16 NOVEMBER 1929, Page 31

In Denwcritus, or The Future of Laughter (Kegan Paul, 2s.

6d.) Mr. Gerald Gould, in his contribution to the To-day and To-Morrow series, reminds us of a great many good stories, for which we are grateful, and contributes a few epigrams of his own. While he analyses ably enough, however, he has nothing either so illuminating or so inspiring to say about laughter, or rather humour, as we have read elsewhere. He is, perhaps wisely, very shy of saying what our descendants will laugh at, though perhaps it might have been worth men- tioning that one subject will certainly be ourselves, and con- tents himself with a treatise on the social function of laughter which, apart from the examples he gives, is pleasantly but perceptibly dull. This is rather a disappointing number of a very excellent series.