Cook's Tour

New Zealand Listener, Volume 36, Issue 924, 26 April 1957, Page 30

Cook's Tour

OMEWHAT at a loss for entertainment last week, sick of music, tired of plays, I decided to make a Cook’s Tour of speakers. Several were busy, and I called on them all. The first was Sir Douglas Copland, speaking in the series What Price Freedom? "Fair Shares for All" was the title of his talk, and the humanity of his sentiments was unexceptionable. He spoke warmly .of the Technical Aid Programme of the United Nations, and of the Colombo Plan; he showed a large heart and a practical sympathy with the under-privileged and dispossessed, But as radio, his talk was crushingly, stupe-» fyingly dull. When leading Commonwealth statesmen trumpet their calls to barbarism and down with the United Nations, the voice of reason and humanity must be more eloquent than

this. What price freedom? Much dearer, I’m afraid, if it is to be possible. Next, to Book Shop, no _ vintage brew this week, with only Dr Angus Ross’s lively account of Sir Arthur Bryant’s The Turn of the Tide to command the torpid attention, and effectively extinguish Sir Beverley Baxter’s syndicated article on the same subject; finally, to Andrew Shonfield for a ‘talk in his series Blueprint for Prosperity, a melancholy title in view of the day’s news. He called this talk "Making the Pace," and compared, in a relentless BBC accent the advantages of a despotic economy like the U.S.S.R. with the. nervous and fluctuating West. I found it twaddle, stodgy padding, unreal and pointless word-spinning. So, except for Dr Ross, my Cook’s Tour was scarcely a success. But I must mention a talk I heard last week and lacked space for: James Bertram’s most moving tribute to A. R. D. Fairburn. Mr Bertram placed him as an artist with the precision we can expect, and concluded with a personal memoir which made his vivid personality sing

in the. minod.

B.E.G.

M.