GUIDE TO GOOD READING

What is happening to
novelist Gwyn Thomas ?

A FRIEND was telling me
about a trade union business
agent who was a going concern
until he became an AA member
and climbed on the water wagon.
Simultaneously he changed from
a fighting representative of the
workers to an exponent of col-
laboration with the boss. t

“How could AA have any-
thing to do with that?” I asked.

“Why, you see, this fellow had
about 16 ulcers,’’ my friend re-
plied. ‘Whenever he took a
drink his ulcers started bother-
ing him. That made him mad
and he’d go visit the boss in a
fighting mood and scare hell out
of him. + He ‘was a real good
business agent in those days.
But soon as he joined AA and
gave up the bottle his ulcers
calmed down, he didn’t feel mad
at anybody, and when he called
on the boss to discuss wages or
grievances he was as mild and
gentle as a lamb. In fact, he
got so he loved everybody, even
the boss, and from that time on
he just wasn’t worth a ‘hoot as
a business agent.”

This story came to my mind
as I read Gwyn Thomas’ latest
novel, Now Lead Us Home

(available at People’s Coopera- .-

tive Bookstore, 337 West Pen-
der). Thomas was a writer Keen-
ly aware of the outside pressure
on people, and he has always
been one of those militants who
pushed back. But in this book
one detects a change in Thomas:

Ever since I picked up a copy
of Where Did I Put My Pity in
1946 I have been an ardent
booster of Gwyn Thomas’ writ-
ings, greeting each new volume
with loud huzzas and introduc-

Capsule
| Reviews

THE LADY WITH A LAMP

The populariidea of Florence
Nightingale is'that of an angel
of mercy. And so she was to the
poor devils in the Crimean War,
where to be wounded was almost
a death warrant.

But to suggest that this was
her character is to completely
miss the whole point of the life
of this woman of steel to wasxn
statistics were -like food and
drink,

Her whole life was a battle
—against her parents, the War
Office, bigotry and prejudice.

She planned hospitals, plan-
ned barracks—where the death-
rate of soldiers had been twice
the civilian death-rate—and re-
organized. sanitation at a pace
which worked War Minister
Sidney Herbert to death.

And for 50 years she was un-
der sentence of death. After
coming back from the Crimea
she hardly; moved from her room,
but her tremendous will to be
doing something never left her.

As she worked Sidney Herbert
to death, she worked herself to
life. She died at the age of 90.

Anna Neagle gives us nothing
of the fire and willpower, noth-
ing of the battle of this great
life. This is a suburban night-
ingale,

She has given us the character
as it might have been seen
through the eyes of a wounded
soldier, gentle and lovely.
Michael Wilding is a charming
Sidney Herbert, but it all needs
more than charm.

\

ing my friends to the scintillat-
ing works of the young Welsh
author. I poured scorn on Am-
erican critics who labelled
Thomas ‘‘a Welsh Damon Run-
yon” because Runyon didn’t -be-
long in the same league. Thomas’
brilliant novel All Things Be-
tray Thee, telling of the struggle
of the Welsh workers in the
1830’s, stamped him as a writer
of genius, filled with what Ralph
Fox once described as ‘warmth,
and passion, and the voice of
sense.”’

In Now Lead <'s i130me Thomas
writes as bewitchingly as ever;
his sentences sparkle with his
special brand of wierd, rich
humor and passionate poetry—
but soon the reader becomes
conscious that something is miss-
ing. For the first time his chief
characters, with the harshness
of the world pressing in on them,
fail to fight back. And prole-
tarians who don’t fight back are
doomed to defeat.

It is not surprinsig, then, that
as the story proceeds the central
character, Mark Lane, fades in-
to the background somewhat
and his place is taken py August
Slezacher, the American mil-
lionairs who has bought the
castle of Glimley a mile or two
from the Welsh village when
the action takes place.

The villagers, hoping the ar-
rival of Slezacher means the re-
turn of prosperty to Ferncleft,
decide to live ‘‘on their knees’’
and treat the millionaire like a
feudal lord,

“Be damned,’’ says Mark,
“Slezacher could put a ilttle
custard on our heads and start
chewing and all we’d do is to
ask if the flavor is all right.”

But Mark, the erstwhile reb-
el, decides to abstarn from fight+
ing back; to adopt a policy of
“wait and see.’ This transfor-
mation in his character occurs
after an abortive attempt at a
protest, led by Mark _ shortly
after the American’s arrival.
Whipping up his lagging follow-
ers at that time, Mark tells one
of them who adopts a servile
attitude: ‘If Spartacus, Crom-
well and Lenin and the other
lovers of change could ever have
heard you they would have given
up the ghost and sur up.”

Here, perhaps is the secret of
Mark’s—and Thomas’—change.
One failure, and Mark subsided.
Is social rebel Gwyn Thomas
preparing to adopt a ‘‘wait and
see’ policy, also, in the crucial
period ahead, when the fate of
mankind depends upon a policy
of struggle?

A couple of years ago I re-
member reading a sentence of
Thomas’ to the effect that when
he becomes. discouraged he
thinks of the International Bri-
vade in the Spanish war and
then “his heart puts om its that
and walks out on the street again
singing.”

Greater struggles are taking
place today than in the Thirties.
The role of the working people
in the fight for peace should in-
spire all progressives to greater
efforts than ever before. Doesn’t
Thomas feel this pulse of the
people? Is his enthusiasm on
the down grade?

There are sentences and para-
graphs and pages in Now Lead
Us Home which are as good as
anything Thomasiever wrote. But
the overall effect. of the book
is depressing. This is no time
for anyone to join the ranks of
the backward-lookers.

—BERT WHYTE

Guard,

14; The Mikado, September 21.

F

Godfrey Rideout (above) is conducting the CBC Light Opera Company in a Gilbert
and Sullivan series on CBC Trans-Canada every Sunday from 8-9 p.m.
with Iolanthe last week and continues: The Gondoliers, August 24; The Yeomen of the
August 31; H.M.S. Pinafore, September 7; The Pirates of Penzance, September
(Photo courtesy CBC Times.)

The series bega™

SHORT STORY

DAVE WALLE

An example

EARLY ON a hot afternoon Kil-
ler Butch entered the crowded
chain store. He slouched with a
tough swing past the shopping
buggies at the entrance by the
big mirrors and rudely pushed a
thin man in a, blue suit, who
with quick, nervous white hands,
was tidying some display cards
of collar studs.

The man half turned to smile
an apology. The Killer noticed
that he did not.smile with his
mouth but not ‘his eyes, like a
tired schoolteacher, but the
other way round.

The Killer set his jaw and
ignored the* smile. He looked
aside and caught sight of his
own face in one of the big mir-
rors along the wall.

It was not as tough looking as
he hoped but very round and
pink and about 13 years old. A
pimple was just starting at the
corner of his nose. He moved
on quickly to the candy counter,

A hollow gramophone brayed
“Melancholy Baby”’ and ‘he sway-
ed in time. The crowd pressed
close and he smelled a delicious
smell of roasted nuts.

* * *

NEAR THE chocolate bars he
stopped and looked at the blonde
who was serving. She did not
seem to stick out as much in
front as Killer Butch’s_ girl
friend did in the comic, but all
the same it would be good to see
her knocked down SOCKO!. So
that her legs went up in the air

like they did in the drawings.

She turned her back~to serve
someone on the other side. If he
fhad a whip now like the gorilla
in G-Man Marvel...

Suddenly the felt a bit queer
with a feeling he did not under-
stand. The greasy smell of the
roasted nuts was no longer ap-
petising but sickening. .A low,
hoarse note from the. gramo-.-
phone seemed to vibrate in his
chest. ‘‘Come to me my melan-
choly babeeee ,. .”

Her back was still turned. He
decided to chance it. He glanced
round furtively like the real
Butch did, just before he shot
someone, and slipped a bar from
the display counter into his
pocket., ‘‘Dead easy.’”’ He almost
wished it was school time so that
he could tell the fellows about
iG

“Just a minute, son.’’ MHold-
ing him by the-elbow was the
man in the blue suit.

All at once the gramaphone
and the crowds and the piled
candies seemed horrible. He
wished he was Superman so that
he could soar away into the
clouds or Killer Butch to lay ’em
all out SOCKIO! WHAM! and
run away.

The blonde at the counter
turned. “T’m sure he didn’t
mean... 3272

“Tt’s no good, miss,’’ said blue
suit, screwing up his eyes at her
as if she were a bright light.

ing for the policeman to ©

“My pilfering graph ss a
about five points since the gi
of the school holidays. mens
ing to make an example of {pe
one, He'll go in front of
beak.” tbe

The Killer noticed that
blonde was looking at him 4.
pity, She didn’t look like Bult
girl friend any more but U2 ho
like his own Auntie Mabel,
had just got married. nt

He wished he hadn’t toned
of her like that, He wished } 7
never come into the store He
heard of Killer Butch.
wished. . ..

klk * <6)

THEY STOOD at the enttal,
by the shopping buggies, ome:
He saw his burning cheeks
big mirror. A little crowd
gathered. ir

Suddenly he saw what the Oe
rors were there for, not just y
decoration, “Smile at ™°
melancholy babeeee . . -

the
nad

was
“I’m sorry, son,” blue suit ake

saying, “but I’ve got to
an example of you. My Pil
losses". 74

reri®

‘ a
While he spoke his wilt
hands nervously tidied 4 pile nd
Yank comics on tle: counter er
arranged at a more attrac”
angle a cover showing 42 * a
whip in hand, advancing
blonde tied to a, bed. ng
“Tt don’t know what’s gett.
into kids these days,” he ™

: 8
PACIFIC TRIBUNE — AUGUST 22, 1952 — page