KANSAN REVIEWS
BOOKS: On Alice Prentice
By MIKE SHEARER Arts & Reviews Editor
A SPECIAL PROVIDENCE, by Richard Yates (Alfred A. Knopf, $5.95)
Richard Yates, in this—his second novel, has proven himself a brilliant and imaginative writer.
He has carefully developed the plot of this novel around the lives of Alice Prentice and her son Robert. While Yates never really gets inside of either character, he gives us a sufficient view of their characters by letting us watch how they cope with various situations. Alice's battle with creeping poverty and Robert's battle with World War II become revelations of the depth of their relationship to each other and to society.
If Yates has a glaring shortcoming, it is his dialogue which is too often unbelieveable. "Responsibility! Oh, don't talk to me about responsibility. . .." "Alice, will you please keep your voice down? Before you wake the boy?" A great deal of the dialogue is too predictable, as if one had read it elsewhere (and wished he'd read in nowhere).
But the two plots (Alice at home in flashbacks and Robert on the brink of war) are ingeniously interwoven. Alice's weakness (maybe it's her strength after all) for affluence, her thirst for it, her denial of reality . . . never leave Robert's side as he struggles to make a man of himself in the trenches.
The war tales (and the sometimes-hinted-at premise that assertion of masculinity in a war is genuine masculinity) fall far short of the episodes with Alice and her pride, in residence in a wealthy neighborhood and then in Texas where she lives off of her sister and brother-in-law. Alice far outshines Robert as a character. In her, Yates has given a memorable and believable character.
Sicilians on foreign shores
Mr. and Mrs. Eddie Carbone watch with amusement the antics of their Sicilian cousins who have entered the United States illegally to search for work. This pleasant scene is but a brief interlude before tragedy overfakes all of them in Arthur Miller's "The View from the Bridge." The play runs Jan. 6-10 in Experimental Theatre. The cast includes (from the left): Carol Shriver, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Robert Shriver, 3226 N. 59th, Kansas City, Kan.; Rick Daniels, son of Mr. and Mrs. Harry Daniels, 8540 Juniper, Prairie Village; Steve Goodman, son of Dr. and Mrs. Le Roy Goodman, 2119 W. 70 Terr., Shawnee Mission; and Jerry Koellsted, son of Mr. and Mrs. John J. Koellsted, 15 Boston, Massapequa, N.Y.
RECORDS: Far too little
By MIKE SHEARER Arts & Reviews Editor
They said "Funny Girl" gave us too much Streisand. If so,
"Hello, Dolly" gives us far too little of that wonderful woman.
The soundtrack, like the movie, is cluttered with choruses and squawky co-stars. The very best thing about the soundtrack, however, is that we are spared galloping waiters, parades and thousands of extras—all of which bog down the movie.
The soundtrack has dropped the Broadway song "Motherhood" and replaced "I Put My Hand In" with "Just Leave Everything to Me." They might have improved the music a great deal by throwing out at least three other songs. They have added "Love Is Only Love" for Barbra Streisand to sing, but the song is dreary and unworthy of her talents.
Streisand fans might want the record for the songs she does best on the album (and which save the Gene Kelly movie), but with any kind of luck she will sing the songs on one of her own albums some day so we can enjoy them without listening to weak-voiced broads sing "Ribbons Down My Back" or to too-circus-like voiced also-rans sing "Elegance."
* *
"The Age of Aquarius" is no doubt the best album of The 5th Dimension. In that style which is only theirs, they sing their hits: "Wedding Bell Blues," "Workin' On a Groovy Thing," "Aquarius/Let the Sunshine in," "Those Were the Days" and more.
Unlike many other vocal groups, The 5th Dimension is ascending. Their sound is also found on "The Worst That Could Happen," probably a less satisfying album all around than "Aquarius," but good listening just the same.
BOOKS
THE PILL: AN ALARMING REPORT, by Morton Mintz (Gold Medal, 75 cents)—A new one that's more or less in the tradition of muckraking journalism. Mintz has assembled a considerable amount of evidence in support of his conclusion that birth control pills are by no means as safe as the public has been led to believe. Evidence here suggests that the pill can cause clots that may travel to lungs and brain, may increase cancer potential, and that long-range effects of the pill are still undetermined. Mintz believes that many women have become, in effect, guinea pigs. The author is a writer of considerable reputation: Washington Post reporter, Nieman fellow, winner of the Raymond Clapper Award for his reporting of thalidomide, winner of the Heywood Broun and George Polk reporting awards and the Washington Newspaper. Guild's first prize for public service reporting.
Jan. 6
1970 KANSAN 5
PEOPLE OF THE CITY and JAGUA NANA, by Cyprian Ekwensi (Crest, 75 cents each)—Two novels by a Biafran author, these books representing the first American publication. Ekwensi describes city life in West Africa, the existence of poverty and fear. The author studied in Africa and in Great Britain, and has written six major novels.
Best sellers
(Compiled by Publishers' Weekly)
Fiction
THE GODFATHER—Mario Puzo
THE DAD
THE HOUSE ON THE STRAND-
Daphne maurier
Daphne du Mauro
THE FRENCH LIEUTENANT'S
WOMAN—John Faulks
THE FRENCH LIEUTENANT'S WOMAN—John Fowles
THE SEVEN MINUTES-Irving Wallace
THE INHERITORS--Harold Robbins
THREE MACHINE--Jaequeline
Louis
IN THIS HOUSE OF BREDE Rumer Godden
Rainer Gudden
THE PROMISE—Chaim Potok
THE PROMISE—Chaim Potok
THE ANDROMEDA STRAIN—Michael Chrichton
PUPPET ON A STRING— Alistar MacLean
Nonfiction
PRESENT AT THE CREATION—
Dear Acheson.
THE PETER PRINCIPLE—Laurence I. Peter and Raymond Hull
THE SELLING OF THE PRESIDENT
1988-10, Me Givens
THE SELLING OF THE PRESIDENT
1968 - Joe McGinniss
AMERICAN HERITAGE DICTIONARY OF THE ENGLISH I CAN.
GUAGE—William Morris, Editor-in Chief
MARY QUEEN OF SCOTTS— Antonia Fraser
MY LIFE WITH JACQUELINE KEN-
NEDY—Mary Barell, Gallager.
THE MAKING OF THE PRESIDENT
1968—Theodore H. White
MY LIFE AND PROPHECIES—Jean Dixon with Nexer Noorberen
AMBASSADOR'S JOURNAL John K. Galbraith
THE COLLAPSE OF THE THIRD REPUBLIC—Wilham L. Shirer
President Urho K. Kekkonen, who is known to take a drink now and then, greeted the last runners and told them he is worried about the growing use of narcotics.
RUM RELAY
HELSINKI (UPI)—A Finnish group known as the Friends of Sobriety finished a year-long torch relay race which covered more than 7,450 miles at the door of the presidential home at Tamminemi.
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