§ Ly © r t J a Ley S UR

Book fair

N THE days before the modern printing press, books
were harder to come by than they are today. To
be printed at all a book had to have some intrinsic
worth. It had to stand high for literary style or its
content must mean something or artistically it had

be be a combination of the best in the book-making —

craft, of the type designer and founder, the lithog-
rapher and the bookbinder.

The modern press has changed all that. Nowadays,
the more rubbishy a book is in all these charactertistics,
the more ready sale it finds, provided it appeals to
the baser instincts of the “reading” public. Rolled off
the presses in millions of copies, books like Gone With
the Wind and Forever Amber make huge profits for
the .publishers and although they do not sell for the
proverbial “30 cents” that figure expresses their real
worth.

But there are other books, books which serve to
raise the level of culture and knowledge of the
people; books which help us to improve our -under-
standing of the world in which we live and the
people in it, either by developing our reasoning facul-
ties by keeping us in line with scientific progress or
by stirring our imagination or emotions which is the
function of art.

This is the kind of books Marx had in mind when
he wrote, “Books are my slaves; I make them da
my bidding.” Such books are not ephemeral as. those
mentioned above, but lasting in their influence. They
have been written and added to ever since Cadmus
brought the alphabet to ancient Greece—and the giant
printing presses of today make them available to
us in ever jncreasing quantities. :

In literature and art, which put a polish to our
cultural development; in science, which puts weapons
in our hands for the conquest of poverty and ignor-
ance and the abolition of the obstacles that have held
the race back; of history which not only describes
the life of periods in social growth but interprets them
so that they become understandable to us—aye, even
in the plays and novels which we consider tu be
lighter reading, in the tales of adventure, romance
and humor, but which also contribute to our under-

wes 3

This is a view

of auxiliary factories and departments.

Soviet industry makes rapid strides

of the ore mine of the Magnit naya Mountain ai Magnitogorsi.
hearth furnace was recently started at the Stalin iron and steel works in the city, which is equipped
with’ six blast furnaces, two blooming mills, eight rolling mills, eight cooking batteries and scores

standing of life, from the Golden Ass of Apuleius to
the latest writings of Howard East—the press brings
them. all to us. And we profit, or otherwise, according
to our ability to select them.

It is a commendable innovation then, to find the
People’s Cooperative Bookstore sponsoring a Christmas
Book Eair this weekend. It is “something new under
thé sun” for us in Vancouver and the _ sponsors
deserve the fullest support of every book-lover for
their efforts.

There will be books on display dealing with almost
every subject, to meet every legitimate demand. Na-
turally, in these days of threatening world war, the
United. Nations display will be worth looking over.
To trade unionists—faced .with Bill 39 in B.C., the
Taft-Hartley Act in the U.S., which even stretches
out its talon claws into -our Vancouver unions, and
the attacks of the Schuman government in Erance—
there will be books and pamphlets treating of* their
particular problems. And of most other human social

‘and cultural activities -there will be tit-bits for the

bookworm.
Excellent programs will help to make the _two-
day fair a. succgss—folk ‘songs, films, music, with

demonstrations of®weaving and painting, sustained by
exhibits of children’s art and sculpture. Altogether the
Book Fair will be worth visiting.

©

Boston aristocrats

ASSACHUSETTS is famous for three things, the
codfish, the Boston Back Bay aristocracy and the
judicial murder of Sacco and Vanzetti, or leaving out
the matter of the codfish, we should say, infamous.
What we are interested in right now is the Boston
aristocracy. ‘
A rhyme used to pass. current which , said
that Boston was “the home of the bean and the
cod, where the Lowells talked only to Cabots and
the Cabots talked only to God.”
Some sort of marital alliance appears to have taken
place between these two relics of European snobbery,
with more success than met the hopes that Romeo

and Juliet had for the Capulets and the Montagues, ©

to produce the latter day representatives of these

‘

by OL’ BILL

s)

two self-styled patrician families, for today one grandee

- speaks for them both in the person of Senator Henry

Cabot Lodge (R, Mass.), grandson of the other Sena-
tor Lodge who led: the fight to bust up Wilson’s
League of. Nations.

He was in Europe a couple of months ago, made
a six weeks tour of several countries there and re-
turned to Boston to tell his aristocratic friends about
the “shocking misrepresentations and untruths” being
circulated there about the United States. i

“Everything concerning us is twisted, the worst pos-
sible motive is being applied to everything we do.”
This misrepresentation, the Senator thinks, “comes
from people, who for reasons best known to them-
selves don’t like the U.S. A lot of things are at
bottom of it.” :

Maybe it would enlighten the honorable senator
as to the why and wherefore of the estimate the Europ-
ean people have of American politicians, particularly Re-
publicans, if he reads up the latest exploits of John
Foster Dulles, who visited France last weekend, had
a confab with several politicians who are no friends
of the French people, including De Gaulle, and was
even reprimanded by. Secretary of State Marshall for
butting in.

Marshall may be state secretary for foreign affairs,
but Dulles is the man behind President Truman—the
man who represents Wall Street and who also repre-
sented Hitler in the U.S. before that monkey business
became unpopular.

The European people are not so dumb; they know
Dulles and those who preceded him—that is why tne
aristocratic sensibilities of Senator Lodge were seared
when he found out what these peoples think of Ameri-
can efforts to impose on them the fascism they fought
so hard to get rid of.

LL over Canada and the U.S. last week headlines spread the

Voice of America’s “unofficial” report, attributed to “trav-
ellers just returned from Russia,” that there were “whole-
sale runs on banks and stores in Moscow and other Soviet
cities because of fear the ruble is losing its value.”

The report, front-paged by the Vancouver News-Herald
on December 4, conveyed the - impression that .the Soviet’
economy was on the verge of collapse.

But on December 5 there was no further mention of the
“buying panic.” There was not even the information, buried
by some other Canadian dailies on back pages, that the
U.S. state department’s fabricated broadcast had been beamed -
by the Voice of America to every receiving country—except
the Soviet Union itself. Se ieee mee

Voice of Wall Street

‘

A new open

It also rehabilitat-

ee

In the I.T.U.-Southam Dispute:

—MOSsCcOW.

Be industrial advances made

by modern Russia are no-
where better measured than by
the progress of the machine
building industry.

In 1932 only 40 types of ma-
chines were produced. But in

i940 the number rose te 500; .

and now machine building plants
turn out more than a thousand

various types of complex ma-
chinery.
In the last nine months of

this year the output of metal
cutting machines increased by
$7 percent as compared with
the same period last year.
The Kramatorsk works in the
Ukraine is now making complex
machines to cut steel slabs used
for the manufacture of rolled

steel railway wagon wheels.
This machine has 16 cutters
which operate simultaneously.
The USSR is producing ma-

chines for the finishing of items
made from various, metal alloys,

’ FRIDAY, DECEMBER 12, 1947

precious stones, etc., where great
accuracy is required. And this
fall Russian factories started
producing new machinery for
the watch industry.

The optics industry, set up

instruments.
ed the astograph of the Pulkovo
Observatory destroyed by the
Germans. ;

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The I.T.U. is not seeking higher wages.

Shorter work week is not an issue

ILS

A master contract is not asked for. '

Dues check-off is not wanted.

in thi try after the estab- =
ee ee “ RODUCTION of electric pow- 2 We do not seek a welfare fund. E
eamed & good reputation. ori the USSR BS already 2 Holidays with pay are not sought. _—
exceeding. prewar figures and = =
Before the war the Progress continues to rise steadily. = ,z
Plant in Leningrad manufactur- i : 2° =
ed ten times more microscopes Forty big hydro power plants 2 x a |
than the famous Zeiss works 2 now under construction, in- 2 : xf |
in Germany. The Leningrad cluding the powerful Mingechaur a |
plant turns out some of the ey Sevan in the eee eA the = : : 4
best instruments “in the -worla,. “ema inthe! Urals,:sthe Irtysh = | x f ahaa 2g
best, instruments in the wort in Kazakhstan’ and others. 4 |) The only issue is that the Southam
year -it produced’ 30 percent these Sisughures «are SON sAe . cia Tol ae ¢ : 2
more than in 1946. _ in rapidly developing industrial Company give the same fundamental =
All movie houses in the USSR ee : 3 : z i Gite 3 Ri Rava eae .
use Sovict-made projectors. The Soviet Union is _ also treatment to each division. : =
The plant which provides te building power plants that will ‘ 2
projectors also supplies “Kom- use hard fuels.. It can be =
somolets” cameras. and various claimed that Soviet electrical : : 2 3 ba ore a
_ optical and mechanical’ instru- engineers have achieved more H H
ments. Recently this plant start- in the way of fuel economy at Vancouver Ty pographical Union, No. 226
ed production of new types of power plants than any other ;
microscopes and astronomical country. EU

PACIFIC TRIBUNE—PAGE 12