It is thus irksome for any essayist to be obliged
from time to time to write about subjects which, from their very nature, refuse to assume any but the most ungainly patterns. I am conscious that my article this week, in that it will contain long lists of names, is going to make an ugly page. The motive for my present assymetry is the following. The Editor of The Spectator received this week a letter from a young officer, recently released from three and a half years' imprisonment in Japanese hands. "Their hospitality," he writes, "never very open, did not extend to things of the mind. Thus I find myself very out of date, especially where the humanities are concerned." He asks, therefore, to be given some guidance regarding the more important books (history, criti- cism, novels, "real biography," and "above all" war poetry) which have been published in this country since 1940. In complying readily with this request one is faced with two initial difficulties. Ia the first place, no such list can be really comprehensive and it is bound to reflect personal predilection or prejudice. In the second place, the present state of the book-market will render it difficult for any humanist to obtain the books which are recommended. The London Library itself, with its splendid tradition and its crowded shelves, was banged on the head during the blitz ; it has recovered with astonishing rapidity ; nor is the waiting list for membership quite as long as is generally supposed. My first advice to this Lieutenant, as to all serious young men and women, is, "Put your name down for the London Library at once."
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