... Elizabeth Bcwen s BROWNS AND CHESTER: A Portrait of a Shop (Lindsay Drummond; 15s.) has an unusual author-- Mass-Observation. Up to now, this form of research has been applied to contemporary affairs; and enlighten ing, if sometimes startling, have its results been --we have been documented, if one may so put it, up to the hilt. We may still be ignorant as to our neighbours' ways of life if ...

... THERE are two recent recordings of Berlioz's Symphonie Fantastique, and though it may seem too much to suggest that both versions of this major work are heard, no one who really enjoys and appreciates music should miss listening to one or other set of records. Apart from the actual performance of the orchestras concerned, both recordings show how much in advance British recording systems are ...

... Elizabeth Betvehs PROBABLY no novelist exposed the inside of his working brain as completely as did Gustave Flaubert. The answer to What does it feel like to be a writer? has been furnished by him-- at length, ruthlessly, freely, and with sometimes intimidating results. It was not that Flaubert, a stolid Norman of considerable reserve, went about giving informa tion to all and sundry-- what ...

... Elizabeth Bowetis THE JUDGE'S STORY, by Charles Morgan (Macmillan; 7s. 6d.), is a tale of the conflict of good and evil, deep in its implications but containing not one overtly strong scene. Over-subtlety is, in these days, a charge against writing showing any marked degree of control; but it is not a charge the most inert reader, with a preference for the noisy, could bring here. I share ...

... . By Victor Canning. (Hodder and Stoughton 9s. 6 d.) THE SLEEPING SPHINX. By John Dickson Carr. (Hamish Hamilton 8s. 6d.) is made easier by the fact that an Italian girl with a jealous lover has fallen in love with Burgess, and the lover, as one of the Resistance Movement, has learnt not to over-respect human life. The climax comes when the pine trees which will span the chasm have been felled ...

... WHATEVER view may be taken of the state of the nation at the present moment, of the severity of the cuts which have been imposed, and of the grim prospects ahead of us, the politicians still think it reasonable to continue the party game. Labour Ministers blame everybody but themselves and I their Government, while his Majesty's Opposition is not slow with epithets such as mismanagement and ...

... GOETHE'S WILHELM MEISTER NEWLY TRANSLATED Hanslip Fletcher Records London Bombing Another Book of Van Gogh Reproductions Carlyle translated Goethe's great novel Wilhelm Meister, but the disillusioned Scottish rustic, one of the strongest personalities of the nineteenth century, possessing the most mannered style of any writer in the English tongue, was not the ideal man to interpret Germany's ...

... THERE is a large section of the reading public who find historical novels irresistible. They do not, presumably, spend their spare time in the calm silences of public libraries, reading the relevant authorities and doing their own research. Probably because they have no time for it. Instead, they prefer the excellent method of History- Without Tears, in which all the spade work has been done, ...

... C. A. Lejeune's Opinion as a MAN-IN-THE-SEAT has asked for my views on the points he raises. Here they are, as exactly as I can define them: Is the critic a thorn in the side of presenters, producers and performers Of course he is. Everybody, including Man- in-the-Seat, is a thorn in the side of presenters, producers and performers. Just ask them. Can a critic kill the result of prolonged ...

... By C. A. Lejeune. THE TWO MRS. CARROLLS.-- A Hollywood thriller, with Humphrey Bogart and Barbara Stanwyck, that works up quite a bit of the authentic spine chill towards the close. The second Mrs. Carroll adores her husband, a tem peramental artist with a London reputa tion and smooth ways, but when he takes to painting in a locked room by day, and bringing her warm milk with a funny taste ...

... OUR BOOKSHELF Rupert Croft-Cooke REVIEWED ON THIS PAGE. SAD ROAD TO THE SEA. By Gerald Kersh. Heinemann 8s. 6 d.) DUET FOR SISTERS. By Kitty Barne. Chapman and Hall 9s. 6d.) SO LONG AT THE FAIR. By Anthony Thorne. (Heinemann 7s. 6 d.) A MAN CALLED JONES. I By Julian Symons. Gollancz 8s. 6 d.) SAD ROAD TO THE SEA.-- The career of Mr. Gerald Kersh has followed a familiar precedent. His name ...

... SINGAPORE, AND AFTER Another Book About the Far Eastern Debacle, and the Years of Bondage Since the war's end quite a number of writers have attempted to tell the story of the fall of Singapore, the chaos of the days of disaster, and the years of captivity and toil that followed in the hands of the Japanese. None of these books has been wholly acceptable: there have been too many reservations; ...