Herewith Bunk About "B.U.N.C."

Radio Record, Volume XII, Issue 34, 3 February 1939, Page 12

Herewith Bunk About "B.U.N.C."

T AM. pleased to have a doubleedged excuse to refer again to "B.U.N.C.," Frances Gray’s shattering satire on the armaments racket, which was heartily recommended on this page recently. First, Messrs. Constable and Company, the publishers, have ‘written from London to say that the book has enjoyed remarkable @uccess, especially for a first novel. Which is as it should be. Second, I have just read a reference to "B.U.N.C." which convinces me that the criticism so often levelled at book reviewers as a class is, alas, merited, A well-known author the other day satirically sympathised with those reviewers ‘who frequently found themselves faced with the inconvenience of having. to read ae Sa te Gira a ee .* ‘ vad. :

the books they were reviewih gy and, better still, he saluted those who avoided ttis inconvenience by reviewing the books without reading them at all,... A London contributor to the weekly book page of a leading New Zealand metropolitan daily, wrote last week of "B.U.N.C.’: "This firm (British United National Chemicals), is run by a woman who ACCIDENTALLY sells the secret of a poison gas to the Governme'nt of another country, and then has to sell its antidote to her own." No reviewer could have read "B.U0.N.C." and got, even vaguely, the impression that the poison gagv was sold to the foreign Government "accidentally." It was sold very deliberately indeed. — If the opposite had been the ease, "B.U.N.C." would have had as much sting in it as a filleted

pee:

A.R.

M.