The Observer from London, Greater London, England • 7

THE OBSERVER, SUNDAY, OCTOBER 22, 1989 METHUEN DR. BENESH ON DEMOCRACY PROBLEMS AND PLACES Demooraoy To-day and To-morrow." By Eduard Benes. (Maomillan. 8s. ed.

Ready October 26 Booksellers and Libraries net) BY GEORGE GLASGOW Certainly Dr. Benesh will not be A Life lor a Ufa." By Stephen MoKenna. (Hutchinson. H. Bd.

net.) Watch for the Dawn." By Stuart Cloete. (Collins. 8s.ed.net.) Let Me Go Back." By Winifred Peck. (Faber and Faber. 6d.

net) Old Home Week." By Minnie Hlte Moody. (Putnam. ad. net.) ignored. There Is no more provocative politician in Europe, none so well in formed, few so logical.

Moreover, in his own person he stands as the very symbol BY L. P. A Life for a Life" is one of those 1 novels which we should read with a better heart if international events had fulfilled the author's hopes instead of from all JfOAIV GRANT'S new novel ILnffe a Cairola The long awaited successor to Winged Pharaoh (over 20,000 copies sold) ios. 6d. HARTLEY the same.

She felt that they should not have been the same, felt that it there was peace and quiet It should have been a brooding, tragic peace; that the leaves of the trees should have hung with their tips pointing directly down; that the shadows under the great fig tree should have been black; that the birds of the air should have sat silent with folded justifying his fears. Mr. Stephen VIRGINIA VERNON Beauty Products," Virginia Vernon's previous noveVwas modern story which proved one of thft successes of the season. Her latest novel of an inventor "who prefer! to itarve rather than turn his genius to the preparation of war ihould find an echo in the hearts of thousands yjg met McKenna's aim Is twofold: to describe of the democratic ideology that plays Its part In his view the leading part in the struggle now joined. Logic is a fascinating, but a dangerous weapon.

For instance, on p. 214 we read: TJhere Is no doubt that democracy irtithe future will accept in very large degree what Is practically accepted and realised to-day by the three the development of a character and the evolution of an epoch. James, tragically soon to succeed his father as Marquis Loring. is born in 1915. From wings.

In this book, as In Turning Wheels," two strains of imagination are found interlaced; one slightly other governmental systems Fascism, National Socialism, and Communism Famous Hutchinson best-selltrs theatrical and inclined to gloat over hor that is, a certain augmentation pf power and of several new functions of the rors (vide the horrible description of the punishment of the native King's errant concubine), the other a genuine and pro State." Now the interesting thing is this found emotional reaction to the mystery of life in primitive or barbarous people. Dr. Benesh In his book gives a compre hensive history, rooted centuries ago, of In Let Me Go Back the charac democracy and. of its crowning, manifestation in a League of Nations. He FRANK SWINNERTON's The Two Wives Beautifully polished wholly dollghtftil Stoutly Timtt "Strong sgift-tnoving intensely Tfrrid Obitrttr t6 DORIS LESLIE'S Another Cynthia Its admirers might well be legion Objtrvtr An entertainment in the picaresque mode Mmbtitor 86 DENNIS WHEATLEY's Sixty Days to Live Well up to his best standard "Objtrvtr "Vigorous and itartling Ddlj Ttltgnpi g6 STEPHEN McKENNA's A Life for a Life "A thoughtful, earnest book" Tit Timtt "It ii a most engaging pieco of work.

"Smdaj Ttmu g6 ters are neither primitive nor bar logically concludes from the lesson of all barous, though they are perhaps more history that some form of limited neurotic and hysterical than one would expect of clerical society living round a national sovereignty (in the present case a regionalised League of Nations in the form of a United States of Europe) is the only effective method of averting the recurrent war in its modern appalling Cathedral Close. The Dean of Mildrum's wife undergoes an operation her heart stops and after some minutes Is set going again by massage. Exactly at Sporting Spectacle WILLIAM FAWCETT Memories of a well-known figure in the world of sport, full of good stories and amusing experiences. Illustrated. 12s.

6d. what point, while under the anaesthetic, Portrait of an Irishman A Biographical Sketch of T. W. ROLLESTON The study of a man famous in Irish political and literary circles, written by his son, Commander C. H.

Rolleston. Illustrated. 10s. 6d. phase.

To that end he postulates the I triumph of democracy as such In thej present war. Yet by implication he she utters the words that give the book admits that the very operation of war must necessarily warp democratic prac comparatively tender years he takes an interest in foreign affairs and follows them with growing dismay until the spring of 1939. Inheriting from his father friendships with a French and a German family, he can study political issues from more angles than are possible to most men; just as his life-long friendship with Davy, son of a miner on his Scottish estate, gives him an unusual insight into social questions at home. Writing in the first person, he reviews his education at a private and public school and at the university; reviews, too, his education in love. Making a bad start with Dahlia, hard-boiled daughter of a successful man, he graduates with honour when, hiking on the Cumberland hills, he meets a girl who looks an almost professional walker of the most efficient order." "A Life for a Life" Is an intelligent and comprehensive survey of a subject which is.

perhaps, too big and too tiring for any but a great novelist. I enjoyed the political background, and I enjoyed the long public school section. Mr. Mc-Kenna notices a phenomenon which me is almost incredible though I have heard it confirmed by others that nowadays boys are bored at school. Perhaps they are, if the hard-headed, thirteen-year-old Davy's comment on seeing Melton it's almost too lovely to be real is a fair example of their precocious aesthetic perceptions.

But the love-interest, I think, is never more than commonplace, and in the hands of a less skilful practitioner would be even dull. This is true, too. of Watch for the Dawn," although Mr. Cloete Invests the romance between Kaspar and Aletta with a good deal of circumstantial glamour the glamour of the African tice into something approaching in very large degree the technique of dictatorship. Not surprisingly, perhaps, its title is never established, and only one witness vouches for having heard them.

But the Dean regards his wife's return to life as miraculous, another case of Alcestis: and he proposes to proclaim it as such at a Thanksgiving Service. How his family, his fellow dignitaries of the Church, and the Press responded to this revolutionary project is the theme of Lady Peck's subtle, delightful and entertaining story. She gives us not one but half-a-dozen lightly drawn and brilliantly convincing portraits perhaps the most successful, magnificent new African story SANDRA Flouting the conventions and risking everything she possessed Sandra Glenn sought adventure and freedom in the wilds of the African bush. Another grand romance by the author of 'Ms Open Secret," "Galeeta," etc. y6 tut certainly the most amusing, are those' of The Mind of the Bees JULIEN FRANCON An account of the author's remarkable experiments designed to determine the capabilities of bees.

Illustrated. 6s. My Friends the Baboons EUGENE MARAIS A fascinating investigation into the inner life of the Ape, by the author of The Sou! of the White Ant. 5- the younger generation. Old Home Week tells of another small-town crisis.

Pralrieville holds a seven days' Jubilee, to which. Its emi grant sons and daughters are invited to return. Miss Moody gets her drama from the effect of the festival on the family of Hiram Benton a hardware merchant In grave financial SON I A DEANE'S It Began in Paris Not for prudes This outspoken novel of a divorce problem as daring a book as you are likely to find Author of Hotel Kegisltr 76 MOLLY CASTLE'S ThislsWhereWeCameln A panorama of the world as it is to-day, in which war, poverty and love give power to her pages ji HELEN WILLS MOODY'S Death Serves an Ace A crime-tennis story written in collaboration with Robert Murphy Readers of thrillers owe the authors thanks" Birmingham Gaetli 76 forests and of a period (the beginning i difficulties. He encounters a former New Fiction DAMKLE VARfi'S of the last century) when Boers, Eng- sweetheart; his wife finds new warmth iishmen, Kaffirs, and bushmen were alii in an old name; their children, too, get making life dangerous for each other. I involved in problems almost too large to there is some confusion in his mind between the rival likelihood of diminished, or increased, State sovereignty as a result of the war.

In one sense no one can possibly disagree with the second of those conclusions. Dr. Benesh himself in his book omits any emphasis on the point, but it is obvious, without emphasis, that the totalitarian practice of government imposed upon democratic countries for the conduct of the war of 1914 to 1918 did itself produce the continuing systems of dictatorship in Europe. Yet his own hypothesis prescribes an opposite result. A man of Dr.

Benesh's wide experience of European politics (a terrible dispensation of fate) cannot fail embarrassingly to see both sides of every question; yet he grimly clings to his own faith in what may be called democracy tending towards a pooled sovereignty. On the one hand he writes (p. 201): "All will revolt finally against the idea that every ten or twenty years Europe has to pass through a world war. A kind of United States of Europe will be, in the end. the only solution which can save Europe from complete and final collapse and moral and material ruin." Yet two pages earlier he writes: I absolutely, deny the possibility of the co-existence of these two contrary regimes democracy and dictatorship.

Either one or the other of these regimes must disappear. The really baffling thing (illustrated especially in the case of Spain) is that the rudder sometimes gets mixed with' the bowsprit. For its great knowledge and documentation and its unconquerable optimism am not pessimistic," p. 218) Dr. Benesh's book will be widely wel In defence of Aletrta's foster-father tackle.

Only Grandma Benton, whose new novel hundredth birthday Is to crown the SIMON DARE's Strange Wines Kaspar killed an English soldier and became an outlaw, though killings were too common to arouse much comment, revels, keeps her head. It was a good idea, but Miss Moody only realises its more obvious possibilities. A country girl loves an actor who loves hli leading lady who In turn loves someone else A grand Simon Dare romance 76 and seem to have been held, among whites and blacks alike, as a proof of manhood. The first man one kills!" He (Afrikander) sighed deeply. "It is like a The Temple of Costly Experience A story of modern China, third of a trilogy of which The Maker of Heavenly Trousers and The Gate of Happy Sparrows have already delighted Welkin In Wartime girl who has a man for first There is in much of Mr.

Cloete's writing. especially when he is describing re 'Twas God's Pure Air, or so we called IN A lationships between the sexes, a reso lute, self-conscious animalism amounting a host of readers. the stuff, Till radio filled ft with their Ues and bluff. Still galleon clouds their lovely voyage make. But what's the cargo? Fustian and almost to brutality.

Bitch and belly are perfectly good words, but coming as often as they do in this story (once I was fortunate enough to find them both in the same sentence) they impart I fake. a certain rankness of flavour, which An exciting new romance by NINA REXFORD In one step Nina Rexford has reached the top flight of romantic authors in a novel that will grip you on every page. A great new novelist is born don't miss her first book 1 6 net All the When Hamburg hurls Its voice into not the same thing as strength. same, despite nis caveman airs, tne Diue, 7s. 6d.

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"A very cheery book to read these days." Birmingham Post. 8s. comed; but it cannot pretend to be poetry, as witness Aletta's reflections I true. after Kaspar kisses her. "Things were Ivor Brown.

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