ENGLISH, AMERICAN AND WELSH

New Zealand Listener, Volume 37, Issue 951, 1 November 1957, Page 13

ENGLISH, AMERICAN AND WELSH

MODERN ENGLISH SHORT STORIES, Selected by Derek Hudson; Oxtord Universit Press, English price 6/-. WELSH SHORT STORIES, Selected by Gwyn Jones; Oxford University. Press, English ee: 6/-. COLLECTED a V. . Pritchett; Chatto and Windus, English price — THE PRESENCE OF GRACE, by J. F. Powers; Victor Gollancz, English price 13/6. NYONE who writes about the short story nowadays is likely to say a‘ word for the traditional. Mr Hudson says it in introducing his World Classics collection of English stories of the past 25 years when he speaks of the dangers of "the era of plotlessness," which (he says) some of our most distinguished writers have seemed bent on establishing. The more important point, surely, is that the best stories read as if they had to be written and have what we generally call a universal significance. Judged by this standard, Mr Hudson’s collection does not make me excited

about the English story today. It seldom communicates that mood of "almost hypnotic attention" on which, he says, the success of a story depends; too often the blood is thin or the bones show through. But a handful of stories which includes "The Basement Room," by Graham Greene, and "The Woman Who Had Imagination," by H. E. Bates, shows that there is still hope. Gwyn Jones in a perceptive introduction claims that the Welsh story has plenty to say and a distinctive voice at a time when "an enfeeblement of imagination" and "a __ self-regarding cleverness" have reduced many English stories to a high-class whisper. Readers who are to enjoy the earlier stories and the more fantastic in this collection will need a particular sympathy with the Welsh; but the best of the rest are less limited by their regional origins and have all the qualities Mr Jones sees in them, With a nice feeling "for form, Mr Pritchett begins and ends his collection with two of the best things he has written, "The Sailor" and "Sense of Humour." Both show the English story at its lively best. Mr Pritchett’s writing (it shouldn’t be necessary to say) is vivid and economical, his characters come quickly to life, and. while he doesn’t lack compassion an infectious smile at the human comedy is never far away. His stories are well-shaped and rounded, too, if that’s what you want; but they are not contrived-and (continued on next page)

BOOKS (continued trom previous page) that’s the vital difference between his and so many others’, Mr Powers is a New Yorker writer, which is almost recommendation enough. I confess ty a great liking for stories of the American city dweller seen with a compassionate but disenchanted eye, and th are one or two of them in this book. But most of the pieces are set in a Catholic presbytery, and almost the most memorable character is a cat through whose eyes the life of the presbytery is seen. It was a new experience to me to meet the priesthood on such down-to-earth terms. Mr Powers writes about them with a wit, irony and humour that I find altogether delightful.

F. A.

J.