Jottings

Radio Record, Volume V, Issue 7, 28 August 1931, Unnumbered Page

Jottings

JN perusing "King Crime," by Mr. Collinson Oven, it is constantly necessary for the reader to assure himvalf that he is not scanning the pages of Edgar Allen Poe, Gaboriau, or Edgur Wallace-if, indeed, these purveyors of horrific fiction, even in their most balefully inventive moments, imagined anything somparable to Mz, Owen’s all too truthful record. WNeyor in the history of civilisation has anything been known like the absolute snbversion of law and order, the complete triumph of criminality over justice and social decency, w hich is the aetual condition of the great cities of the United States. The "Saturday Evening Post’ dleclares that "the protection of the law is steadily shifting from the citizen to the erook." With such guarantee of the ‘truth of conditions depicted, the reader of Mr. Owen’s vivid pages may accept this almost incredible volume as _& sober record of actual and indubitable fact. "King Crime" will occupy an enduring place in the sociological literature of the twentieth century. ‘ # * * WHATEVER one may think of the validity of the doctrine of relativity, it is certain that no physicist or mathematician has imposed his name on the rank and file of his contemporarjes as has Dr. Hinstein. The reason of this is explained in "Albert Hinstein: A Biographical Portrait," by Anton Reiser, who decides that Einstein is the complete human being in his ability, learning, and very wide interests. It was while working in the Patent Office at Berne in 1905 that he made what his biographer calls the "revolutionary discovery" which has brought hin fame. He is not only a man of science, but also a publicist, with an eyer-in-creasing interest in his race, and: he adores music, playing the violin and the piano well, in striking contrast to rwin, Who ultimately lost his power ‘listening at wl. nt % * "WIE Man with Iwo Mirrors" tells ~ of what goes on in the "antique" trade. As was to be expected from a practised dramatist, Mr. ISnoblock pre sents a plot that is cunningly contrived against a picturesque and everchanging background. It is the story of Benjamin Sinith, half Greek and half Muglish, whose adventures begin in the servants’ hall of 2» London house and end op a more fashionable storey, Iror Ben gets on in the world, though *. he has to fight hard for his place in the \ sun, and it is some time before he finds / "himself, znd meantime he marries the wrong woman. Ilowever, the unpleasant Zoe leaves him and bigamously marries another, and Ben goes into partnership ‘ with the curious Carradine. There is much exciting ineident, and, moreover, @ touch.of melodvamn, which is not unattractive, the whole large canyas being painted in vivid strokes,

"RED IRD," by Mr. J. M. Denwood and Mr, Fowler Wright, which is the Bnglish Book Society’s latest choice, is an exciting tale of Cumberland poachers and gypsies. The real feeling for the rough countryside is apparent in this tale of the fells, and Ike himself, besides being a poacher, is also a poet. An excellent story ef its kind, though its rough customers certainly do seam over-careful of their grammar and their language at times is of the stilted yariety, Nevertheless there is plenty of action, and some thrilling episodes. » "MIN Lustre Jug’ is a_ thriller, but of an unusual kind. Here there is no mysterious murder and no detective. Nobody, in fact, is killed until the last chapter, though there justice is done in the most satisfactory, if unexpected, way. On the other hand, Mr. Ilird has a finely dramatie story to tell ghout a woman wsose one overpoweting ambition to become "a lady" leads her into the darkest and foylest corners. There may not be many Mrs. Stradmores about, but they certainly exist, * * "tHE year of ouy Lord 1848 was a turning point in the development of girls’ education in England, and so, it may be, in the history of the world." This is the opening sentence of Miss Steadman’s biography of Dorothea Beale, who raised Cheltenham Ladies’ College from its shaky, audacioustimorous beginnings to the position of an English Public School for girls, not unworthy of consorting with the Public Schools that made their brothers. In 1848 a eollege for women students was opened in London, and christened Queen’s College, and among its first students was Dorothea Beale. Five’ years later four gentlemen of Cheltenham met to consider a scheme for a girls’ school in their own town, "the proposed course of studies to embrace instruction jn Holy Seripture and the Liturgy of the Church of England, the principles of Grammar, (Geography, History, Arithmetic, French, Music, Drawing, and Needlework." German, Italian and Dancing were "extras." It is pleasant to Jeary that when the school was opened the children brought thely dogs with them, and "eight of these settled their private differences in a free fight in the dressing-room." To this school, after its somewhat unsuecessfyl start, game Miss Dorothea Beale, in 1858, aged thirty-seven. She rempined at its head yntil her death in 1906, It was only a fortnight after she had given her last lessen in college that she died. This biography, if rather too profuse in schoo] details to hold the interest, of those who have no connection with Cheltenham, was finished, approximately, on the centenary of Miss Beale’s birth. It is a careful, ious, thorough piece of work, showing Miss Beale as she appeared to ene who was first her pupil and later a member of her staff,