...With... BOOK and VERSE

Radio Record, Volume IV, Issue 37, 27 March 1931, Unnumbered Page

...With... BOOK and VERSE

By

John

O'Dreams

*JT ONDON MPEMORIBS" will be eagerly looked for by the countadmirers of the work of St. John Gon. Knowing his London from ore end to another, with the sympathy, tolerance and imaginative vision of the writer, allied with a genius for the graceful word and phrase, this is a pook that will be bought for its literary excellence and cherished in memory of a great light in the world of journalism, which is now unhappily quenched forever. # s PL XCEEDINGLY droll is M. Dekobra’s latest fictional effort, entitled "The Sphinx has Spoken." Couched in naive and attractive form, this narrative of two British officers on the Indian frontier is to be commended to those who like to read of still another friendship between David and Jonathan. Gay ‘ gamaraderie and eompanionship are ‘threatened when the inevitable woman appears upon the stage; for both love this irresistible siren, and who could help it? All ends well, however, and ong is sorry to read "Finis" to this admirable tale of fun and frolic, with a happy conclusion that is not to be despised these dim days. * * * "Bor Not for Love," by Beatrice Kean Seymour, adds yet another to the already overwhelmingly large number of novels anent artistic temperament jn throes of tender passion. Skill in construction is apparent, Mrs. Seymour being a practised writer, the milieu for the most part being London, though later it is switched to wild woodiand, which affords setting for tempestuous rg@mance, Various members of smart bonemia, flaming youth, and intelligentsia of a stratum of society, flit through the pages, but fail to materialise into abiding place in the consciousness ; perhaps. the best portrait, being that of author-father of lovely modern heroine, he being of roving disposition and inflammable temper, and emphatically of the philandering order of male, Not finding him satisfactory as a parent, his moody daughter goes a-wandering, and, finding herself stormstead in a mountain fastness, promptly falls in love with the owner thereof, a handsome young giant, but strangely unattractive, who speaks in broad vernacular. Tempted by the heavy dower of his unexpected guest, he incontinently marries her, Y¥but fails to recognise the truth of the ‘adage. "’Tis well to be off with the old love" before taking on the bonds of the holy estate, and the end is trag- edy, which somehow fails to impress. We think Mrs. Seymour is a better eritic of other people’s novels than ereator of her own,

R. JOHN DRINKWATER, sound and versatile poet, playwright, and critical essayist, has delved into the past in his latest contribution to literature. Though perhaps it will add little to the laurels’ already won by this talented writer, the bigoraphy of the entertaining and garrulous Samuel Pepys, from Mr. Drinkwater’s angle of vision, makes interesting reading, though perhaps not so highly spiced with romantic interludes as one would have expected in the life of the old saturnalion, The author dealg extensively with official achievement of his intriguing protagonist, and those interested in this most frank and famous of diarists will find an account of his pedigree and a recapitulation of the main episodes of his life, both pwbhlic and private, Mr. Drinkwater’s work is always worth while, and his latest searchlight on modes and.manners of a former age is no exception.