Books.

Radio Record, Volume II, Issue 4, 10 August 1928, Page 12

Books.

Last Pos t.-ITor "di Madox Ford. TAXIIIS) remarkable addition to ithe onotable series of war and post-war sketches by a brilliant writer of fiction, essays, and verse, is worthy of the close attention of students of the scope and trend of the modern novel. Exxtraordinarily interesting is the presentment of Mark Tietgens, typical British Conservative, condemned in his 1 .t years to paralysed speechlessness, although following affairs with a deadly clarity and making vitriolic mental comment on men and women-the latter in particular-who pass before his vision. Much of the story is revealed through the medium of this acute consciousness of the passing show; also as ~ it presents itself to the eyes of his French light-o’-love, Marie Leonie, ultimately Lady Tietgens, who nurses her man with sacrificial davotion, and whose naive and startlingly frank comments on Briton and Gaul make illuminating reading Then there is Christopher, another and widely-differing Tietgen, with his devotion to old furniture and the’ family home; and entire lack of it for Sylvia, his lawful spouse, that corrupt, lovely, and unscrupulous liar, surely the most hateful female in fiction. The literary style is episodic and s iasmodie in the mode of the moment, events being visualised through the" minds of the protagonists; all allied — with allusions to the beauty of the English countryside, and unerring insight into various aspects of the social upheaval of post-war Britain, with the disastrous tragical reactions upon a heipless humanity. ~ "Last Post" will make strong appeal to the intelligentsia, but is not for the squeamish, the nrarrowvisioned, or those whose taste is moulded bv the works of Edgar Wala

lace or Mr. Oppenheim.-

R.U.

R.

"Home, Health, and Garden." Several inquiries have come to hand regarding a book entitled "Tome, ITealth, and Garden,’ mentioned in this column on July 27. It is being published by the British Broadcasting Corporation (publication department), Savoy Hill, London, W.C.2. We are not aware that any advanced copies have yet reached. New Zealand.