The Bridgeport Post from Bridgeport, Connecticut • Page 56

C--EIGHT BRIDGEPORT SUNDAY POST, APRIL 3, 1966 BOOKS History With A Punch Bryna Untermeyer Is Author Of Charming Book About Pet; THF Simon Schuster. Ryan, the author By RUTH LOW BATTLE Bv sne be Ine nrst to Ryan. New i Bryna Ivens Unterrney- cr's chief claim to fame is the fact that she is the wife of the of "The poet and distinguished man of Longest Day," has distilled Betters. Louis Untermeyer. who i i a so Americas most prolific here in 500 vivid pages all amhologist kaleidoscopic horror of the con-j Up anvway It 5 mt quest of Berlin, in the three-1 that she has been idle.

During week period which began at 4jher 11 years as fiction editor a.m.. Monday, April 16. 1945. Seventeen magazine she pro- It is a book filled with the sights and sounds of a tremen- duced from its pages short story collections. three Since dous struggle, as witnessed with her husband, she has felt by individual human beings'collaborated on more than a the high and the mighty, the'dozen anthologies lor young obscure, the pitiful, the and adults, ful and the fearful.

i She describes the literary By focusing on specific Production that issues from viduals during the high keyed heir blue painted pre re and low-keyed episodes of lut nar -V house on Gn storv (and this is a technique road ln Newtown as ARTIST'S DRAWING of the Saratoga, N. Performing Arts Center, which will open July 9. The center will become the summer home of the New York City Ballet and the Philadelphia Orcbestra. Watering Place Gets Culture Center By MILES A. SMITH In a few months another summer temple of culture will be inaugurated.

This new one will be remarkable for the variety of its attractions symphony and ballet, with mineral springs, a nature refuge and summer hotel, and two race tracks nearby. It is the Saratoga Performing Arts Center, at Saratoga Springs, N. situated in the cool breezes above the Albany-Troy-Schenectady area. It will become the permanent summer home of the Philadelphia Orchestra and the New York City Ballet. Each will appear for four weeks.

Magnet of Society The location is historically a great watering place, or spa. which in the 19th Century was one of the magnets of society. Once the fashionable and wealthy paragons of New York summered there, it was a place of prancing horses, Victorian opulence and dramatic flourishes, created by such celebrities as Diamond Jim Brady and actress Lillian Russell. In 1962 the site became a state park of more than 1,500 acres. Nearby is one of the oldest racing scenes in America--the Saratoga track, where the finest thoroughbreds compete each August.

For the performing arts, a theater has been created in a natural amphitheater. The cost is about $3.6 million, large portions of which were supplied by the Rockefeller Brothers Fund and individual members of the Rockefeller family. THE FUND-RAISING activities for this center have been varied. The state of New York, in clearing the site and establishing a parking area for 5,000 cars, has spent more than $900,000. And the blue ribbon racing world of Saratoga has contributed its share.

Famous speedsters of the track claim thousands of dollars in stud fees from their prize- winning horses to this enterprise. The structure has been inte- Returns Spy Yarn THE NAKED RUNNER. By grated with a natural bowl, and is approached on a 40-foot bridge through the treetops. over a mountain stream known as Geyser Creek. It will seat approximately 5,200, roughly comparable to the music shed" at Tanglewood, summer home of the Boston Sjnn- phony at Lenox, Mass.

On the sloping lawn there will be room for thousands more. THE FORMAL opening will be on July 9, after a preview, and the 119-member New York City Ballet will perform every nigh except Monday, giving a studen matinee on Wednesdays. George Balanchine. the ballet's artistic director, has been a consultant to the center since its inception. A world premiere has been scheduled for the July 9 opening It will be the first performance "Narkissos," the first full-scali choreographic work of Edward Villella, one of the ballet com pany's leading male dancers.

Robert Prinec has been com missioned to compose the score and Villella is expeced to dano the title role himself. The Philadelphia Orchestra wil arive. on Aug. 1, giving concert on Thursdays, Fridays and Satur days, with matinees on Wednes days. Eight concerts will be con ducted by its musical director Eugene Ormandy.

Guest conductors, for two per formances each, will be William Steinberg (Aug. 5 and 7), Thorn as Schippers (Aug. 12 and 14 and Seiji Ozawa (Aug. 18 and 20) Ormandy will conduct an al Beethoven program for the firs formal concert on Aug. 4.

It wi include the "Consecration of th House" overture and the Eight Symphony, concluding with th Ninth. For the. Ninth, the soloists wi be soprano Martina Arroyo, con tralto Lilt Chookasian, tenor Joh Alexander and bass Justino Diaz all of the Metropolitan Opera The choirs will be the 100-voic Capital Hill Choral Society; direc ed by Judson Rsni, and th Glee Club and Chorus of Corne University, directed by Thoma A. Sokol. THE SUMMER'S SHisical pro gram will conclude with conce of "Der Rosen avalier" on Aug.

23 and an Eng- sh version of "Die Fledermaus" Aug. 24. "Der Rosenkavalier" will fea- re the Spanish Mont- irrat Caballe. along with Hilda ueden and Walter Berry. On the 1 night the singers will in- ude Miss Gueden, Barry Morell.

oberta Peters and heodore Uppman and Frank New York: Francis Clifford. Coward-McCann, Here is a British spy thriller ut out of the same cloth as fail- to warm the spy left out in le cold and served as a shroud or a "Funeral in Berlin." It erivative, as ill tales of espi- nage have to be, but the extra ick is added that sends this story roaring to a good end by intro- ucing into hazard the only chile the hero, held hostage "by the ommunists while his tight-lipped ather kills for them in Copen- lagen. The plot and counterplot are veil woven into a puzzling pat- ern that keeps the reader guess- ng and exhilarated by the danger the tale. There is a sure-footed drive towards the end in this that begins with the very irst page and never lets up. The uspense continues until the veiy ast page, and the hero, for once, eceives sweet and, it is to be oped, a lasting reward.

These books read better than detective tales and serve a bet- er purpose than mere escapism. There is something Western, something of a Don Juixote. of the cowboy, presen the best of them, as the hen valks or rides, or drops, into he blanket of the dark evil over he Wall, turns his back on the quiet kindness that he may have achieved in his own free land fight with the weapons of his toe, our foe, for all of us. Thereby he often achieves nothing bu a dusty death, is disowned by those he fights to save, and only rarely, as in this novel, does he return whole and rewarded Strangely, this book almos reads like a scenario, so tha the reader can pass the film of it past his mind's-eye, am score his own victory on'TV and Hollywood where this book wil iureiy end. What they will make of it is a bigger conundrum than even this novel proposes -WILLIAM READY story (and this is a technique of higher journalism in the service of history), he has succeeded in making the reader eel that he is present at the making of history.

WE FOLLOW A Berlin milkman, carefully gathering his mpressions of danger in the aim before the storm. We vatch an aging Swede walking is dachshunds to a store fre- juented by important people -e is a spy for the Americans. Ve sense the fears of a hidden ewish family, the tenuous of an underground communist. We see a band of emaciated iritish prisoners, liberated rom their German captors marching proudly westward to he skirl of two bagpipes. We are deafened by the roar of the ipening barrage as the Rus- iians attack from the Oder, and ee the blood streaming from he gunners' concussion press- ears.

We hear a Russian ield marshal snapping "Get gong" to one of his generals, and ee an agitated Hitler stabbing a shaking finger at symbols on i map symbols which repre- non-existent divisions. Ryan went directly to the mil- tary experts who conducted the battle. They included Koniev and Zhukov, the Soviet mar- ihais who were fierce rivals for he honor of reaching Berlin irst; and General Heinrici, the defensive expert who was given he impossible task of delaying Russian advance. TOGETHER WITH John Toland's recent "The Last 100 Days" and the Collins and La- lierre book of last year. "Is Paris Burning?" this is history with a punch.

Ryan's book has more impact than these, ihough it is less encyclopedic Shirer's "Rise and Fall ol the Third Reich." Here is a prime example of new type of nonacademic listory writing; a fusion ol careful documentation with the emotional wallop of physical presence. It is a book to be en- absorbed and appreciated. MILES A. SMITH eat Hill so unremitting that she has sometimes bought of calling their projects Untermeyer Enterprises. Last month a new aspect of Enterprises emerged with he publication by Simon and Jchuster of her first original 30ok, "Memoir for Mrs.

Sulla- LITERARY AWARD Elie Wiesel. a Hungarian Jew who survived the horrors of Auschwitz to write of the Nazi holocaust and its effect on people, has been presented the B'nai B'rith Jewish Heritage Award. He is the first recipient of the 51,000 literary prize established by B'nai B'rith's Commission on Adult Jewish Education for "excellence in Jewish literature." The Talks of Animals memoir is the tender and charming true story of the four cats, three dogs and assorted kittens, as well as the people who made up the Untermeyer household during lifetime of Mrs. Sullavan. Mrs.

Sullavan was a cat, a very special cat. As any theater buff worth his weight in old Playbills will immediately suspect from the spelling, Mrs. Sullavan was not unrelated to Margaret Sullavan, the actress. It was shortly after the Untermeyers were married in 1948 and acquired their house in Newtown, that she offered them a fluffy six-week- old tri-colored male kitten. He was irresistable and they named him Sullavan.

As nearly all cat lovers are aware, the three colored male cat does not exist. The name was modified with a Miss. Then with the arrival of her son, Bobo (subtitled The Belly That Walks Like a Cat) it was modified again. Man, Wife In Drugged Nightmares UP ABOVE THE WORLD. By Paul Bowles.

New York: mon Schuster. GIFT OF Mool- "THEUFT HUNDRED DATS Current Best Sellert (OmptlM kj nttulxn' Flettoa THB DOUBLE DUOB THE AucMac THOSE WHO LOVE--IniKZ THE BEJJOS THB THE LOCKWOOD COXCERS THE DOWN STAIRCASE EtewarT siJ A a M2" i r-Sot" JNEDY LN TKS WHITS HOUSE Latin America, the Far PLAT- TI Africa have at various periods HUMAN RELATION-SHIPS been the home of Paul Bowles. This background undoubtedly has contributed and given shape to his new novel, a tale of horror. The book opens with seeming simplicity. Two tourists.

Dr. Taylor Slade and his wife Day, in his late 60's. she young "is "PARIS BI nough to be his granddaugh-1 1 er, have come by freighter to Central American country. Another passenger on the ship was a Mrs. Rainmantle, a rich.

Icoholic Canadian on a visit her son. More out of boredom with her lusband than with liking for the woman, Day befriends her both the ship and at the primi- ive port where they land. A ay later, in the country's cap- tal, Dr. Slade reads of the woman's death in a fire at the old rotel where they had left her dent. but keeps the news from his wife.

Not until the end of the book is it made clear what role THE i PAPERS Love Their Pets There is a special quality about the Untermeyer's regard for their pets. A friend of theirs is once reported to have said wistfully, "If there is such a thing as reincarnation, 1 think I would choose to return as an Untermeyer cat." Some of this quality, which pervades Mrs. Untermeyer's perceptive and beautifully written small book, comes through in the following excerpt. "We are unabashedly emotional about our pets. Louis is the compleat aelurophile, unhappy without at least one cat to call his own, to stroke, to comb, to burp on his shoulder, to spoil with tidbits from (or on) -the table at every I have a heaving affection for almost any animal, and have felt this way for as long as I can remember." This broad-ranging affection, though once sorely tried, was not found wanting.

It was, simply, the problem of what to do a dead opossum lying in her door yard. The prospect of the cats emerging at any moment from their private hatchway and devouring the corpse made her acutely unhappy. But when she became aware that it was breathing and not, in fact, a corpse, her problem intensified. What to Do? As her concern for the safety struggled with BRYNA IVENS UNTERMEYER AUTHORS BOOK ON PETS--Bryna Ivens Untermeyer, above, wife of poet Louis Untermeyer and a resident of Newtown, is the author of "Memoir for Mrs. Sullavan," a story of pets and the people who cared'for them.

her distaste for handling it, she summoned spiritual assistance. "What," she asked herself, "would. Ernest Thompson Seton have done? Or John Muir? or Florence Nightingale?" Strengthened by moral support of this calibre she managed to get the animal into a box and carry it through deep snow to a safe distance in a back pasture. Some hours later, she glanced out of the window, only to find it back in her yard again. There it was sitting companionable, beside Bobo, the great hunter, politely nibbling on dried peony stalks.

This, then, is one of that select company of books best enjoyed with someone close at hand to share it. The list of delightful and funny incidents is considerable. Here are a few. There is Cleo's extended, confused and confusing courtship. And later, with Mrs.

Untermeyer as midwife, her indifferent and protracted first accouchement. A some hours of this, the poet announced, at midnight, "The miracle of birth notwithstanding. I am going to bed." This is so precisely his manner and speech pattern that one can almost hear his slightly husky voice speaking. Another Fan On the occasion of her first meeting with poet Mark Van Doren, at a formal luncheon, they discovered, almost immediately, their mutual enthusiasm for cats. Barely ten minutes later, as Mrs.

Untermeyer relates it, "Mark leaned toward me, scrutinized me for a moment and then, risking all, whispered, 'Do you find yourself kissing them all the 1 whispered back. 'On their 'I do too, 1 he else, is not unlike being In love. When I wasn't actually working on it I was thinking about it, planning how I would write the lousework Actually, "Memoir for Mrs. Sullavan" did not start out to be a book, Mrs. Untermeyer explained-recently, as Puck, her Yorkshire Terrier jumped into her lap and settled down to be petted.

The three cats, Bobo, Plush and the beauty. Cleo. surveyed their reporter, blinked with apparent approval and curled up, each in its own chair. Personal Memoirs idler KIERKEGAARD TRANSLATED "The Concept of Irony." by 3oren Kierkegaard, will be published by Harper Row on April 13. This is the first Engish translation of the only un- translated major work by the jreat Danish philosopher-theologian.

The translation, introduction and notes are by Lee M. Capel. An analysis of Hegel and Lhe German Romantics, and material on Socrates. Aristo- phanos. Plato and Xenophon are included.

Kierkegaard died in 1855 after becoming an import- "I really thought of putting down these things, these memories, for my own pleasure." she said, "as they moved me. Also for Louis. Mrs. Sullavan's life had such a shape to it, and our life around her had its own shape. "It wasn't till after I had written four sections that I had Louis read it.

He was the one who said, right off, 'This is going to make a I hadn't thought of it that way. The evening I completed the final chapter, where Mrs. Sullavan dies. "Louis was reading in the living room. The ending had been worrying me.

When I finally felt I had it right, I went in to read it to him. but ant influence on existentialism. 20th century NEW 87th PRECINCT MYSTERY The detectives of the 57th Precinct are confronted with not one but two bizarrely puzzling cases in "Eighty Million Eyes" by Ed McBain, published by Delacorte Press. PETS ARE THE SUBJECT-Cats, dogs and kittens are discussed lovingly In "Memoir for Mrs. Sullavan," a new book by Bryna Ivens Untermeyer.

The front of the jacket for the book Is shown above. Mrs. Sullivan wu given to the Utter- meyeri by actreii Margaret Sullivan. I was weeping so I couldn't speak. "I have recently begun a new book, and I feel the same way about it.

I want to do it because there are things I want to get said, for myself. Wrote of Feelings "I suspect this is one of the answers to the question people are asking me, 'Why did you wait so long to write your first I think the truth is that it took me all these years to write what I felt deeply, rather than what I felt was a publishable book. "Always, since I was a little girl, I've been trying to write. I'll tell you. Ruth, I think that when I was immersed in the writing of this book, it was one of the happiest times in my life.

Certainly, the most self ab(orbed. "Such a complete immersion, next went section. My to pot. Of course things happened to in- lerrupt, and then occasionally I bogged down. I wrote it in spells, over a couple of years was a good thing it wasn'i a longer project.

If it had been the whole family would have gone to seed. Hoped to be Editor "In high school I wrote for 'he newspaper and in college was editor of the literary magazine. I always hoped to be an editor. After graduation from Hunter I burst upon the literary scene in 1930 at the depth of the depression. From a com- fartable girlhood I graduated into absolute nothingness.

did typing, stenography and selling. Anything to earn a little money. And wherever landed 1 tried to see if there was any possible opportunity for writing. It took me actualh ten or 11 years to climb bad to any kind of effective func tioning. "My first chance to work in an editorial capacity was on a trade publication, and from I went to the magazine She.

After its demise 1 decid ed that I was going to settle down and write a Bu then came the offer from Sev enteen. Probably as a result the depression years, I found couldn't turn it down. I remain ed there from 1946 to 1957. Works Harder Now "I work harder now with Lou is then I ever did on the mag azine. He's a real slave driver that man.

We have a 600 page collection of stories for Golden Books coming out this spring And we just finished a compa nion book for the younger group. I think we've gotten together terribly good material But, God help me, I'm afraid we'll have to do another one oon. "As an anthologist, Louis methods couldn't be. improved on. I do the ground work foi things in the field.

I've always liked researching and I'm very good at it. "Eventually, I think. If you live with an anthologist long enough it's catching. Apparent ly. when it comes to literature I have the collecting instincts a magpie.

In this respect, Loui and I kind of fortify each other Her Own Anthology "And now I have done a tiny little anthology of my own fo Odyssey Press. It is a collec tion of quotes on the so-calle battle between the sexes will the i title of "Thi Sexes." "I've already had some pre publication reactions to "Me moir." The British publishers Allen and Unwin, bought it for publication in England, and th other day I received anothe letter saying they would like an option on my next book. "But I think my far, came from our veterinar ian, Dr. Edward Lubin, who appears In the book. He is a ter ribly tender-hearted man and unlike some vets, he reall; loves animals.

He phoned after reading an advance copy 'You know Mrs. Untermeyer you've really got the soul -o that cat into your story," he sai seriously. "Most people don' Shovelsful Of Sex And Violence THE ADVENTURERS. By Har- Robbins. New York: Tn Mrs.

Rainmantle has played in the lives of the two Americans. ON THE FIRST day of their lay at the capital city, Day, ooking for an American magazine, is helped by a handsome, charming young man who in- roduces himself as Serior Soto. Before he drives her back to ler hotel, he takes her up to lis apartment to show her the spectacular view and to give ler a cold drink. Impressed by lis hospitality and his obvious vealthy background, she accepts an invitation to return with her husband the following evening. At this time, the Slades meet Luchita, a pretty, 17-year-old refugee 'from Cuba who, with her infant son, shares loto's home.

One is somewhat prepared 'or the horror-laden events that follow by Solo's relationship with the girl. He uses her as a convenience; he dislikes her child wiose father Is. unknown; le rations her on marijuana cigarettes. The Slades never return to their hotel. An expert in the use of brain-washing and hallucination inducing drugs, Soto, variously called Vero by and Grove by a sinister Engish hanger-on, plays a diabolical game with his guests.

They are driven a world of nightmares where they cannot dis- dreams from reality. To accent their condition, Soto Drings them up to moments ol where in terror they examine their fears and helpless- ess. When Day asks her husband if he can remember their immediate past, he lies to her in order to give her confidence. But the truth was that "very definitely there was a blind spot in his memory; he could recall nothing that had happened beyond the first two or three days on the ship out of San Francisco." Worse than the moments of consciousness for the two are the dreadful scenes and experiences which hang between reason and madness. "He is in a house," 1 a believes, "caught in the body of a man who is being kept in bed There are long periods when he is imprisoned in a muddy, submarine world clinging mol- lusk-Iike to the underside of consciousness until someone comes and touches For Day, the images were equally terrifying.

She was a captive in an. endlessly chang ing Hell "where cities topplec and crashed upon her." WHAT WAS THE cause of this malevolence is explained in the final pages of the book In this new genre of mystery and horror, the world of mind destroying drugs, Bowles shows a masterly hand. ROSE C. FELD 1HC11 plenty of action spread all iver the Americas and Europe, md a knowing familiarity, with lighlife in the jet set. MOSTLY, It is about Diogones Alejandre Xeron, known as Dax, a primitive stud male of mixed reed who comes from the little mythical country of Corteguay in Latin America.

Thanks to his ponsor, the typical dictator El Presidente. he spends most of lis time wandering the world's ashionable cities as a poloplay- ng Latin Lover. The story gets under way with the sex and sadism formula. At he age of 6, Dax witnesses the rape-murder of his mother rand sister by rebel soldiers. A few rears later, trapped by the mili- ary, he is forced Mil his grandfather, already nearly dead NEW BOOK BY PICK Bishop James A.

Pike is thi author of a new book. "Wha Is this Treasure," published by Harper Row. This is a com panion volume to "A Time Fo Christian Candor," which provided considerable controversy and some accusations of heresy Bishop Pike is bishop of the California Dicoese of the Protestant Episcopal church. In "A Time for Christian Candor," th clergyman concentrated on breaking down what he consid ers church erected barrier to belief. In his new book, hi tells how Christian faith can bi rebuilt on what he calls soli serousiy.

mosi people oon Creed realize cats have souls, but n(1 Cu do. On his mistress' lap. Puck stretched and executed a miniature yawn. From their respective chairs the three cats gazed at her, unblinking. What more can one say? Cat's souls are a matter of opinion.

One thing about which there can be little difference of when you can't think of any- opinion, however, is the very particular ambience and qualit of warmth in "Memoir for Mrs Sullavan." It is, in fact, the next bes thing to a nice, leisurely, am at times intimate, visit to th blue house on Great Hill road And there are few things pleai anter than that You name it: this 781-page ovel by the Norwalk author The Carpetbaggers" has it. Al he usual gambits to attract the wpular trade, that is. It has lots of sex, crime, vio- ence pseudoglamor and the ell of money. It has a huge Mr. Crump As Viewed Currently THE CASE OF MR.

CRUMP. By Ludwig Lewisohn. New York: Flrrir, Strain and Glrouz, Ludwig Lewisohn, an American novelist, scholar and teacher, died in 1956, but a few of his numerous novels--most especially those dramatizing peopla enmeshed with incompatible mates and trapped by tyranneous laws and traditions--are still read and admired. Perhaps the best known of his novels is "The Case of Mr. Crump." an intensely biographical work which, for legal reasons, was first published ia Paris in 1926.

The some of the objective facts of the life of Lewisohn, so that the novel is fleshed with a goodly portion of Lewisohn's or Crump's early life in the South; his youthful marriage and early days New York; his troubles (because of his pro-German sympathies) in, his teaching job in the Middle West; and his days as a man of some artistic prominence his return to New York. MOST OF ALL the novel dramatizes the marriage of Mr. Crump to Mrs. Anne Vilas. That marriage reflects Lewisohn's subjective vision of is own union with Mrs.

Mary irnold Childs, a marriage which mded in 1925 soon after Lewisohn ontracted an alliance with the inger Thelma Spear. It 's be- ause of the sordidness the wssible libellousness of Lew- sohn's dramatization of that marriage that "The Case of Mr. Crump" was not originally pub- ished in America. In endless detail in "The Case if Mr. Crump" Lewisohn records he horror, the inferno; of a sen- itive young man's marriage to an aging, egoistic virago.

By the time Mr. Crump, no longer a rom torture. The cast includes a French- English banking family, a wealthy American family interested in jolitics, a nymphomaniac who is he richest heiress in the world, i roundup of Texas oil promoters, 1 phony Russian prince who 'rants for a fashion house, a par- inoic shipping king who swindle! Texans, and a few assorted dope addicts, homosexuals, pros- itutes, gun runners and primitive EVERY FEW pages there a sex kick, usually with Dax as he central figure, whether the scene is a bedroom, the sea, a beach or an automobile. At one point, Daz attends a party at which there are 12 women. Including ex-wives and ex-mistresses, he has slept with all but one she was too old.

A sort ol class reunion. Us inhibited clerks and secretaries sure get a lot of action or our $5.95. Maybe we shouldn't wait for the paperback. -MILES A. SMITH Brutal Slayer Loose in Tale THE HANDS OF INNOCENCE By Jeffrey Ashford.

New York: Walker and Company. Jeffrey Ashford's talent for building up suspence by quiel understatement and for implying unspeakable horror without de tailed Ascription is almost un bearably good. "The Hands of Innocence," a short and definitely not iweet ad dition to the list of "Walker mystery" novels, Is a rare sus pense story--one that almost lit erally chills your blood and ye one that carries you along hur riedly from page to page, afraid of what comes next and yet com pelled to find out the next de velopment. It's all about George Kram mer, a mild-mannered man who has been convicted of the un believably brutal sex-slaying two girls but has had his sentence commuted to life im prisonment because of the im mient abolition of capital punish rnent in England. He escape, from prison, determined to prove that he is not the monster hi compulsive crimes have proven him to be.

And his first act as a "free 1 man is to abduct another girl 12-year-old Sarah Bramswell. The rest of the story concern: itself with the police attempt ti find Krammer and the girl with in a four-day period, since ir the cases of the two girls Kram mer has already slain he kep the children four days before hi sadistic tortures killed them. "The Hands of Innocence" 1 story-telling at its best--and a "must" even for those reader not usually attracted to the mystery itory genre. -EDNA W. VERCIN1 youth but a middle-aged man, akes a poker and crashes it down upon the skull of his wife, the reader can only welcome the murder and its justness.

At'the same time, he may well complain that no man, no matter how 'oung or how foolish, could have derated for so long the hideousr ness of a marriage to a creature such as Mrs. Crump, IN THAT COMMENT lies the ailure of this novel to move lis oday. Despite Mr. Lewisohn's complaint that society unites-to enforce the continuation of unions of completely incompatible-peo- )le, it is impossible to believe the total horror of this marriage, or to accept the humanity of either Mr. Lewisohn'i artistic lero or his villianous heroine, nstead, one completes the novel feeling, as Ernest Sutherland Sates has commented, that Ludwig Lewisohn'! artistic urge was one of "creative malice," and the sickly plaints of his writing reveal, as does much of his life, a persecution complex he never transforms into true art.

To say this is to disagree with Dr. Sigmund Freud, who calls the novel "an incomparable masterpiece," and with Thomas Mann, who insists that the book "in the very forefront of modern epic narrative," but that is not to say that "The Case of Mr. Crump" is not a considerable achievement. It is --if for no other reason than that Ludwig Lewisohn can limn a Freudian nightmare in a pure and vivid irose beyond the dreams of most writers. -JAMES F.

LIGHT WILLIAM BLAKE BIOGRAPHY Viking signed a contract with Aileen Ward for a full-scale biography of the English poet William Blake. Miss Ward, who already has begun research on the project, published "John Keats: The Making of a Poet" with Viking in 1963. That book won the 1964 National Book Award in Arts and Letters, and on its publication in England won two more outstanding awards-the Duff Cooper Memorial Prlit for the best work of non-fiction published during the preceding two years, and the Rose Crawshay Prize of the British Academy for "a critical and historical work by a woman on English literature." the Communist long predicted it RELIGION IN SOVIET UNION What Is the itate of religion to the Soviet Union today? If. it dying out party hai would, or li it, some travel- era report, as itrong aj ever? In "Opium of the People," published by Bobbs-MenUI, Michael Bourdeaux, a young Anglican priest, gives his appraisal of the situation based on first-hand studies. NOVEL SET IN BULL RING Spain and the bull ring are the settings for Circle of Sand, a new Bobbs-Merrill novel by Richard Karlan, to be published on April 29, Karlan, a movie and television actor aad television writer, maket hii debut a noveliit In-thii book..