The Herald-Sun from Durham, North Carolina • 43

'TV" W0m SP Durham Morning Herald Sunday March 21 1965 Another Mirror Hit children ere the lucky onei That'i what any book reviewer who sees new books by the dozens ev-ery week can tell you It's as if the publishers all too aware of the unevenness of the offerings in the adult realm are trying to compensate by outdoing themselves in the juvenile field As always a number of the more tempting new chit books are also North Carolina books One of the most beautifully intriguing of these is for mer Charlotte newsman Julian Scheer's enchanting nonsense book Rain Makes Applesauce (Holiday House New York $495) a runner-up for this prestigeladen Caldecott award A nonsense book totally composed of the all imaginative children love handsome little volume is one to grow up with A talented writer who has already produced two books plus miles of superior newspaper copy Julian had the rare good luck to be assigned an equally talented artist as illustrator ELWIN AND HIS PEOPLE Marvin Bileck a New Jersey bom artist known for his book illustrations saw in rhymes a whimsy that inspired him to three years of drawings so delip cately colorful the book was sent to Belgium to be printed via a special color process Abridged For Children Eccentric Englishman Devoted To Indians' Adventure of (Doubleday New York 294 pp $495) ia an abridged edition Ths completed book seems so integrated hard to imagine the words without the pictures of Irving "The Agony and the Ecstasy" the biography of Michelangelo sculptor painter poet architect and engineer Shown here is one of Joseph illustrations which combine with hotographs of the master's works to enhance the ook which ia aimed at children up to 12 Julian sings stars are made of lemon and rain makes and Bileck' intricate drawings show golden stars exploding from a lemon being squeezed by three parachuting gamins Julian fancies "My house goes walking every day and rain makes and Bileck' fantastically complex house teeters along on stilts Remarkable Bookshop All the while the refrain "Oh just talking silly enters and reenters and somewhere in each doublepage spread a little Bileck couple demonstrates another step of the applesauce process from seed-planting to the creation of a whole sea of applesauce current literary history Future commentators would do well to consult its pages Present readers will find it a valuable record of an important chapter in the world of A 8 Reflects Gusto LETTERS FROM BOHEMIA By Bn Hecht Doubled ay HR The live pulse of nonconforming Individualists is retained in these pages It is a collection of remembrances keyed to a handful of letters that were written at a time when free spirits possessed a fine mocking but exuberant zest for life a nonorganization blend of gusto and irreverence that seems hard to find these days It was a time when artists and writers lived for the extravagant gesture of contempt of admiration and vivid and often add metaphor and sometimes savory sometimes devastating flick of a phrase As bohemians they were the opposite of beatniks They had a vitality that often tricked them into charging at mirages Sometimes they seemed snphnmnric but under the surface of their prehipster talk there was a gambler's willingness to thrust all the chips to the center of the table Hecht has written about seven of his friends who preceded him in their departure from this earth-writers Gene Fowler Mencken Sherwood Anderson and Maxwell Boden-heim painter George Grosz composer George Antheil and finally another writer Charlie MacArthur It is a pity that the younger generation has missed the flavor and essence of Hecht's day but they can discover them in this anecdotal book It is a bright mirror of a lively era Ben Hecht THE AMAZING ADVENTURES OF ARCHIE AND THE FIRST HOT DOG Written and Illustrated by LrGrand Abingdon Press New York $Ut When a boy named Archie and a dog named Samuel combine with George Washington in a very tall tall tale me can expect history to suffer a bit but it dues a lot for the cause of humor In another of LeGrand's farfetched tales a young boy whose father insists he amount to finds the dollar that George threw across the Potomac and he buys himself a dog with it George's father is pretty upset too that his son is throwing his money away and he tells him also that he amount to much" The two unfortunates come together and decide that they will amount to something The way to victory George takes and the process Archie takes to invent the first hot dog are clever enough to amuse an adult although it wont tax the reading skill of a third grader "Rain Makes win for itself a special place literature THE TRIBAL WORLD OF TERRIER ELWIN An autoMogra-phy By Verrier Elwin Oxford Ualvenlty Press $(75 The author was the son of an English missionary bishop who after his early death was raised by an eccentric mother graduated from Oxford and secured a position teaching at his alma mater The appeal of India struggling for independence proved stronger than the security of his post at Oxford Elwin left England in 1927 to Join a Christian missionary group and soon became involved with Gandhi aid the nonviolent movement This kept him in trouble with the government and as the involvement Increased it resulted in first withdrawal from his church second his abandonment of Christianity entirely and thirdly his renunciation of British citizenship Those facts will not generate sympathy with the ordinary reader and to tell the truth Elwin at this stage is not a particularly sympathetic figure However he leaves file city for file rural tribal areas in the Northeast Frontier Agency whoa he spends virtually tha Another new juvenile takes a different approach but comes up with an Interesting result The veteran bookmaking team of Ruth and Latrobe Carroll are authors of Danny and the Poi Pup (Henry Walck Inc New York 48 pp $375) The Carrolls from their Western North Carolina mountain retreat have over the years produced a whole aeries of books drawing on Tarheel backgrounds and people but this new one goes to Hawaii for its setting Their little hero Danny is the son of missionaries in Hawaii in the early 19th century and his preoccupation is with a little black puppy which he fears is being fattened for a kingly feast As they describe efforts to keep the puppy from gaining enough to be tasty the Carrolls draw a picture of our newest state as it was a hundred years ago Ruth drawings reflect the vivid tropical and scenes and her stories of rest of his life doing what he could medically spiritually and politically for the primitive tribal people of India Although he is no Albert Schweitzer his genuine affection for and loyalty to these not-too-lovable people exposes a bit of real humanity in the man that it is hard not to respond to It may be difficult fir the reader to realize that deep in the heart of India completely surrounded by the sophisticated culture of the Hindus there exists in relatively primitive firm number of tribes of people who are to India approximately what the are to America might be even more difficult for the reader to understand how an educated Englishman would choose to live with them marry one of them and make them his life When referred to as That freakish Englishman the brilliance of whose eccentricities even Oxford could not Elwin gives an uninspired reply by way of defense One Is left with the impression that had he not frit his behavior In need of defense he would not have expended the effort in writing this book -C little 1) ought to be accorded equal HOW TO BE ALIEN By George Mikes Basie Books New York 15 pp $215 George Mikes is one Britisher and world traveler widely known and read thaw but virtually unknown in America Mr Mikes comments on the refusal of American publishers to present his works and facetiously (one hopes) scores them all for passing him by until Basic Books people decided to take a chance with him This is a travelogue of good style and taste Being a successful alien is a job at which one must work He enjoyed traveling in and writing about Britain France Italy Germany Switzerland Israel and Japan Any reader should enjoy these observations They are humorous minus barbs one might expect The countries and their people come alive in his Variation In Intrigue THE THOUSAND DOORS By Ahrshun Rothherg Holt Rinehart 282 pp $415 Though the hero of this novel is confronted with a motley assortment of secret agents he is an agent of different kind-literary Fortunately for his physical survival literary agent Warren Stone had been an American paratrooper so he la able to handle all the fighting and hooting he is drawn into Stone goes to Yugoslavia looking for Kon statin Karst who once hid risen to the post of vice president in the Red (but non-Soviet) nation but had broken with the regime and now was a virtual prisoner Stone hopes to get an ideologically hot manuscript and smuggle it out to the West for publication (The fictional Karst is in position similar to that of a real-life figure Milovan Djilas) It develops that Karst is eager to have the literary agent carry away four manuscripts hut there are many obstacles The Yugoslav secret police headed by retar Decani would like to use Stone as a cat's paw to get their own hands on the documents Stone seeks help from American officials but for some reason they fear political repercussions and don't want him to succeed Also there are a couple of thugs on the Moscow side of this complex maneuver So the now secretive literary agent has a thorough lesson in Balkan intrigues as well as some romantic adventures with the beautiful Eleanor without knowing for sure whose side she is on The story is an interesting variant of the international thriller type with enough action and color to make it lively -M Abraham Rothherg Duke Prof Is Author Of Volume in Chilean is the title of a new book published by the Duke University Press The author is Dr John Fein chairman of the Duke Department of Romance Languages Modernismo is the name given to a literary movement that affected the style of a generation of Spanish writers It originated with the publication of Ruben Dario's in 1888 Soon after the publication of Dario's work he left Chile However the movement he began followed its own distinctive course there Modernismo writers became divided into two groups One early identified themselves with the poetry of social protest The other displayed an air of isolation from the rest of the continent and from the cosmopolitan spirit characteristic of the movement in general Records concert fare which concert id anisti in general have reduced to fodder Entranont ia not such a pianist He has to grow artistically before he is one since he can't now lilt throe familiar works above and out of the rut of routine And who does Columbia think kidding when it labels them "The Great Romantic Piano Tha young and sensational voice of Shirley Verrett (who ia not yet two years away from her debut) is excitingly exercised in a collection of Spanish songs the seven songs of Falla plus songs of Granados Monlsalvalge Nin Turina and Obradnra (RCA Victor-2778) This Week in THE OLD BOOK FEATURE CASE OLD SETS you're looking for Inexpensive but decorative shelf or If you're lucky Important titles In unimportant here's your chance for a treasure-hunt THE INTIMATE BOOKSHOP 1 1 9 East Franklin Street Chapel Hill Open Till 10 PM Brief Reviews Of Recent Books efforts to teach the prince the customs and traditions grammar grade level CONFESSIONS OF A BOHEMIAN TORT By Russell Kirk Fleet New York KM pp $4JS Widely noted for his pungent phrases and incisive thinking Russell Kirk also wears with pride the label of arch Conservative with a capital C) Because of this fact he confesses to being very much worried about many things in a day when so many things seem to be wrong especially from the point of view of the conservative This realistic pessimism is reflected in his syndicated column now appearing in a couple of hundred newspapers and in his articles and books that pour forth with amazing agility The 90-phis articles that make up this book are superior examples of his philosophy and approach They tell of places and people he knows They design an unending canvas upon which he shows his conservatism with missionary seal One feels that somehow any equally articulate and intelligent liberal (with a Danny and tha Poi Pup mskel both an Interesting departure from the usual Carroll offering as well as a worthy addition to their reputation Pretty Penelope Coker Wilson a likely daughter of historical novelist Elizabeth Boatright Coker made her debut in the world of publishing with Fancy and the Cement Patch (Reilly St Lee Chicago 80 pp $350) The remarkable story of a little boy who kept a pony in the cement backyard of his New York apartment Fancy is one of those natural books which approaches things the way children do in direct and unencumbered fashion Its sweet-without-being-sacchrine story deals with young Jamie Ramsey whose Great-Uncle Orville from Wyoming brings him a Shetland pony and widowed mother Beryl who is child enough herself to let Jamie keep the pet in the "cement backyard of their big city apartment As the two struggle with the problems which quite naturally arise Jamie learns to deal with a bigger problem he had had all along and manages to do some growing up in the process Frank drawings reflect for young readers who might live elsewhere the not necessarily impossible life of a child in a city too Fancy and the Cement Patch is a nice bow for Miss Penelope who besides writing has been active in the theater and television world of the Big City as both a producer and an actress Like young Danny she rides frequently in Central Park and is currently at work on a novel and another book WISE MEN FISH HERE By Rogers Hereeurt Brace pp $5-15 More than a biography of a person this bonk is the story of Frances SteWf and her unique shop the Gotham Bonk tha two am Inseparable the remarkable influence which both of them have had in the literary life of this century Mias Steloffs 77 yean have been filled with a good many paradoxes Deprived of a formal education because she came from a poverty-distressed family she nevertheless made her mark in the electrically charged world between authorship and readership Though the always has blushed at crudity and vulgarity aha has fought soma significant court battles against blue-nose suppression Not an intellectual herself she has given practical help and encouragement to many who were Her bookstore has been located In West Forties since 1920 She was a shrewd pioneer in promoting the new writers the little magazines tha books about art drama and the theater Her customers and intimates include a tremendously long roster of nearly every literary figure of our times and many from the arts Tha author has shown her shortcomings and idiosyncracies as well as her merits relating (for example) how she has driven her employes as hard as she has driven herself It is a chronicle deftly written and wisely understanding of a person and an enterprise that belong near the center of Best Sellers FICTION "The Spy Who Came in from the Cold" John Le Carre Wapshot John Cheever NONFICTION "Profiles in John Kennedy "My Years with General Alfred Sloan Jr Market and friendly as she chats in tha restored home of Confederate Gen PGT Beauregard But a visitor finds it difficult to be at ease It ia a regal hospitality an aloof friendliness An then any regrets In the long- bountiful literary career a visitor asks "I almost never have had good ahe says a note of puzzlement in her voice "The critics have never taken me seriously "Why? I don't know why You might also ask me why I have never had a book made into a Hollywood has not turned any of her intricate full-blown novels into movies although television and radio have done adaptations Although book reviewers havt never regarded Mrs Keyes as first rata they have praised her vivid descriptions of tha world of wealth and gentility By and large they have found her characters cardboard her dialogue stilted her plots rambling One critic wrote: 'To read a Keyes novel is to enter an enormous ballroom decorated with expensive good taste where a number of generally kind people rotate in eiegant costumes and whisper to each other interminable stories of family entanglements ft is never too clear just what ia going Tha public goea right on will age beautifully and in the realm of children's the English alphabet reveal of past all on a DURHAM Meet Cswiplrta Benfc Lunts Seen As Extremely Nice People STAGE STRUCK: The Romance ef Alfred Loot and Lysn Fan-Unne By Maurice Zolotew Hu-conrt Brace and World New York 272 pp $515 A New Yorker who visited the famed theatrical couple at their home In Genesee Depot Wis described them as "two very nice and hospitable how they come across in this well-written biography But they also sound like tha most fascinatingly dedicated perform-era ever to set foot on stage "You sometimes get the feeling that nothing outside the theater really exists for writes Znlntow At other times when they are not appearing in a play their interests run to design interior decoration and cooking for Lunt and home sewing for Miss Fontanne She makes not only clothing for herself but upholstery and curtains The Lunts met in New York In 1919 when Miss Fontanne was appearing with Lauretta Taylor her mentor and a leading American actress They were married but not even their Who's Who biographies say when Both had been successful singly before they teamed up onstage as wen as off Their first team hit was in 1924 The only fault this enchanted reviewer finds with their biography is the tendency to he too adoring aa when he writes: cannot be made to do anything they do not see the relevance of doing on a stage and they are invariably Surely not even tha Lunts can be that great Reviewing NEW YORK (UPI)-If you have good stereo equipment (or better) and some affinity for the warm humanity and humor of Haydn be excited by the six flute quartets of his opus six which have been musicianly recorded by Jean-Pi erre Rampal admirable flautist and three excellent French strings players (Angel-38226) These are such early Haydn no one can definitely assign to them a year or for that matter prove by documentation that the works are his But they themselves proclaim their authorship Tha Haydnesque turns ami moods and capers ere unmistakable ancestors of those which mark the unique individuality of his later works Good reproductive equipment ia essential to get out the tonal richness and subtleties which the flautist put into the performances The flute is a difficult voice both to record and reproduce Angel's engineers did a wonderful job at their end The young pianist Phillippo Entremont has four piano concerto recordings going for him simultaneously on a three-record set in a box They are the concertos of Grieg and Tchaikowrsky and the 2nd concerto of Rachmaninoff along with his concerto called on Paganini theme Throe were two the Philadelphia under Ormandy and the New York Philharmonic under Bernstein (Columbia-715) One has to like a pianist very much indeed to want to hear him through so much itandard If Tough Critics Create Good By DAVID ZINMAN NEW ORLEANS La (AP) -In the gracious Southern setting of camellias and a fountain patio the words that have created 47 bonks still flow from tin pen of Frances Parkinson Keyes Six bouro or more a day seven days a week tha 79-year-old widow writes in her blue-lined notebooks She keeps two secretaries busy near her study once a slave quarters in antebellum Beauregard House When she is not writing she is In Spain or France or the mountains of Peru immersing herself in the locale for a new book All this despite the fact that he is lame and arthritic and plagued with insomnia and that he has already turned out 19 best-sellers "Why don't I retire? Why you ask a doctor why he doesn't practice? Or a lawyer why he take any more she says Is my chosen profession This ia my livelihood This is the thing I can do Writers have one great advantage: Their work gets better and better Age ia no A beavy-set gray -haired woman whose Yankee years emerge in her New England accent Mrs Keyes (rhymes with has the air of a grande dame Ring ef emeralds diamonds and pearla be jewel fingers of both hands She ia hospitable Koz's Nurse Nellie Nurse Nellie is the creation of Larry Katsman or Kaz as he signs the cartoons he draws of her and whose collection appears in paperback form aa New (Pocket Books $100) Besides drawing cartoons Mr Katzman ia president of an electric vaporizer company Continued Success Stories EVERYTHING IN BOOKS THE BOOK EXCHANGE Author of 19 best-selling novels since 1936 Frances Parkinson Keyes now 79 continues to writ She is seen here holding her latest novel at her home in New Orleans She moved there after her death in 1938 AT FIVE POINTS geeth's Lam St and "The ti i tsiSuWMUil iierwiniiueeten.