CONDENSED CLASSICS

New Zealand Listener, Volume 19, Issue 472, 9 July 1948, Page 9

CONDENSED CLASSICS

BARCHESTER TOWERS. By Anthony Trolag WESTWARD HO! By Charles Kingsley. Todd Publishing Group Ltd., London. APMITTEDLY the Victorian novelists were verbose, but there seems little justification, in these days of paper shortage, for putting out condensed versions of their works when it is hard enough to get reprints of the originals. These two books, we are told in their introductions, have been "arranged for modern reading in the author’s own, words," but we are not told who has been responsible for the arbitrary excisions that have reduced Westward Ho! and Barchester Towers to 50,000 words each-a quarter of their original lengths, Even if we do rebel at the vast burden of explanations, moral digressions, philosophic vapourings and pompous circumlocutions which last century's writers liked to indulge in, surely it is the privilege of the reader himself to decide, according to his own personal taste, which of these passages he shail skip and which devour. In any case-the publishers are aiming presumably at a juvenile marketthese two novels have been denuded ot practically all except the bare bones of plot and action, and consequently they read almost like penny, melodramas. Although the books have been reasonably well produced as far as printing, paper and binding go, and the cuts and joins have been’ fairly skilfully made, they still fall into a category not very far above the "classic- ‘ comic" level. Many people may buy and enjoy them, but they are a poor bargain at any price. |