READING MATTER

7 Out paper has already told
ay the new format of the
Shee Marxist Review and what
ue anuary issue contains, but
a le stand repeating. The for-
oe s really attractive and more
ened. Among the con-
a apart from the main art-
ae the Lenin Year and
ae ions of social prognostica-
hoe a Scientific foretelling of
ae evelopment of society,
ee oS very interesting stu-
serve currently important
eae which are the more
Be ant because we have lit-
oe Sa information on
tee Penne: For example,
Beet rie with developments in
thes) a revolution under way
rane the present situation
Beat es the outlook for the
Sech mocratic parties of the
nd International, and the

eee in the fight to bring
aa nomy of the previously

pe and dependent coun-
1s ese and Africa to the
sthee exc highly developed
light reading? Well, it isn’t
ton A € escape literature but
Bee Nelaa and the argument
Mane rom facts presented.
time ea if you take a little
sant chew over and digest it,
wines well informed on
in

‘cid peace: place and where
* 7 *

A friend has sent u
L Ss several

wont of the Irish Social-
St. paddies is 16A Pearse
at lin 2, Eire) and three
Ha nae that were published
et ad recently. Not only
will fi other Canadians too

has eben of interest.
aise nd has given us many
fies Martyrs, poets and
SA . The revolutionary so-
ua ames Connolly, who led
at PEM Ree

“ys; Gwen

a LL. LAL
on he USSR youngsters in

practically every city

Of Canadian interest

the Easter insurrection of 1916
and was executed by the Eng-
lish, was highly praised by
Lenin. His 140-page Labor in

-Jrish History and smaller Labor,

Nationality and Religion are
two of the booklets we received.
The third is Fiery Cross, a bio-
graphy of revolutionary Jim
Larkin by Joseph Deasy.

With Ireland among the “hot
spots” in the world today, it
would be good for Canadians to
learn a little more about the
background and. the problems
there today.

* * *

We have received a booklet
of a dozen selected short stories
by Morley Callaghan translated
into Russian by G. Stetsenko
and issued by Progress Pub-
lishers in Moscow. While Cal-
laghan’s column in our daily
papers sometimes causes us to
gag, and his novels don’t reach
the heights even though he did
rub shoulders with Hemingway,
the fact remains that he is one
of Canada’s foremost authors
and his work does deal with
social problems. The Soviet
reading public is already quite
widely acquainted with Cana-
dian letters and this booklet of
stories by Morley Callaghan is
a welcome addition.

In her comments on the selec-
tion, L. Oryol, who has been
specializing in Canadian litera-
ture and wrote about it in the
Soviet Literary Encyclopedia,
notes that Callaghan’s short sto-
ries are stronger than his nov-
els. Along with a brief biogra-
phy of the author she describes
the struggle for Canadian cul-
tural independence and evalu-
ates Callaghan’s writings as 4
contribution to this effort, which
she considers to be quite large.

block or villa

ge

Among the most remarkable
of the pre-revolutionary Ukra-
inian writers was the poetess
Lessya Ukrainka (Larissa Ko-
sach-Kvitka), who was born a
century ago (Feb. 25, 1871). A
flaming democrat with very
close ties with Lenin’s revolu-
tionary socialists, she died from
tuberculosis in 1913.

Among her rousing poems
against oppressors was Robert
Bruce, in which the Scottish na-
tional hero personifies fighters
for freedom in Ukraine and all
Russia—and of course through-
out the world.

The centenary is being mark-
ed not only in Soviet Ukraine
and the USSR as a whole, but
is one of the dates chosen by
UNESCO for world-wide com-
memoration. Ukrainian Cana-
dians have organized a number
of centenary affairs (in which
all Canadians interested in pro-
gressive culture should take
part) and English translations of
some of Lessya Ukrainka’s po-
ems (by John Weir and Mary
Skrypnyk) have appeared in the
News From Ukraine and Ukra-
inian Canadian.

Mistetstvo Publishers in Kiev
are bringing out her long poem
In the Catacombs, translated by
J. Weir.

Quarter-billion
union cards

The international trade union
movement now has a member-
ship of over 250 million—about
half of the world’s working
class. Over 60% of this number
—about 160 million—belong to
the movement’s progressive
wing, led by the World Federa-
tion of Trade Unions.

The reformist-led International
Confederation. of Free Trade
Unions numbers about 45 mil-
lion members. Many of the na-
tional centres affiliated with it
have lately been co-operating
with the class-oriented unions
and broadening contacts with
the trade unions of the socialist
countries.

The third largest international
centre, the World Confederation
of Labor (known until October
1968 as the International Feder-
ation of Christian Trade Unions)
has a membership of about 12
million. Some big organizations
belonging to it, notably the La-
tin American Federation of
Christian Trade Unionists, stand
for united action with the pro-

TURN TO BOOKS

Fine novel

The Manuscripts of Pauline
Archange, by Marie-Claire Blais,
translated from the French by
Derek Coltman. N.Y., Farrar,
Straus & Giroux, 1969. $5.95.

Marie-Claire Blais’ novel “The
Manuscripts of Pauline Arch-
ange” is an outcry against the
poverty, cruelty and hopeless-
ness of daily life in Quebec. To
read this timely book helps one
grasp the despair of many
French-Canadians and the neces-
sity for economic and social

changes in Quebec.

Through the perceptive eyes
of Pauline Archange, we exper-
ience the life of a French-Cana-
dian girl growing up in an en-
vironment of physical and spi-
ritual deprivation. The lot of the
working man is portrayed by
her father who “. . . worked all
day at the factory, studied in
the evenings, worked at night
mending roads, and was never-

“theless astonished to feel like

a man who’s had it before he’s
forty.” When Germaine Leon-
ard, a socially-conscious young
doctor, visits the convent,

Pauline reveals the condition of.

Quebec children as she observes
her welcome: ‘Never having ex-
perienced such a thing as a cure
for our ills, we raced as one
child to the infirmary to present
our rotting teeth, our sore
throats, our racking coughs
rasping up from the abyss like
appeals for love and kindness.”

In her condemnation of the
Church in all its forms, author
Blais is ruthless. The convent
and Catholic boarding school are
places of inhuman treatment,
judgment and punishment of
children. As in the church, so
in the God-fearing homes is
there violence directed towards
children with Uncle Victorin’s
cruetly to his family of invalids
shown in all its horror. Weak-
nesses of “a sick priest”, Ben-
jamin Robert are, divulged.

Marie-Claire Blais’ is an out-
cry against the socio-economic
system of Quebec. Just as she
points a finger at the church, so
she does at the ruling class:

« |. and us farming people
then, when we went to work in

of Quebec

the city we were no more than
muck, the bosses just walked all
over us, they told us we stank,
man’s. honor, a man’s pride, that
was something no one had ever
heard of in those days, when
you went into a factory it was
like going down into the mines,
you came out shivering, with
your belly empty, and what they
paid us at the end of the week,
well it was almost pennies, and
to think we were so dumb we
were glad to get it, we let the
whole world use us like stepping
stones.”

But life will not always be
the same. Through one charac-
ter, Blais envisions the poten-
tial of change, the seeds for a
better future:

“Faced with so many people
participating in the sleep of a
passive solidarity, each indivi-
dual contracting his frontiers to
include only himself, I told my-
self that there were others keep-
ing their vehemence intact for
later, appeasing their irreconcil-
able ardor with the present
while they waited, and rose
every morning, perhaps, with
the thought of a future that held
more hope.” ‘
—Harriet Sanger

CAPSULE
REVIEW

Dictionary of Afro-American
slang, by Clarence Major. Inter-
national Publishers, New York.
Price $2.45, paperback.

This is a fullest (127 pages)
and most up-to-date (1970) dic-
tionary, which explains “‘puz-
zlers” you meet in periodicals,
literature and conversation (a
good many Afro-Americanisms
seep into the general slang and
some into the English language
proper). Interesting in them-
selves, the origins of various
words and terms invented by
black Americans are also clues
to their social and national ex-
perience and attitudes.

US: ARMY SPY SCHOOL

o CHART N&| o

The Pentagon isn’t too busy killing people in other parts of

ani eee . .
ize special interest clubs and the adults help them with equip-

ment and know ive wing of the movement. the world t I he citi P
-how. Se i n the Black Sea and the gress! g 1 o neg ect the citizens of the United States. A U.S.
ns end girls naturally ren ee 0 to sail the seven seas. _There are also” national, re- Senate committee is currently weighing evidence that the Army
ac ack Sea naval command handed over to them an honest-to- gional and industrial trade union intelligence has been eavesdropping on telephone conversa-
ee ship —a former sub-chaser—complete with radar, direction federations unaffiliated with any sere of governors and other public officials and spying on h
haha depth sounding instruments and everything needed to train of these. ee students on campuses. ia

Sailors,

PACIFIC TRIBUNE—FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 26, 1971—PAGE 9