...With... BOOK and VERSE

Radio Record, Volume IV, Issue 41, 24 April 1931, Unnumbered Page

...With... BOOK and VERSE

By

John

O'Dreams

"LITrLD. AMERICA," by Richard. Tivelyn Byrd, is an account of the wogld-famous expedition, which, eighteem™. years after Amundsen and Scott made a magnificent attempt, succeeded in reaching that far-off Mecca, which in the past has been the burial-ground of innumerable high hopes. ‘This reeord .of flight over those austere solitudes that have been milieu of historic vain endeavour, despite its simplicity of expression, or because of it, makes an inspiring and thrilling chronicle, which we follow with unflagging interest until the small band of adventurers dropped the American flag over the spot where Amundsen and Scott once stood. Few and unostentatious are the words descriptive of attainment of the great goal: "The Pole lay in the centre of a limitless plain. No mountains were visible, . . And that, in brief, is all there is to tell about the South Pole. One gets there... a is the effort to get there that counts." Simple as a child’s primer it sounds, but worth all the heroics in the world. * * = "QATURDAY Night. at the Greyhound," by John Hampson, is an excellent first novel, and future work by this writer will be anticipated with eagerness by the literary cognoscenti. Of dramatic truth and simplicity, the narrative enchains attention from first to last. On a certain Saturday night in a little public-house things come to a crisis when the landlord, weak, good-looking and unfaithful, seduces the barmaid, of which fact her appalling mother, whose horrifying attributes are limned with uncanrny.glarity, quickly takes advantage. In thig@ novel the character-drawing is excllent indeed, each character being etclied with uncompromising | strokes, and the whole story related with a simplicity and sincerity that gives the apparently "ower-true tale" an atmosphere of realism and intuitive grasp of potential action that promise great things for future achievement.

A NOTHDR arresting story of a single evening is "An Angel in the Room," by Mr. Gerald Hopkins. At a small dinner party there are three guestsMr. Lothbury, home from the East; 2 reticent Major, and the blonde Mrs. Daggenham. Superficially a party that is ordinary enough, but subtle drama has been present, albeit unknown at least to one of the few guests. A domestic problem is presented ant solved in entirely charming fashion, and Mr. Hopkins has shown admirable skill and imagination in his subile setting forth of his motif. * * * To many the name of Mary Baker Eddy has spelt inspiration and a new lease of the life spiritual, while others have not hesitated to dub the establisher of "The Christian Science Monitor" a clever charlatan, much controversy raging for and against the selfelected missioner and the enormous influence she wielded over her following. Another biography of this intrepid lady has now been published by Fleta Campbell Springer, who sets out to give im-~-partial life-story of the Founder of the First Church of Christ. According to Miss Springer’s testimony, Mrs, Eddy was a remarkable personality, quite above logic or consistency, and capable of bluffing a large section of the community into accepting her as a prophetess. A delicate woman in her earlier years, and mundane enough to contract three matrimonial alliances, Mrs, Hddy’s life would appear to have been somewhat difficult until fate brought into her ken Dr. Phineas Quimby, a faith-healer, and a person of import_ance in his day. Him she accepted at his own valuation, and through his influence discovered health of body and. spirit, and the kernel of that creed which later she expounded to her listening coterie with such triumphant success. Mrs, Eddy’s interpretation of the message of the Prince of Christianity has become one of the religious forces of the world, and whatever in- ' dividual opinion may be, there is no doubt that for thousands it has solved the paradox of orthodox religion.