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University Daily Kansan Thursday, March 26. 1964
Two Books by West Plus Oliver La Farge
TWO NOVELS BY NATHANEL WEST: THE DREAM LIFE OF BALSO SNELL and A COOL MILLION (Noonday, $1.65).
These are for the West cultist, which has become sizable in recent years. These, unfortunately, are not in a class with either "Miss Lonelyhearts" or "The Day of the Locust." Yet, without comparing them to those books (modern works of art in their way), one must conclude that "Balso Snell" and "A Cool Million" are still of interest.
West died in an automobile crash in 1940, when he was only 37, his talent unrealized. He was in decline for years, but has been discovered of late. This book includes novels of 1931 and 1934.
"The Dream Life of Balso Snell" is little more than a vignette, a fantasy that takes place inside the Trojan horse. There is wild humor and beautiful writing in both this and "A Cool Million," a Horatio Alger type story that takes place in the depression and sets out to shatter a good many popular conceptions of Americans.
SO RED THE ROSE, by Stark Young. (Popular, 75 cents).
Though Stark Young is best known as a critic, he wrote this novel in the early thirties, some time before "Gone with the Wind," and it achieved considerable popularity as a story of the antebellum South. The years have not been good for "So Red the Rose," and today it looks like a far more romanticized view of things than 30 years ago.
years ago.
The author's setting is Mississippi, there is the conventional southern heroine, there is the fiery father, there is the dashing lover. Donald Davidson, in an introduction, gives to the novel considerable significance, more than it may deserve. Speaking in a literary sense it is the superior of Margaret Mitchell's story of Scarlett O'Hara; in a dramatic sense it is inferior; in terms of commenting on the war
and its meaning it marks no new ground.
LAUGHING BOY, by Oliver La-
Farge (Sentry, 8.195).
Last August the newspapers of America reported the death of Oliver LaFarge, novelist, anthropologist, and authority on the American Indian. He was best known for his slight, lyrical novel, "Laughing Boy," which won the Pulitzer prize for 1829, despite the competition of such books as "Look Homeward, Angel."
Its stature then was somewhat higher than that of today, though it may be the most believable novel yet written about the Indian. Its hero is the Navajo. Laughing Boy; its heroine his mate, Slim Girl. Laughing Boy and the conflict of his civilization with that of the white man provides the plot.
LaFarge, who lived in New Mexico, knew well the ceremonial dances, the work of silversmithing and rug weaving, the speech patterns of the Indian. These are basic to this beautiful book, which remains, despite some slips, a sturdy modern classic.
THE ART OF THE NOVEL, by Henry James (Scribner Library, $1.65).
Students of the novel could find few books of more help to them than this collection of critical prefaces by Henry James. These were done for the Scribner edition of James' novels which appeared in the first decade of this century.
James was selective, and tended to regard lightly certain of his works, so they do not show up among these prefaces. But most of the familiar titles are here, with James spelling out for us just what he was doing and trying to say.
PUTNAM'S CONCISE MYTHOLOGICAL DICTIONARY (Capricorn, $1.45).
Here is an interesting little guide for the service of students of literature and mythology.
a 95 each simplified approach to the classics
Barron's Educational Series, Inc. Great Neck, N.Y.
PLATO &
ARISTOTLE
CHAUCER
DANTE
FIELDING
FAUST I-II
VERGIL
HOMER:
ILIAD AND
ODYSSEY
MILTON
ROUSSEAU
OTHER TITLE:
SHAKESPEARE:
OTHELLO
MACBETH
KING LEAR
JULIUS CAESAR
HAMLET
OTHER TITLES IN ACTIVE PREPARATION
JAMES
TWAIN
HAWTHORNE
WHITMAN
MELVILLE:
MOBY DICK
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