LOVE PLAIN, LOVE COLOURED
SCHOOL FOR HOPE, by Michael McLaverty, Jonathan Cape, English price 12/6. LOV. 1S A BRIDGE, by C. B. Flood; Victor Gollancz, English price 15/-. TELL FREEDOM, by Peter Abrahams; Faber and Faber, English price 12/6. MARY ANNE, by Dahpne du Maurier; Angus and Robert son, Australian price 16/-. | MAGINE Jane Austen translated into terms of modern Ireland and you have some indication of the scope of Michael McLaverty’s sedate and- decorous little novel. It concerns the love of a middle-aged headmaster for a young teacher and the disfiguring jealousy of his sister. The world of this novel is narrow, but it is not niggling. Its truth of feeling is obscured by a curious woodenness in the writing. Love is a Bridge (a young man’s first novel) is supposed to be "sensitive and civilised" and "about decent ,people," dangerous and revealing claims. A couple fall out, and after the husband’s unsuccessful remarriage, eventually come together again. Both the wives have charming children, and one must commend the graceful manner in which people on opposing sides in the sex war keep up courteous appearances. Civilised, maybe; but sensitive? Anyway, it is a good picture of that America where money supplies a sort of traditionalism of its own. Peter Abrahams’s autobiographical novel gives a terrifying insight into the South African inferno-a region, in the scriptural sense, without love. Even as a member of the comparatively privileged "coloured" class, the young Abrahams has a hard enough upbringing. The book is not designedly a tract, -but this account of its author’s youth rouses both sympathy and indignation. Daphne du Maurier bases her novel on the life of a picturesque great-great-grandmother, Mary Anne Clark (sometime mistress of the Duke of York, son of George III), who set the fashionable and parliamentary world by the ears in her attempts to conquer some security for herself and her children. "A clever woman, Mary Anne is not clever enough to avoid going too far and goes to jail for criminal libel. This lively story is suited to its author’s romantic talents; it is as edifying as the adventures of Moll Flanders.
David
Hall
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New Zealand Listener, Volume 31, Issue 792, 24 September 1954, Page 14
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358LOVE PLAIN, LOVE COLOURED New Zealand Listener, Volume 31, Issue 792, 24 September 1954, Page 14
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Copyright in the work University Entrance by Janet Frame (credited as J.F., 22 March 1946, page 18), is owned by the Janet Frame Literary Trust. The National Library has been granted permission to digitise this article and make it available online as part of this digitised version of the New Zealand Listener. You can search, browse, and print this article for research and personal study only. Permission must be obtained from the Janet Frame Literary Trust for any other use.
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