Bubbling Down
I CAN see the headline in Arts et Spectacles nom 'Patrick Anderson : Existe-t-il?' Surely it improbable that someone himself so improbab should be at large in England. Even Mr. Norris all his glory can never have had a practic demonstration of artificial insemination by Australian-born peeress. This is just one mo half-anecdote in Mr. Anderson's Wanderjalu which no novelist could , imagine and fe raconteurs tell. This book is the sequel to th brilliant, horrifying piece of autobiography Stich Wine, and inevitably it disappoints.
The beginning is hopeful. Mr. Anderson, mow a middle-ageing faun, slums in a basement near Portland Place. He has been a teacher in Canada. He looks to the London literary world for his next meal. Sadly and wittily he discovers the hard facts: 'I was too old to get invited to literary parties on the strength of an undergraduate reputation and the colour of my hair.' He has r ° success and exists on 3s. 6d. a day. Occasionally. friends help him : 'He heated pilchards and poured out the dregs of the Chianti bottle.'
He drifts to a weekend college—where the
e peeress enters his life—and then finds a curious sanctuary as a teacher in a Black Country train- ing college. From here the book begins to fall dr. Some misguided sense of purpose makes Mr. Anderson put away the cap and bells. He finds conformity not such a bad thing. IncanclusivelY, the training college shifts away, and the rest Of the book is a sustained hero-worship of a Canadian painter. The joy has gone, the shame- lessness bubbles down.
DAVID STOP
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