MUSIC ARTS N REVIEW —— the book. of man, cut began.” his longing for the woods. woods.” undeniable appeal—EH.A. Loggers Rhymes Have Strong Appeal Rhymes of a Western Logger—by Robert E. Swanson —Lumberman Printing Company—5s0 Cents, A SECOND edition proves the popularity among log- gers of this little book. The author’s warning: “This book of verse—it might be worse, and still it might be better” will not daunt men who know “the call of the tall timbers” as he himself does. They will agree that his rhymes have captured the spirit of the logging camps. “The Vanishing Host” is perhaps one of the best in “Qur were the valleys untrodden, unspoiled by the hand Ours were the slopes of the mountain before the great In every line is apparent the writer’s familiarity with loggers’ ways and his love of the job, and he minces no words in telling of his contempt for life in the city and The reader will undoubtedly enjoy the loggers’ dic- tionary included in the book. To “raise hell,” it informs us, means “to do anything in a boisterous manner.” is “something there is never much of, in the “Joint” we are told mens “an establishment,” and to “pull the pin” means to quit the job and go to town. The timekeeper or office man is known as the “inkslinger” and “jack-pot” means “a hell of a mess. female person between ages 9 to 90,” and the dinner gong, we gather, is known to loggers as the “guthammer.” In serious and humorous vein, these rhymes have an 3} “ce A dame is “a Eyewitness Reports Battle Of Moscow ALL-OUT ON THE ROAD TO SMOLENSK — by Erskine Caldwell—Duell, Slean and Pearce—$3.00. RSKINE CALDWELL’S eye-witness account of the Russo- German war on the Moscow front during the first months of that struggle, is a readable, and at times, exciting report. Told in the matter-of-fact style of a reporter who occasion- ally outdoes Hemingway in a deliberate understatement, a picture of the heroism, coolness and resource of the Soviet people emerges. Caldwell tells of the early air raids over Moscow, when, due to the efficient organization of civilian defense, very little dam- age was done, although the pro totechnic display was awe-inspir- ing. The People’s Army, which repaired streets and buildings struck by bombs, apparently per- formed its work with great dis- patch and ingenuity. Caldwell relates how a public square which had been practically demolished by bombs one night, was re- stored the next day, even to re- turning a statute to its original position, Among his accounts of the ac- tual fighting at the front, an in- cident involving the editor of one of the military newspapers, which were published on the _ spot, Stands out very vividly. This edi- tor, having lost his reporter, de- cided to get the news himself, and “bummed” a ride with 4a tank crew. When the members of the tank crew were all killed by a direct hit, the editor con- tinued the battle single-handed, until his tank was put out of business. He then managed to es- cape the enemy, returned to his mobile printing plant, and wrote the story of the battle. e e ) ALDWELL admires the cour- age and the conviction of the Soviet people, but appears not to understand fully just what is behind it. He tells of the Peo- ple’s Army, which is organized from workers and peasants to assist the Red Army behind their own lines, of the guerrillas, who have demoralized the invading Reichwehr, and of the Red Army itself with as much enthusiasm as he permits himself, “but when he comes to analyze the political and economic situation in the USSR, he falls into some rather strange errors. In the chapter which he de- votes to Stalin, he betrays, along with his admiration, a complete lack of knowledge of the princi- ples which govern Stalin’s ac- tions. He says that prior to and including the period of the sign- ing of the German-Soviet pact, Stalin was convinced that the democracies were just as much his enemies as was Germany, but that “shortly after the signing of the pact, he changed his be- liefs to conform with reality.” Caldwell would be better advised to say that “reality” changed, and Stalin’s actions changed to con- form with it, while his “beliefs” Civil War Story Tells Of First Organized Fifth Column THE COPPERHEADS—by William Blake—Grossett and Dunlap—$3.25. ss story of the ‘first organized fifth col umn movement in America,’ the Coppe Rebellion during the American civil war, c ontains an amazing amount of authentic int tion about intrigue, double-dealing and sellout carried on by those ‘respectable gentler the south’ to maintain a slave system, the onl y system under which they could keep luxurious way of living—at the expense of the rest of the population. Every phase of the struggle be- tween the North and the South during this period which mould- ed America’s future along demo- eratic lines is covered by Blake in his story, which tells of ac- tion in the immediate vicinity of the war, and its reaction in oth- er places, including England, par- ticularly among the ‘working class. The story of the Rebellion is woven around four central fig- ures, Maria Meinhardt, daughter of a German emigrant, and her three lovers, “la femme aux trois amants,” and unfortunately the fortunes and misfortunes of these four hold the reader’s attention at the expense of the vastly more important and significant mater- ial in the book. Hero of the story, Frank, is of course a Union soldier, who rises to rank of colonel only at the end of the whole business, despite his undying and often much ma- ligned attempts to do his best for the Union. His sentiments, and those of the North, are summed up very neatly in a talk with his father: “That's poison to their (the South) system, the right of mil- lions of men to go West and settle the prairies, poor men at that, men without capital What's the good of free trade without free land? Are the hov- els of England and Scotland the workmen’s advertisement for free trade? Sure the looms go round and the hammers ring in the ship- yards and that’s what Cobden and Bright boast about .. .” HE “original Copperhead,” Jurgen Van Rensselaer, is a very appealing villain, although obviously rotten to the core. He is quite prepared to sell New York City to the South, to bribe Union generals to lead their arm- ies to defeat and shame, to pre- cipitate the draft riots and to join with the organizers of the Copperhead Rebellion. He obtains information through one of his mistresses and sells it for,his own personal gain to the rebels, in this way rising from pauper to millionaire at his country’s ex- pense. In the end he sees, somewhat, what he has done—and what oth- er Southern gentlemen have done —and declares to his mother: “Imagine it, they would have burned their own allies! They fired even Democratic hotels, remained, as always, those of a Marxist-Leninist. However, one should not quar- rel too much with a reporter who was one of the first to acknow- ledge the power of the Soviet armies, and the efficiency of the Soviet military machine.—Lavon Tooth. UNIVERSAL NEWS STAND 188 EAST HASTINGS STREET Mail your Order for all PROGRESSIVE LITERATURE MOSCOW NEWS WEERLY “THE SOVIETS EXPECTED IT” by Anna Louise Strong where our people gathered. Well, if they classify me with Union men, and make us all targets, they’re welcome. I'll take them at their word.” The third member of the love triangle, Karl, is a Duteh social- ist, dull, uncompromising, who eventually provides a safe, stodgy husband for Maria, when the oth- er two fade out of the picture. HE story of these four peo- ple is interwoven with real incidents, names of people who have left their mark on inter- national working class history. One reads of Karl Marx through his correspondence with Sorge Weydemeyer, such people as Wait Whitman and Rimsky-Korsakov as incidental characters in this vast panorama of America’s bat- tle for a “free” land. Wevertheless, there is som ticism due, despite the spl @ message it carries for all ling to look for it The story of “lafemme- trois amants” is made to afF in such a strong light so < dim the colorful and signif story behind these love af: The importance of the rebe and its result on American tory is lost in a wealth of d dully presented, while the ro: tic side of the picture stand: in bold relief. z William Blake has unden obtained a vast amount of thentic significant informatic. interest to lovers of the d cratic way of life, mform: which carries much more wi upon second reading of the } when the first intense int in Maria’s fortunes has assuaged Kay Gregory. by Joseph Stalin | | 11§ West Pender NIGHT IS EMD A SELECTION OF THE POEMS OF J. S. Wallace : $1.00 AN AMERICAN LOOKS AT KARL MARX— by William Blake ... SABOTAGE! The Secret War Against America— by Michael Sayers and Albert E. Kahn __... $3. LENINISM—Selected Writings PAGES FROM A WORKER’S LIFE— by William Z. Foster SOCIALIST SIXTH OF THE WORLD— by the Dean of Canterbury -—-...............---------.--- $1. NAPOLEON’S INVASION OF RUSSIA—1812— by Eugene Tarle ....... : WITCH HUNT—The Technique and Profits of Redbaitins—by George Seldes __._........... $3. THE WAR OF NATIONAL LIBERATION— by Joseph Stalin _.... COLLECTIVE BARGAINING IN CANADA— by J. L. Cohen, K.C. The People Bookshop 105 Shelly Building MA. 6929 Vancouver, 5.