LIBER'S NOTE BOOK

Dominion, Volume 13, Issue 269, 7 August 1920, Page 11

LIBER'S NOTE BOOK

"The Round Tabic." "The Round Table" for June is an exceptionally strong number. The 1 opening article, "The Last of i!he Peace Treaties, 3 is, a careful, and extended, if not exhaustive, survey of the situation in European Turkey,- with the indirect effects of the Turkish Treaty upon tho Mohammedan communities in A'oniern Africa and Central Asia. The author of tho article is greatly concernod over tho dangers arising from Pan,'. Islamtsm, .which he fears the Entente Powers nro over-inclined to placate at the oxpense of the nationalist! principle. The policy of' tho Powers in tho Middle East should be, he contends, to encourage nationalism; Another very useful feature is' the presentation ,by a .French writer and a German correspondent respectively ■of ilio case against a revision of the Versailles Treaty, and the arguments in support of such revision. The American Presidential campaign is referred to in the course of an -article on "America and the Peace .Treaty." The writer of tho

article holds that, if Johnson won tho 'Republican nomination, "it.nouW spell tho' Treaty's defeat," and that if Hoover should win it would mean ;i resounding victory for the League." From whin! is enid us to Johnson '} anti-British viows -his criticisms on Great' Britain have made Mai tho "favourite son" of IrishAmericans—it is a matter for congratulation that it'his particular candidate did not secure ,the nomination. Tho summaries of political and other happenings in Canada, Australia, and New Zealand are, as.usual, marvels of conciseness. Stray, Leaves. 'More Chestertoniana (from "The Superstition of Divorce"): "You turn tho world upside down, .and ttiere is much to be eaid for the view that it may then bo the right'way'up." . . . "Tho morality of a great writer is not the morality he teaches, but the morality he takes for granted." . . . "Man can always be Wind to a thing provided it is big enough." ■'.'■,, .. ■ , Two forthcoming novels by exceptionally clever lady writers are "The Judge," by Rebecca West, and "The Romantic," by May Sinclair. > . A London second-hand bookseller has been telling "John O'London" (who now writes a gossipy London letter to the "New York Times" Literary Supplement), that he has been doing big business with the "new rich" in elegantly 'bound editions do luxe of standard authors. In their desire to furnish their new homes with fine-looking libraries, money, says John O'London, "is no object with: these people." On the other hand, the well-to-do artisan "is spending money freely on books He is buying expensive works'on sociology and economics, and publishers are surprised at the big orders they are getting from the industrial centres in the Midlands and the North of England for new books and new editions of old ones at anything from 10s. Gd. to two guineas." The. fact that Sweden is a paper-pro-ducing country may account for the fact that a translation, of.' Joseph Conrad's' latest.novel, "The Rescue," which, toy the way, is a long time in reaching the New Zealand bookshops, is published at one krone, about a shilling! The cheapest English edition costs Bs.' ■