Wednesday, March 6, 1963 University Daily Kansan
Page 3
Golding and Updike Books Lead Current Titles
LORD OF THE FLIES, by William Golding (Capricorn, $1.25).
We are informed that "Lord of the Flies," for high school and college students, has replaced "The Catcher in the Rye" and "1984." Though a spot check reveals relative ignorance of the book, there is reason to see why it would capture the present generation. The book is going on a decade in age, but its rediscovery has made it something of considerable interest.
Briefly, Mr. Golding has taken the theme of innocence, which Mark Twain in "Hickleberry Finn," Henry James in "The Turn of the Screw," and Richard Hughes in "A High Wind in Jamaica," have handled so superbly, and given it a cruel twist. He places a group of boys on a desert island and proceeds to show the eventual corruption of most of them.
Critics have commented that the author is dealing with the inherent nature of man. What we have here is the social contract turned upside down, the breakdown of civilized veneer—for that's probably what it is—into savagery. It's a shocking and enthralling story, an adventure tale that has little flair for the romantic. For its social comment, for its story, for the beauty of its style, this novel deserves close attention.
RABBIT, RUN, by John Updike (Crest. 70 cents).
There is no denying the power or the skill of this young writer. He tells here a story of a man caught in a trap, one partly of his own making. Whether Harry (Rabbit) Angstrom is meant to be symbolic of American society today is not certain; he does resemble many of us in his desperate attempt to seek identification in a mass world.
But Angstrom does not have the stature nor the dignity to command
our attention. He is like many of the anti-heroes in our fiction, movies and television. A flash basketball star in high school, he gets into a miserable marriage and a miserable job, flees them both, finds solace in the arms of a prostitute, chums around with an Episcopalian minister who is about as confused as Rabbit, goes back to his wife, and runs again when tragedy strikes his home.
In its brutality and sexuality this is one of the most explicit books in years. Good though the book is, it makes one yearn for the at-least-life-size heroes of the past.
WILDERNESS, by Robert Penn Warren (Signet, 60 cents).
There is a good deal more compassion and understanding in this short novel than one usually finds in Warren. In addition, this member of the "Till Take My Stand" group of 1930 seems to be on the way toward rejecting the southern society he once praised so highly.
"Wilderness' deals with Adam, a Bavarian Jew who comes to America in the Civil War but because he has a club foot is not permitted to fight. With a castoff North Carolinian sutler and a Negro he journeys into the countryside of northern Virginia about the time Grant is taking over command of the northern forces.
And, like Pierre in "War and Peace," this hero attempts to learn about war and his own relation to it as he follows the troops and sees men and women at their best and worst. Though always engrossing, and containing much understanding, "Wilderness," unfortunately, cannot compete with the best of Robert Penn Warren.
CLOCK WITHOUT HANDS, by Carson McCullers (Bantam, 75 cents).
Every so often, as one reads this latest novel by Carson McCullers, he has a glimmering that the author might make the thing come off. It recalls her earlier works, particularly "The Member of the Wedding," in its evocative qualities, and as usual she gives some sharp portraits of the South and of southerners.
But the whole thing descends into a wild and melodramatic ending. And its twin plots are puzzling, because one never knows for sure just what the focus may be. Basically, it is about a small town pharmacist in Georgia, who is dying, and who at 40 is trying to come to grips with death. But just as basically it is about a senile judge who lives in a fantasy of antebellum dreams and has a strange relationship with a blue-eyed Negro boy and his own grandson.
THE WATCHMAN, by Davis Grubb (Crest, 50 cents).
Many readers will remember Davis Grubb for his chilling story, "The Night of the Hunter." This new one is in the same class, a shocking story of innocence and evil, with enough believability to temper the grotesque.
THE EMPTY CANYAS, by Alberto Moravia (Signet, 75 cents).
it is the story of a sheriff, greatly respected in his community, and of the strange connection he and his daughters have with the death of a young man. Readers who enjoy the macabre should find "The Watchman" an exciting experience.
If we are to take this novel at face value it is one of the most explicit and blunt novels of sex to appear in years. Let us assume that there is more here than that. Let us assume that Alberto Moravia is trying to tell us something about ourselves and our times.
Here is a novel of vacancy, not of lostness, because the central characters were never found, but of vacancy. The chief character is a dissolute Italian named Dino, who stares emptily at his canvases and finds he is unable to make so much as a mark on them.
Dino becomes the sexual slave of a nymphomaniac named Ceclila. Neither feels anything in their many (almost daily) sexual encounters. Dino comes to realize that the body of this woman he wants to love is as empty as one of his canvases.
BANG THE DRUM SLOWLY, by Mark Harris (Doubleday Anchor, 95 cents).
Few writers attempt the vernacular mode these days. One who does quite well with it is Mark Harris, an English professor at San Francisco State. Harris knows baseball, and out of the world of baseball he has constructed novels that compare favorably with the stories of Ring Lardner.
This one is absorbing, frequently funny, slow-paced, and quite believable. It's a bout a no-good catcher from Georgia who is dying of an incurable disease. And the story describes his last baseball season, and that of his team, the New York Mammoths, as told by the southpaw pitcher, Henry Wiggen.
Sometimes it's beautiful, always it's moving. Few novels catch the theme of man's inhumanity — as well as humanity — to man as well as this slight little tale.
THE AGONY AND THE ECSTASY. by Irving Stone (Signet, 95 cents).
Few recent novels have had the popularity of this blockbuster, which does, in a way, for Michelangelo what Stone previously did for Van Gogh. But inevitably there is embellishment, and the novelist has provided everything, including romance.
For the casual reader of popular fiction, this book probably is a must. It has vigor and force and sweep. It has full-fledged portraits, and one can almost feel the creative urge of a genius like Michelangelo. Stone has provided his interpretations of the great Medici family, the powerful Popes, Leonardo, Botticelli, Raphael, and the impassioned Savonarola.
THE WINTER OF OUR DISCONTENT, by John Steinbeck (Bantam, 75 cents).
Those who scorned Steinbeck's being awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature could find support for their position with this novel. Though it is engrossing, at times moving, maybe at times even meaningful, it is basically second-rate fiction.
Steinbeck herein gives each of us a look into himself and his postwar attitudes. There are some sharp blows struck here against shoddiiness of thought and action, materialism, the fast buck, and veneration for the guy who can put it over on somebody else. His hero is a grocery store clerk (and unfortunately he, his position, and his language ring of the thirties more than the sixties), who has fallen to low estate from his once-important New England family position.
It is in this man's rejection of an elaborate plan to get rich quick, in favor of a return to integrity, that Steinbeck makes his points. But it's all quite labored, and one wonders if perhaps it wouldn't have been better for American fiction — and Steinbeck — if he had quit writing some years ago.
PENGUIN AND PELICAN BOOKS for enjoyment for required reading
Fiction and Crime
CASTLE GAY - John Buchan. A millionaire newspaper proprietor vacationing in Scotland accidentally becomes involved with central European revolutionaries. 85c
CONVERSATION IN SIGILY - Elio Vittorini. A novel translated by Wilfrid David. Introduced by Ernest Hemingway. 95c
COFFIN, SCARCELY USED - Colin Watson. Inspector Purbright didn't think it natural that Marcus Gwill should be found dead with his mouth full of marshmallow. 65c
COURTROOM U.S.A.; 1 - Rupert Furneaux. From the crime annals of 20th-century America: the kidnapping and murder of the Lindbergh baby; the Sacco and Vanzetti affair; the trial of Harry Thaw 65c
FAMOUS TRIALS 7 (TRIALS OF OSCAR WILDE) - Ed. H. Montgomery Hyde. The trials which led to Wilde's conviction for gross indecency with male persons. 85c
GREENMANTLE - John Buchan. A story set against the background of political and religious unrest in the Middle East. 85c
THE LOVERS - RAYMOND PEYNET. Witty and amusing cartoons about love by the French artist. 95c
JOHN MACNAB - John Buchan. A witty tale of a poaching expedition in Scotland. 85c
LITTLE BROTHER FATE - Mary-Carter Roberts. A fantasy-ridden woman, two homosexuals, and a parson are led inexorably on to the final demented act of murder. 65c
NO LOVE LOST - Margery Allingham. Two swift-moving detective stories. The Patient at Peacocks Hall and Safer than Love. 65c
THE PRINCESSE DE CLEVES - Madame de Lafayette. Translated by Nancy Mitford, the novel reflects the manners and morals of the court of Louis XIV. 85c
General Knowledge
AFRICAN PROFILES - Ronald Segal. An assessment of the leading personalities of Africa today. $1.45
BERLIN: HOSTAGE FOR THE WEST - John Mander. The story behind the Soviet pressure on Berlin. 95c
THE BHAGAVAD GITA. A new translation by Juan Mascaro of the great Sanskrit philosophical poem. 95c
A BOOK OF MEDITERRANEAN FOOD - Elizabeth David. Recipes for delicious dishes from Provence, Italy, Spain, Greece, and the Middle East. 95c
THE CHESS MIND - *Gerald Abrahams*. How the average player can improve his standard of play. $1.45
THE DEAD SEA SCROLLS IN ENGLISH - Geza Vermes. A clear, faithful translation of the non-Biblical scrolls from the Qumran caves. $1.25
FREUD AND THE POST-FREUDIANS - J. A. G. Brown. Freud's theory and its development; how his contemporaries and immediate followers have revised his ideas. 95c
A DICTIONARY OF ELECTRONICS - S. Handel. Words as used in the fields of automation, computers, artificial satellites, radar, guided missiles, and navigation. $1.65
HAMLET - William Shakespeare. Edited with an Introduction by Willard Farnham. 65c
HINDUISM - K. M. Sen. A guide to the nature and function of Hinduism. 95c
HUMAN GROUPS - W. H. SPROTT. Social relationships and needs in a world of impersonal contacts. 95c
KNOW YOUR OWN I.Q. - H.J.Eysench.What an I.Q. is, applications and shortcomings, with eight sets of problems for determining one's own I.Q. 85c
LEONARDO DA VINCI - Kenneth Clark. An account of his development as an artist. $1.45
MEDIFAL LATIN LYRICS — Tr. Helen Waddell.
A selection from the work of the 'Vagantes' $1.25
PELICAN HISTORY OF MUSIC, 1: ANCIENT FORMS TO POLYPHONY - Ed. Denis Stevens and Alec Robertson. $1.45
THE PENGUIN ATLAS OF MEDIEVAL HISTORY - Colin McEwedy. 40 maps facing text pages. 8-3/4" x 7-1/8"; $2.45
THE PENGUIN BOOK OF CHINESE VERSE
Ed. B. M. Kotewall, A. R. Davis and N. L. Smith.
An autobiology from 600 B.C. to the 20th century.
$1.25
THE PENGUIN BOOK OF RUSSIAN VERSE — Ed. Dimitri Obolensky. Lyrics of the 12th-20th centuries, with plain prose translations. $1.95
PREHISTORIC CRETE - R. W. Hutchinson. A complete account of what is known of the Minoans today. $1.95
THE PSYCHOLOGY OF STUDY - C. A. Moore. An explanation of the mental processes by which we learn. 85c
SAILING - Peter Heaton. Beginner's guide to choosing, buying, and fitting out a boat. $1.25
ST. JOAN - Bernard Shaw. The complete text of the play and the author's preface, 65c
THE SHAW ALPHABET EDITION OF ANDROGLES AND THE LION - Bernard Shaw. The Roman alphabet faces a line-for-line text in a new alphabet of 48 characters. 95c
A SHORT HISTORY OF AFRICA - Roland Oliver and J. D. Fage. A view of African history as a whole. $1.25
UNITED NATIONS: PIETY MYTH AND TRUTH - Andrew Boyd. A behind-the-scenes look at developments, 85c
WINES AND SPIRITS - L. W. Marrison. How alcoholic beverages are manufactured; characteristics and use. $1.25
YEVTUSHENKO: SELECTED POEMS - Ed. Robin Milner-Gulland and Peter Levi, S.J. A selection from the work of the young Soviet poet. 65c
PENGUIN BOOKS, Inc. 3300 CLIPPER MILL ROAD, BALTIMORE II, MARYLAND