BORN UNDER SATURN
S1R,—Having myself read Mr. Priestley's new thriller with much enjoyment, plus admiration for the extra- ordinary verve it shows in a writer of his age and output, 1 was startled to find Mr. Geoffrey Grigson attacking it so savagely. Mr. Grigson is, of course, as entitled to find in it 'amateurism' and 'staggering incompetence' as 1 am to think it professional and skilful, but I am puzzled by the standards implied in his last sentence : 'It would take longer, and wouldn't be worth while, to explain the qualities (added to bounce and bonhomie) which make it nasty as well.' In so far as this means anything, it surely suggests that bounce and bonhomie add to the weight of the millstone round Mr. Priestley's neck. Oh, dear, what a lot of novelists must sink under the severity of Mr. Grigson's judgment!—Yours faithfully,
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