SIX TRAVELLERS Black River of Tibet. By John Hanbury-Tracy. (Muller.
12s. 6d.) Enchanted Vagabonds. By Dana Lamb and June Cleveland. (Hamish Hamilton. 15s.) In the East My Pleasure Lies. By Theodora Benson. (Heinemann. I25. 6d.) • The Other Side of the Mountain. By James Ullman. (Gollancz. 12S. 6d.) THERE is a gulf which takes some bridging between the public who pay good- money to read books and the reviewer who is paid. More often than not my feeling on opening a parcel of new publications is one of pleasure combined with mild wonder. Here they are, five substantial, expensive works, more than three guineas' worth, all readable, all except one good-looking—but who is going to buy them ? It is a question quite proper for a reviewer to ask himself before he commends a book to anybody else: is he going to keep it himself? There are, I have heard, editors so depraved that they ask for the return of review books ; perhaps the anonymous drudges who sweat under this yoke sometimes spend their miserable earnings on actually purchasing the books they have praised. It is a sobering thought. The ordinary reviewer in civilised service is not faced with so heroic a choice, but he does ask himself, each week, whether it is worth carting a parcel round to the second-hand booksellers to receive half the published price. It is not a bad test of his real opinion. I am obliged to confess that in spite of their undoubted merits none of these are books which I want in my library. Before the ink is dry on this review I shall be packing them up for the second-hand dealer, to be exchanged for half their price in old calf quartos.
Tibetan Adventure is not a happy title for a -book only one section of which deals with Tibet. The wrapper, also, is misleading, for it represents a motor-cyclist passing a file of spearmen. The uninstructed might think that these men were Tibetans, and that this was the means by which Mr. Tichy reached the Holy Mountain. They are in fact Naga tribesmen, and Mr. Tichy visited them by boat. He went to Tibet on foot disguised as an -Indian. The wrapper in fact is doubly misleading, for it gives the impression that the author is -a bouncing sparking-plug endurance demonstrator of the beastliest kind, while in fact he shows himself as a sensitive and highly sympathetic soul, brim full of respect for oriental religious practices, as responsive as Ruskin to the elevating effects of mountain scenery. The book is a series of travel narratives translated from the German. Sven Hedin vouches for their authenticity but his preface is both egotistical and superfluous for the reader's scepticism is never for a moment aroused. The quiet story carries conviction whether it deals with the supernatural gifts of the inhabitants of Tomati or with a deliciously described interview with the Prince of Western Tibet. The photographs arc excellent.
Mr. Hanbury-Tracy's Black River of Tibet is eminently creditable to its author both as a writer and a traveller. It is a straightforward, modest account of nearly two years' scientific work in practically unknown country. He and his companion did serious collecting and mapping ; the " colour- ful " experiences were incidental to their main purpose.
It is impossible to speak as warmly of Enchanted Vagabonds. The production is peculiar and, to my eyes, detestable. From pea-green end-papers one opens directly upon thirty-one pages of illustrations printed in the sepia ink of American " rotogravure " supplements. These pages contain no fewer than 38 portraits of the female author and 36 of the male, mostly in the kind of costume which make their compatriots conspicuous on the Lido. Then follows a mustard-coloured title-page and then 400 odd pages of highly colourful adventure, which is unimpaired by the humility which compels so many modern travellers to represent themselves in a prosaic or even, on occasions, a ridiculous light. The surfeit of self-por- traiture is really remarkable and, with all deference to the protest lately made in this paper by Mr. G. M. Young, I am inclined to think that a psychopathologist could offer a better explanation of it than a literary critic.
Miss Benson's far-eastern trip strikes an agreeable mean between pure tourism and heroic achievement. She travelled about the Dutch East Indies with the right letters of intro- duction and the decorum suitable to a well-brought-up young lady, but she saw a great deal more than most tourists and she thoroughly enjoyed all she saw. That is the note of her book—relish—and she has the art to render this quite rare emotion communicable.
The publishers describe The Other Side of the Mountain as " one of the two best travel books " they " have ever pub- lished," without invidiously specifying its rival. It is thoroughly enjoyable. An unsuccessful New York theatrical producer seeks relaxation in a tough and lonely journey across South America from Pacific to Atlantic. I cannot conceive why his plays were not better received, for he seems to have a very wide range of literary accomplishment, not least of which is the essentially dramatic gift of conveying character in dialogue. If he can write as well as this, he ought to be a good judge. Why does he not write them himself ?
EVELYN WAUGH.
Previous page
