Fiction

BY L A. G. Smotsa.

7s. 6d.)

As a collection, the stories in The Lovely Lady imperfectly represent their author. The book will not stand beside England, -My England, or The. Ladybird, and anyone unacquainted with Lawrence into whose hands it came might wonder what all the fuss and" bother had been about. Still, it was well worth publishing, not only because it contains one of the best stories Lawrence ever wrote, but because as a whole it shows him in his lighter mood, and there are in it many touches to make us realize once more what a genius we have lost. The important thing about Lawrence was not his message, but his genius. It was the genius that roused all the enmity and expostulation. Scores of lesser writers have advanced views more subversive of orthodox beliefs than Lawrence's, without rousing any such opposition': It was Lawrence's genius that enabled him to get under the reader's skin, that made it impossible to ignore what he was saying. Genius has either to be rejected or to be swallowed whole. In face of it, men must declare themselves ; and the air still rings with declarations roused by Lawrence. It is easy, but mistaken, to regret them, for they are a tribute to the power and vitality of his work. The only disadvantage of the uproar is that it raises confused or even false issues, and tends to make people become pro- or anti-Lawrence before they have read him.

The present volume is not an ideal introduction, but at least it will not rouse controversy. It shows, if only at moments, the astonishing vividness of perception and exactness of visual imagery that combined to make one of Lawrence's chief attributes as a writer. It reveals him as the possessor of a sense of humour. It has his qualities of innocence and simplicity. It catches him experimenting with subjects and devices off his usual beat. A girl, sunbathing upon a roof, hears a disembodied voice in all-too-revealing soliloquy upon the air beside her. It turns out to be the voice of an old lady talking to herself, and unwittingly entrusting her secrets to a gutter pipe which acts as a speaking-tube. Pretending to be a ghost, the girl croaks an accusation down the pipe, with dramatic results. What a device to find in a Lawrence story 1 It belongs to fiction of a very different kind ; and yet the use he makes of it sends a thrill down one's spine. In another story, a small boy obtains occult information as to the winners of future races by ceaselessly riding his rocking- horse. " Mother and Daughter" is a return to a familiar theme, but for once Lawrence is writing without animosity, and with a real sense of fun. Virginia, whose mother has long preyed upon her vampire-wise, is sought in marriage by an Armenian.

" He spoke bad- English, but fairly fluent guttural French. He did not speak much, but he sat. He sat, with his short, fat thighs, as if for eternity, there. There was a strange potency in ,his fat.immobile sitting, as if his posterior were connected with the very centre of the earth. And his brain, spinning away at the

one point in question, business, was very agile. Business absorbed „ Later in the story comes a flash of genius. The Armenian comes to ask Mrs. Bodoin for her daughter's hand.

” There was a moment's blank pause. Then Mrs. Bodoin leaned towards him from her distance, with curious portentousness. ' What was that you said t ' she asked. Repeat it ! '

I wish I may have the honour to marry your daughter. She is willing to take me.'

Hia dark, glazed eyes looked at her, then glanced away again. Still leaning forward, she gazed fixedly on him, as if spellbound, turned to stone. She was wearing- pink topaz ornaments, but he judged they were paste, moderately good."

This instinctive awareness of an alien mode of thought is outside the range of all but very few. The best thing in the book, however, is the last story, " The Man Who Loved Islands." This has what the others lack, the imaginative passion that made Lawrence one of the greatest writers of his time.

Those who begin Mr. Phillpotts's trilogy with its second volume may get a somewhat distorted view of the character

of Avis Bryden. She may appear a monster, a sort of distillation of Dartmoor at its grimmest ; whereas the first volume, tracing the gradual development of her character in youth, prepares one for her deeds in the second. It will be extremely interesting to see what happens to her in the last volume. At the end of Witch's Cauldron, when she has carried through her great plan for Peter, not flinching even at murder, she says to her son, " It is a good sign of a man when he don't meet any more dilemmas in life than a tiger meets in his." There are by this time no. dilemma& in her life : only enterprises. She is now a middle-aged widow, and the son for whom she lives is a contented farmer, engaged to his head-man's quiet little daughter Unity. Then Grace, daughter of the self-important Warren Warburton, comes into their lives. Mrs. Bryden arranges matters as if she were playing chess against fate. She sees that Grace, and Grace's inheritance, are what Peter , needs. She works for him to have them, managing even to make Unity drown herself. When Warren proposes to her, she is nearly checkmated, for to refuse him would be to turn him against their children's marriage : and she will not marry again. However, she murders him, in his own study, and makes it appear a con- vincing suicide ; and then Peter, horrified as he is when she tells him, is free to marry Grace, to own Nine Maidens Farm, and to get on. The story has its lighter moments, and opens with a meeting of the Parish Council which is in Mr. Phill- pott,s's best vein.

Facade is a most accomplished and exhilarating performance. Its story is told twice, so I shall do no more than indicate it here. Miss Benson gives us first that version of the relations between Philippa (single), Sylvia (married), and Tony (Man about Town), which might have been presented to an onlooker, or which they themselves might have wished to present. Philippa and Tony appear to be going to marry and yet everyone knows that she loves another man, and that Tony has always loved Sylvia. When Tony is warned off the Turf, speculation runs high. Philippa sticks to him, and they puzzle the world by marrying and going abroad. Then Miss Benson gives us a second version of the story, and we learn • a lot that we did not know before. In addition to the wit

and assured knowledge that this novel shows, it is Miss Benson's triumph that, though she adds so much in her second version, the first version is neither superficial nor apparently incomplete.

I can never resist books about Oxford, and here are two good ones. I take off my hat to Mr. Shamus Frazer, who has produced a first novel of surprising quality. He has wit, invention, confidence, and he says what he thinks. James Laxative, M.P., in a Socialist England has decided to rid Oxford (and, of course, Cambridge) of all the parasitical and brainless undergraduates who there waste their time and money, and the nation's. Philip Kinnell, who has very good eyebrows (this is important), takes a Class D in the qualifying examination, and finds himself a railway porter. Later, owing to these same eyebrows, he finds himself a national hero attempting to fly round the world, and a secret agent for the Stewart cause. Democracy has had its day. What England wants, and what Hollywood wants, is, as Mr. Salmon says, a real King, ".Gold crown, spectre, and all the whole swell caboodle." Charlie Stewart, film star, becomes king of England. The fun reaches its height when the new king goes down to Oxford to found Stuart College, and expounds his great Bacon and Eggs policy.

Mr. Dermot Morrah I have hitherto known as an indefatig- able reconstructor of historical events. I welcome him in his new guise, as a satirist and maker of mystery, The Mummy Case is a lighthearted and excellent detective story; set in an imaginary but not improbable Oxford college. Corpse, criminals, and detectives are all provided by the members of Beaufort's. Senior .Common Room When. Pro-

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fessor lileanilley.'s rooms - were. gutted ,by fire, on the .n tea., of the Commemoration Ball, were the sad remains which were found those of Benchley, or of his favourite mummy? And anyway, who hurned-them ? Two of the jimior fellows under- take to solve these problems.