Listen to a Clown

New Zealand Listener, Volume 3, Issue 53, 28 June 1940, Page 10

Listen to a Clown

HAVEN'T elsewhere read pages which, like these few, convey the impression of the utter helplessness of the individual in the confused, blind, cruel struggles of those days (of the Russian Revolution). And in the midst of them Coco fell in love. ..

Hear how Nicolai and Valentina celebrated their marriage: We went: back to my mother-in-law’s house, and for our wedding feast we had on the table a pound of bread and one salt ‘herring, "You eat, Valentina," I said. "No, Nicolai, you eat; you have to go to work,"

"Listen, I will cut it in half,’ I said. I did so, and that was our wedding party. Now there, in that passage, you can catch what is most admirable and likeable about Coco: a per-

fect simplicity, a sort of unspoilable, childlike innocence, unspoiled by horrors seen and suffered. But they are the dark background against which you see Coco arrive in England, under his first contract to the Bertram Mills Circus-arrive, and fall in love again,’ with peace. He had to bring Valentina and their children to live in England: "My mind was on England. Having lived there once, nothing would ever be the same again for me when I wasn’t there. There are people in England who do not seem to realise what a wonderful place it is. Its cities, so-big and clean. And the beautiful countryside. Life can be lived there freely, and there is no cause to be afraid. And that makes its people kind." This happy period closed when the war came and the circus lights were blotted out. Coco the Clown is in the British Army today, fighting for the peace of his adopted country.-(From a review, 3YA, June 11, by J. H. E. Schroder, of Nicolai Poliakoff’s "Coco the Clown." J, M. Dent and Sons Ltd.).