From Edward to George & Mary*
From Edward to George & Mary*
THE EDWARDIANS--V. Sackville-West-- Doubleday, Doran ($2.50).
A great English country house, one of the many built to be the glory of the aristocracy but becoming its grievous burden, is the dominating personality of this novel. The figures of the story are drawn from the unreal, tightly woven society of the reign of King Edward VII. Characters and house together present the argument: that there is no living under the weight of aristocratic tradition, but only a formalized existence of satisfying present appearances and ancient responsibilities.
To a weekend houseparty at Chevron, the sprawling ancestral manor, comes Leonard Anquetil, polar explorer, the type of free intelligence beloved by H. G. Wells. Anquetil watches the "set" at play, but himself hangs aloof, speculating. He learns of the other guests' boudoir intrigues, all artfully manipulated by his hostess. Only in Viola and Sebastian, the children of the house, does he find the strength of noble heritage without the conventions of elegant social horseplay. The pair make excellent companions, and Sebastian leads his visitor in a scamper over Chevron's rooftops, in the course of which Anquetil saves him from slipping to the courtyard beneath. Taking advantage of his momentary prestige as rescuer, the explorer unburdens himself about his surroundings, analyzes the life of artificiality and compliance to which Sebastian is condemned. He pleads with the boy to come exploring with him. But Sebastian refuses, for his career has already begun: he is having a love affair with his mother's friend, Lady Roehampton.
Anquetil leaves, and Sebastian pursues his amour with the ageing but resplendent beauty. When scandal threatens, however, she abandons him, though it costs her her heart and her youth. Sebastian roams on darkly, rebellious but ineffective. For a time he finds a pretty young middle-class doctor's wife refreshing, until her bourgeois virtue thwarts him. Later he loves a hard-headed little model for her honest kindness, and there is mention of a game-keeper's daughter. His only steadfast affection is for Chevron, its venerable house, its loyal tenantry, even its exhausting duties. Increasingly the proprieties grow upon him, and at last he languidly courts a proper match. Against his will he takes part in the coronation of George V. and Queen Mary, and during its wearisome ceremonies feels that his career as an individual is ended, his career as a peer commenced. Then outside the Abbey he abruptly encounters Anquetil, returned from the jungle to marry Viola on the strength of a six-year correspondence. Anquetil renews his invitation for an exploring expedition. Sebastian accepts. The story ends with an intimation that under the new monarch will come new manners, and the brilliant, flighty society that Sebastian is renouncing has nearly run its course.
The period is carefully drawn. Social history and social theory are mingled wittily. One may guess at will about the characters, for the author informs us, with feminine tact, that no one of them is wholly fictional. But there is no anonymity for Chevron. Its original is Knole, home of the Sackville family since-Elizabethan times. It is one of the most stately of English country houses, with which time and taxes, as they have with many another, have dealt rudely. The turning point, when the life of such private communities still flourished in gallantry amid the signs of change, is the material of the novel.
The Author. Victoria Sackville-West knows whereof she writes. Born at Knole in 1892, daughter of Lord and Lady Sackville, she wrote up her ancestors formally, in Knole and the Sackvilles (1922), an erudite history which gained her high rank among London's literati. While her husband, the Hon. Harold Nicolson, was writing on Tennyson, Verlaine, Swinburne, she wrote unusual travel books on Persia and South America, short stories, poems--one of which, The Land, was awarded the Hawthornden Prize (1927). Admired in England, she is better known in the U. S. as the heroine of Orlando, fantastic novel of her friend Virginia Woolf. Her group centres about the Hogarth Press, includes Rebecca West, the Sitwells, Lytton Strachey. Other books: Poems of West and East, Grey Wethers, Diary of Lady Anne Clifford, Passengers to Teheran, Seducers in Ecuador, Twelve Days, King's Daughter.
Birkenhead Plus Haldane
THE WORLD IN 2030--The Earl of Birkenhead--Brewer & Warren ($3).
When these essays were recently published in England, J. B. S. Haldane, who had previously written on the subject, recognized 44 passages as his own, rebuked the Earl (TIME, June 2). The latter admitted that there was some truth in the comment, sales jumped, and now the book appears in the U. S., a brain-child of truly distinguished parentage.
A race of scientifically-minded humans, uniformly rich, is seen working one day in four, and flourishing on synthetic foodstuffs. Children will be laboratory-made by ectogenetic methods, leaving governments free to design their subjects, women free to run the governments. The higher reaches of statecraft, however, and of the arts as well, will still be the province of males, who will relax in foxhunting and horse-racing, sports which the Earl, with true British acumen, finds will continue. War unfortunately will persist, but in a more humane form, conducted largely by amphibian tanks, perhaps radio-controlled. If the molecular engine is devised, airplanes will supersede all other vehicles, decentralizing all activities, including industry--and here the Earl makes several bows to Henry Ford. The last essay wanders a bit, forecasting an exact psychology that will sweep falsehood and pretense from the earth, leaving little that is so interesting as a brilliant, plagiaristic Earl.
The Author. Rt. Hon. the Earl of Birkenhead, P.C., G.C.S.I, D.C.L., LL.D., D.Litt., onetime (1922) High Steward of Oxford University, Rector of Aberdeen University (1926) and Lord High Chancellor of Great Britain (1919-22), has often lacked money but never self-possession. As all England knows he was born Frederick Edwin Smith and his first title was "Galloper," which friends and others still apply. Eloquence and legal brilliance carried him to the highest honor of the Law, thence to politics. Both Liberals and Conservatives respected his abilities but mistrusted his policies, as did all England. Chronic indebtedness finally compelled his retirement from Prime Minister Baldwin's cabinet in 1928. As chairman of Greater London & Counties Trust, Ltd. he has sought to stabilize his violently fluctuating fortunes. In business he has had his usual success and prominence. His heavily lined face and heavy-hanging hands betray his persistent fondness for strong drink. Last fortnight he lay critically ill in London with bronchial pneumonia, but was reported gaining with the aid of blood transfusions.
Acrobat Ludwig
THREE TITANS--Emil Ludwig--Putnam-- ($3.50).
Not content with a rapid succession of single biographical stunts, Author Ludwig here manages three somersaults in one leap, and lands, rather blown, upon his feet. Into one volume he has squeezed the life and works of Michael Angelo, Rembrandt and Beethoven, enough to occupy an author 20 years. The temerity of the performance may be pardoned, however, for the deftness of its execution. It is machine-made biography, but Ludwig is a facile mechanic, and only errs badly in poetizing, when he seems to write faster than he thinks. Except for the overripe interpretive verbiage, the volume can be read with pleasure and profit by all but exacting and critical students of literature.
Michael Angelo Buonarotti's career was one of incredible energy. Surrounded by the treachery and jealousies of the Renaissance, he preserved his life and his artistic integrity for nearly 90 years. While yet in his 20's he had done the Pieta of St. Peter's, the David of Florence, had become a national figure and a centre of dissension. When he was a boy, Lorenzo de' Medici was his patron, and his intermittent allegiance to that family was finally commemorated in the dreamy Medici Chapel of San Lorenzo. Six Popes employed him. An ever-unfinished undertaking for a tomb of the first plagued him half his life. For four years he worked on the Sistine Chapel ceiling, for six on the Last Judgment on the adjoining wall. No project was too immense for him to begin, but many were too great to finish. From birth perverse and self-contained, he had a permanent disfigurement which toughened his misanthropy. Love for mankind he never developed, but love for his work never deserted him. At 70 he was finishing the Palazzo Farnese, altering fortifications, making a church of the Baths of Diocletian, designing the Capitoline square, and planning the dome of domes for St. Peter's Cathedral. In 1564 he died, leaving comparatively little sculpture, his few majestic frescoes, a group of sonnets, all works of a lovely strangeness, a married strength and sweetness.
The life history of Rembrandt is obscure and conjectural. It is known that he was born in 1606, son of a Leyden miller, that he studied only briefly. He married the rich Saskia van Ulenburgh, and after her death took his servant Hendrikje Stoffels as mistress. He enjoyed popular favor for a time, but lost it when his Night Watch heartily displeased the members of the Banning Cock guard, who had paid for their portraits, not for a dramatic episode. Bankruptcy followed plenty. He died in disgrace and poverty. In addition to many miraculous etchings, there are hundreds of paintings signed with his name. Of these J. C. Van Dyke says 48 are genuine, but Hofstede de Groot lists 998, and controversy is wrathful. His character and temperament must be deduced largely from his paintings, a work requiring exact study. Herr Ludwig presents a changeable, sensual, weak figure that does not convince.
Last of the trio is the much be-generalized Beethoven, to whom the name "Titan" was long ago accorded. An aura of worship clings about this tough Rhinelander who transformed the intolerable affliction of his deafness into mighty music. His impossible pride impeded the social intercourse he desired. He loved always unsuccessfully. His tempestuous affections multiplied troubles with loyal friends and an ungracious family. Yet invariably out of his greatest despair came his most triumphant works: the Eroica symphony sprang from misery that led him to write his will in Heiligenstadt. This biography succeeds despite irreverent handling of disputed material and much romantic fluff. Beethoven emerges the most distinct character of the three, perhaps the greatest.
Ford's Edison
EDISON As I KNOW HIM--Henry Ford --Cosmopolitan ($1.50).
The genius of Edison, already legendary, here shines forth in all its glory. It has amazing extent. Not only does the Wizard figure out what needs inventing and then invent it, but he trains a sales force, markets his product. At heart a chemist, he is entirely at home in physics, astronomy, architecture, politics. Many business practices owe their origin to him. His phenomenal memory recalls with equal ease the make of his first printing press, the dimensions of his early laboratory, scientific facts pertaining to his many inventions, and every superior funny story anyone has told him.
The chief reason for his great productivity is that he has applied the methods of big business to the art of invention. His is the idea and the plan of work, but the execution is for his subordinates, who never question his drawings. In 24 hours he drew a complete concrete factory so accurately and imaginatively that were it built today no vital changes would be made. The ingenuity with which he overcame early lack of materials is prodigious. While building the first commercial electric light plant he was forced to invent switches, cables, fuses, even the friction tape for splices. So sincere, so acquisitive is the admiration of Author Ford for his great & good old friend that he has transplanted to Dearborn the entire early laboratory plants of Fort Myers, Fla. and Menlo Park, N. J., the latter complete to the local boarding house, to teach "boys and girls something of the spirit which made this country." There is a Fordian enthusiasm for that spirit evident throughout the book, which is as simple as the author's automobile, and with the aid of Publicist Samuel Crowther made to run as smoothly.
* New books are news. Unless otherwise designated, all books reviewed in TIME were published within the fortnight. TIME readers may obtain any book of any U. S. publisher by sending check or money-order to cover regular retail price ($5 if price is unknown, change to be remitted) to Ben Boswell of TIME, 205 East 42nd St., New York City.
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