LANDFALL

New Zealand Listener, Volume 18, Issue 456, 19 March 1948, Page 5

LANDFALL

Sir,-In his notice of Landfall, vol. 1, No. 4, OD. describes Lawrence Baigent’s review of For the Rest of Our Lives as "a pacifist’s refusal to try to understand a soldier." Yet in spite’ of its being "so obviously hostile" he finds "it "effective" and "uncommonly well done." There is surely a contradiction here. O.D. must be reading into the review something which he did not find there. Mr. Baigent keeps strictly to the point; he discusses the novel before him, criticising its "philosophical immaturity," "uncertainty of purpose," "flatness of characterisation" (I quote his own words); he does not discuss war or soldiers, and no one could deduce from his review that he held any particular opinion on these subjects. If he had refused to try to understand, if he had failed to understand, how could he possibly have written an "effective" review? He would then have been, precisely, ineffective. As for O.D.’s implied criticism of my choice of Mr. Baigent to review the novel in question, he has answered it himself. If the review is "uncommonly well done," it appears that I was right in not first catechising Mr. Baigent about his views on war, but considering solely his ability and integrity as a literary critic. And when O:D. writes of the "hostility" and "offensiveness" which he discovers in the review, he no doubt means that Mr. Baigent has. no right to criticise a book dealing with experiences which he has not himself shared. It is a pity he does not say so openly. Then we should know where we are. For this would of course put an end to literary criticism.

CHARLES

BRASCH

(Editor, Landfall).

(A copy of this letter was posted to our reviewer and brought the following reply: "If Mr. Brasch finds it interesting to tell me what he knows I meant I am not going to spoil his fun. What I said, however, was that Mr. Baigent’s review was hostile but effective. That is as contradictory as to say that Mr. Brasch is an editor,""--Ed.)