NOVELS OF 1933

Evening Post, Volume CXVII, Issue 23, 27 January 1934, Page 18

NOVELS OF 1933

THE FIFTY BEST

In publishing a list of what it cqngiders to be the best fifty novels published last year, the "Manchester Guardian" remarks that the novels of the year, taken as a whole, .have been unenterprising and without excitement. "They show an even level of competence, but-there are no peaks .either,of achievement or of commercial success. In most years it has been simple enough to find one that had outstanding merit and another that rushed triumphantly through its editions; this time it is almost impossible. The general standard of quality has been higher • than usual, for second-rate work does not slip easily through the fine meshes of financial stringency, and there is also .the un.doubted improvement- in the popular taste. A comparison between the works, say, of Marie Corelli or Mrs. Florence Barclay and, the 'best sellers'; of the present time can only < encourage the view that the modern circulating library' subscriber has a keener literary palate than his pre-war equivalent. If this year has produced no work of genius or even of exalted merit, at least it has thinned out : the meretricious and the trashy." , •',.'•

The list given is as follows:—"Over the Eiver," by John Galsworthy; "Vanessa," by Hugh Walpole; "The Bulpington of Blup," by H. G. Wells; "Ann Vickers," by Sinclair Lewis; "The Bird of Dawning,", by John Masefield; "The Snows of Helicon," by H. M. Tomlinson;"So a Poor Ghost," by Edward Thompson; "Light in August," by William Faulkner; "All Men are Enemies,/' by Bichard Aldington; "Pocahbntas," by David Garnett; "The Paradine Case," by Robert Hiehens; "The Farm," by Louis Bromfield; "Ordinary Families," by E. Arnot Bobertson; . "Mandoa! Mandoal", by Winifred Holtby; "Frost.in May," by Antoiiia White; "Peter Abelard," by Helen Waddell; "The Proselyte," by Susan Ertz; "The Woman on the Beast," by-Helen Simpson; "Gay Life," by E.M. Delafield; "Probably Stormy," by Muriel Harris; MMary of Nazareth," 'by Mary Borden; "Stallion," by Marguerite Steen; "The Old"Man by Elizabeth Spriggo; ''The Flowering Thorn," by Margery Sharp; "Describe a Circle;" by Martin Hare;'"Hostages to Fortune," by Elizabett Cambridge; "The Augs," by G; B: Stern; "High Bising," by Angela T-hirkell; "The' Ploughman's Progress," by Sheila Kaye-Smith;" No Second Spring," by Janet Beith;'"Tops and Bottoms," by Noel Streatfeild; "The Gowk Storm," by H. BryssOn Morrison;, "Nobody starves," by Catherine ■■";Brody; "To '• Make My Bread," by Grace Lumpkin; "Little Man What Now," by Hans Fallada; "Flo," by F: C.Boden: "Love on the Dole," by Harry Greenwood;' "Tho Plebeian's Progress," by Frank Tilsley; "Pageant," by G. B. Lancaster; "Pond's Hall Progress," by H. W. Freeman; "Knight Without Armour," by James Hilton; "Sea W s all," by L. A. G. Strong; "Tho Enchanted Village," by Edward Shanks; "Trumpeter, Sound," by D. L. Murray; "The Master of Jalna," by Mazo do la Boche; "Wonder Hero." by J B Priestley; "Water on tho Brain," by Compton Mackenzie; "The Child of Queen Victoria," "by William Plomer; '^ King," by Somerset Maugham; '/£^ Wife," by/Pearl S. Buck "They. Brought Their Women," by Edna Ferber; «.«The,Delicate Fire," by Naomi Mitchison; "Forthcomine Marriages, " by Mary • Lutyens. ' :