You'll forget the lot -as you forgot Michael Arlen
TEST OF GREATNESS-2
continuing a Saturday series in search of the highest standard of achievement... today among the novelists
by JAMES LEASOR
OW great are they- NOVEL, something that enter-
these 1961 novelista falns.
H
whose succcuses cul- cade in gay book jackets in every bookseller's window? How many will be read (or even remembered) years from now?
100
Check the lint and build Our standards of greatness as we go.
To
sweet-sucking the romance reader, Ruby M, Ayres is "great," and so indeed any woman must be who earns & Ave-figure salary every year by mild and biterless prose.
read
But there are no indications that her books will be read a century from now any more than Mrs Gaskell's are today.
The Shorter Oxford Dle- tionary defines great as per taining to someone "cminent in point of attainments* achlevements," and by reason of her achievement 103 novels, £20,000 a year) Miss Ayres is Crest.
ог
But output is not the only consideration, Nor 11 con- temporary fame or notoriety.
Vitality
LET the writers
themselves
of
There is also u changeling Public Taste element, called Ly come, and Luck by others. Yesterday's famous stories P. G. Wodehouse. Phillips Wallace, Oppenheim, Edgar John Buchan, all seem oddly uuted today.
class
Daphne Cà Maurier/ biggest money-spinner in her ther Intest novel, "My Cousin Rachel, sold 95,- in its Arst 000 week), is aware of this fickle ele ment.
She Twenty
says:
Rive
years ago every- one was reading Michael Arlen.
Great Indaraan
Ho was great A. . Oricin then, SO overy.
Bul people want one said,
..the writers who can mirror way they live now.
"That's why Nancy Mitford is so popular, She catches perfectly the modern spirit of quiet debunking. I don't think there are many really great writers left, though, of course, there's Charles Morgan...."
The old-timers in the Inky Defoc. Dic- nrt Smollett,
kens,
serious
-
Thackeray
Jacked competition Their numes shine like beacons be- think chuse there was so little olher' are the qualities of greatnessght.
home what
in their trade,
they
GILES
THE VINA MAIL, SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 15, 1951,
ON HOLIDAY
DELIVERS HIS CARTOON
"Wait till you see our station-.you'll see why you're wasting your time telling me to hurry."
Landon Express Bervice
They danced boogie-woogie in perukes and crinolines
Seven Hundred
Party Of The
Venice.
The
Attend Century
From EVEYLN IRONS
THE last of the 700 guests at Mr Charles de Beistegul's fantastic Compton Mackenzie, gramo- The names of today's great pre-French revolution mask- phone - playing, Siamese-cal struggle together to share the ed ball arranged themselves loving author of a generation light: Hemingway Waugh-
gracefully in their gondolas of good books, some ("Sinister ursly the greatest satirist
whisky
Gatore") the day-Dos l'asson,
O'Hara, and were rowed home along cheered when Cronin, the silent John P. Marquand,
canals here at him. "What made Churchill But it is doubtful whether from dawn.. great man? Not necessarily. his
among them or their challen- strategie qualities, for he = gers will come any great books mits he made mistakes. It was fut will live-as Barrie's fan- his tremendous vitality
With tasics and Conan Doyle's detec- which he infected others. My tive storici-to become part of test of greatness in a witter, is the language. his ability to reproduce vitality
on the printed
page.
"Thus readers 100 years from
now, or 300, if you like, cun
Test it!
a situation and VCU doubt it? Then try this text, I name eight novels by
Oliver Messel, In his
prince, also
mounted by a lyre-shaped spray of feathers.
It must be said that many of e costumes were highly in- cccurato historically.
Outside the palace the square was thronged with white paper lanterns and jam-packed with people.
people clapped and motorboat that took her back they recognised to her hotel on the Lido.
As she blood on the sump- rich fuously carpeted landing stage,
Wine and cakes provided free Thousands of lights which led velvet uniform coat, which one of the dozens of armed
for by Mr de Belstegul soon ran out, danced with the palace gallantly stepped had outlined the massive once belonged to a Bohemian Italian police guarding the
ward end, foCered a haltered but the crowd stayed, gazing up building of the Labla Palace local girls.
at the palace Windows, where cuitcase, suddenly winked out. The
Cuesis obligingly stood in the Mrs party of the century was
Churchill smilingly
open balcony to show off their thanked him and sat on it.
costumes. It was indeed a fabulous HERE were impolite bursts of
laughter from the crowd at party. Even the dogs were in
A: black poodle had, some of the costumes. But no costume. tomatoes were thrown, no Com- a harlequin suit to go with the munists demonstrated.
harlequin costume of its Italian
over.
still recognise
Was it worth, all the sky- feel it almost personally, al-
to the though customs and
have rocketting expense manners some of the authors and times have all changed." mentioned here. In their day
By that standard, two books they were hailed as great. But host, or the pangs suffered is not now by those failing to get an
invitation?
I
are: 1,
by Semcrict Maugham should edály, their day tive: "Liza of Lambeth" and but yesterday. "Of Human Bondage." Their
are time-
pavies are
less, ageless; their
problems eleraai.
What
other
qualities must be mixed in the cru-
cible
give
of lime to
the
Amalgam?
Batchin
Sm
Small
great Nigel
Back
Any ti
"Miac
Own Executioner") adds three more:
Reem," "The Bar-
Faith
Testament,"
Charity. Hope. Bulchin says: "The greatest barrier to
good and
great writing now is the absence of faith and hope. Most good writers have charity, but prob- ably not enough.
"Given that an quthor has more than his share of imagi- nation and technical ability, he obundance of also needs an
faith, hope, and charity
the human race."
And Luck
for
TOW we have four elements
Now
to our standard of greatness. How do the authors measuro
beslag up
them? Grahanı
Greene, who to his critics "has discovered, the art of marrying religion to what could have ("The been u sordid tale Heart of the Matter," "It's a Battlefield), Hos theso
clements in abundance.
four
His film stories ("The Follon Idol" "The Third Mun") show his vitality and the sad, most
al-
hopeless love of his
fellow-men...
They
also throw up a neh element of greatness:
power to entertain.
So easily we forget
the
primary job of
the
that
the
novelist is to write something
NANCY
ARE YOU—
STILL TELLING AS MANY
FIBS
"Grand Here they Canary 2 "Shannon's Way";
But no tomatoes
Lady Diana Cooper in her Carl-festooned silvery dress,
woman owner.
Two women wore diamond
She was pretty AN attractive woman appeared It one window wearing a magenta-jewelled musk. Tako it off," bawled the crowd. She
The Aga Khan thought 3. "Winner Take Nothing" 30. Wearing a black and
Peoples"; 5. "The white satin domino over his dressmaker- Jacques Fath, studded collars and their toe- did... She was pretty.
4. "Remote
Gunroom": 6, "Black Cargo" dinner jacket sult he sat 7. "The Name of Action"; 8,
back beaming in a wheeled The "Income and Outcome."
chair by the canal, waiting key Is below.
for his motor launch to take him to his hotel.
If you can place them all, then at least one thing is great: your memory! And that, after, all may be the final test.
Key: 1 and 2-Cronin: 3-Fleming- rev: 4-Evelyn Waugh: 5-Charles Avani Grene, catchin. Graham
X
"The outstanding features of this σun. pentlemen, are,fia tight-- ness and the fact that it will not kill anyone."
Well Meaning...
I'M TRYING HARD TOM STOP
BACH TIME I TELL A [WFIÐ, I'REMIND, })
MYSELF ITS WRONG, BY DROPPING ALA PEBBLE IN MY KWELL
Clapped, cheerid
She: "As you know, I have bcen to hundreds of parties In my time, starting in Queen Victoria's day. But I am cer4 tain that this was the best, of
The Italien boys yelled, op-
A 50ft, greased pole In the crowned with a
extravagantly nails were gilded: in his fantastic
satin coat gold-fringed white.
Each French 'dressmaker and towering white ostrich (male) más
more startlingly plause. feather headdress, were among gat, up than the last. Christian the flocks of people who strolled Dior's party carried 10ft, pules quare was f.om the palace to show thei: dressed in white and gold and Lunch of garlic sausages, and Coɛtumes,
chattering crowned with black hats, to re- totiles of chianti. The youths. crowds packing the neighbouring present eighteenth century of the town shinned up, and the
streets.
·
to
tha
There was applause when these two appeared. Sighed one
woman, gazing on
chubby
taptured at the display: "How beautiful, how elegant."
giants.
palace windows were thronged 15. Watch one or two snatch' a prize.
Suddenly all the lights went
Towering host PEOPLE wondered why their out and froworks crackled from
host, normally a middle-sized across the square. man, towered, high above his Armed police lined up to deal The Aga Khan should know, which had started formally with guests. The answer was that with possible Incidents. But wore shoes they good-naturedly allowed Mr de Beistegul specially built with it, high the crowd to do anything they platform soles.
liked-except get inside.
them all."
But he left early. The Begum, he said, would dance till dawn.
One elaborately gowned lady from Rome, wearing magnia.. cent. diamonds, took another
view from the Aga Khan's, "It is much more fun out here," cho sald.
Inside the palace the party,
rchenrs:deptrances and alów music, became less dignified.
Suitcase seat
He was a most remarkable Agure, with his huge white powdered wig and his splendid blue brocade robe.
.
General vate seemed to ge to Princess Elizabeth Chay. chavadze in her black velvol dress and imposing crown
INSTEAD of gentle minutts and quadrilles suitable to
There was much discussion the period, the 10th century or chestra in the minstrels gellery, about which costumes were the whose dress was copied exactly most splendid. That was when at 3 a.m. mon from the musicians' costumes'in
in surperb satins the
on the and women
Tiepolo frescoes and walls, played the latest 20th and laces, diamonds emeralds, streamed from the century alts, dazzlingly lit palace and danced to an accordion band in the squaro San Geremia out in the central courtyard, on side with the lesa glamorously floor painted, to imitate an Au-
busson carpet. dreased pubile..!
Host de Belstegui, in his pozing. robas as a Procurator of the Venetian Republic, come out in the square, too,"
THAT. REMINDS" ME-ID-UKE' NICE COLD
DRINK
Empress Catherine of Russia.
Guests in stately perukes and crinolines danced boogie-woogle Her husband, Prince George
Chavchavadze, was one of the group of splendidly dressed, per- conages who surrounded 'her.. Most of the older people left Others preferred the group before two am. Mrs Winston of American Indians headed by Churchill, in black ice with a Mrs Reglasld' Fellowes 'in har allver-edged three-cornered hat, original dreas of white satin and und 10 ininutes to wait for the leopard skin, Kar head sur-
By Ernie Bushmillere
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