butcher and other such traditional creatures. But out of his acquaintance with real monks Mr. Shuster has wrought an atmosphere of which the charm is quite beyond cavil, even the well-nigh inescabable air of proselyting being warded off by quiet irony and bathos. Brother Alphonse and Brother Guido quarrel in the garden; a dream reconciles them. They argue of a prehistoric monster; the Father Superior sends them to the circus, which they miss through absentmindedness, forgetting their monster with their destination. Not by grace but by slices of red beef does Brother Exuper tame the fearsome mastiff. The monument achieved by Brother Giles, after unseemly longing, is his huge foot print in a new cellar floor. By such simple means is the essence of a faith distilled, not for the saints but for the love of art.