Fiction
God's Warrior. By Parry Williams. (Faber and Faber. 9s. 6d.)
IT might be thought that a novel dealing with the years 5937-38 the present Japanese war against China, and written by a Chinam would be desperate, angry and set to the speed of actualities ; bu Dr. Lin, who called his previous novel, of fifty years of mand family life, A Moment in Peking, still, amid unimagined outrage takes his thought from Buddha and his tempo from Chinese histo —by no means from the baton of the warlords. A Leaf in the St is almost picaresque, indeed, so unhurriedly and even humorous does it make its way through horrors ; horrors which are in one sen its very stuff, and demand courage, unselfishness and patience of characters throughout. But the subject of the book is love—love the young feel it and as the experienced, generous Buddhist uncle stands it ; love in its kinds and the adjustments which human natu must make between these kinds is Dr. Lin's characteristic theme, he brings to its illumination not only all his knowledge of Chin history, thought and art, but also a fine selective talent for the deta of human relationships, an eye for significant externals and an eas way with character and dialogue.
There is no need to outline the plot, save to say that it takes t three chief characters from captured Peiping to Shanghai and then to the interior, to Hankow. There are hardships, dangers and great and bitter increase in understanding of the awful war ; a through the anxieties of personal love, the seeing and sharing general suffering and the chance eventually to work in alleviation that suffering, the girl Malin, afterwards Tanni, develops witho any straining of truth from a somewhat tiresome mystery worn concubine of many men, into a warm, attractive creature, of flow ing intelligence and active courage. And the love-plot grows svi her to a classic, sacrificial solution that fits naturally into the se
of national tragedy. Dr. Lin blenches at nothing of the evil now loose upon earth, but it is characteristic that he is more astounded before the general mystery of wickedness than nationalistically angered. His calm, unflinching reflections on the outrage of Nanking are terrible and salutary to read, and there are some awful passages descriptive of the sufferings of the innocent. Yet the book is consolatory in effect, and good and rich ; it is, in fact, a very good novel and should be widely read.
Mr. Sheean has so easy a mastery of his medium that it would be very possible to read Bird of the Wilderness without giving such a finished and competent piece of prose the recognition that it. deserves. The story of young Bill Owen's first love, partly idyllic and partly the result of an uncongenial background, is a very simple one. It is told, as it should be, simply. Bill is the son of a German- born mother who has long since become Americanised and a no- good Welsh father, who deserts his wife and child only to reappear inconveniently and disgrace Bill in his college days. The boy is sensitive, artistic and musical. His home-town appreciates none of these qualities, and Mr. Sheean is sympathetic and accurate in por- - traying the difficulties of a very young person in process of extracting himself from a cramping environment. The boy's imagination fastens upon his teacher of English, whom, because she is " Miss Carpenter," he views as a much older and more important person than himself. The sad, touching, doomed relationship between the boy and the woman, who is in fact not so very much older than himself, is quietly and convincingly unfolded in its small-town setting. History and politics are realities to Mr. Sheean, as he has proved in his other work, and in this novel, which takes place in 1917-18, when the U.S.A. went to war with Germany, he makes general events so real to his readers that they blend almost un- perceived into the background of the story.
Unlike its publishers, I find no charm in The Cage, which is a close study of a neurotic and dissatisfied girl. The book does show powers of observation, though all on one plane, and extending no further than sexual attraction between a man and a woman and its inadequacy as a basis for life. The author's prose style is irritating ; she uses inverted commas inappropriately and has an imperfect mastery of the words " shall " and " will."
It is sad to be unable to praise so heavy a labour as God's Warrior, which is a conscientious tale of tenth century England and of the life of Saint Dunstan. But the prose is of the " Nay, worthy kinsman," school—quite astonishingly so. And I confess that as I struggled along I was put to sleep again and again by the fumes of the lamp.
KATE O'BRIEN.
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