The New Leader Literary Section
The New Leader Literary Section Nationalism Rampant By JOSEPH S. ROUCER ffff /DJPA OF NATIONALISM. By Hons Kohn. New York: The Mae-mjfUn Co., 1944. Pp. xi, 735. $7.50. |U8T as in World War...
...They didn't get it—or thought they didn't...
...In reality, "A Bell for Adano," recounting the efforts of the Italian-American Amgot functionary, Major Victor Joppolo, to secure a replacement forth* seven-hundred-year-old hell which the little fishing town of Adano had relinquished to Mussolini before the invasion, is merely an expanded htiman-hterett ttory...
...This, to the reviewer, is the only weakness, a mechanical one, of Kohn's publication which, otherwise, presses the specialist into superlatives in praising its accomplished purpose...
...lly John Henry...
...But it it clear ^that the townspeople reject him even before this happens, for his former pomposities still bite in their memories...
...Since they are published in a special section at the end of the work, in Mo, lucky is 'the reader able to locate whatever reference in which he is interested...
...That men make policies, and that policies are Interpreted by men, it something Mr...
...Correction The book by France* Biddle, Democratic Thinking and the War, reviewed last week by Morris Krnst, was published by Scribners...
...A Luce View of Italy By VIVIENNE C. KOCH A BELL FOR AIJAXO...
...Government control of business mad* necessary by World War II has doubled our real national income in five year* lime, and thi* i* only • hint of what Socialism could do...
...If the temperate, kindly, former Sani-htthm Department clerk from the Bronx, Major Joppolo, is a little too good to be ama (as even the author occasionally ¦asms to suspect), what can one tay of tas other dramatis personae of the occupied town, natives and foreigners alike...
...But what is this phenomenon of na-tssnslism ? It is first and foremost a ¦tats of mind of the various groups com-ss*sag mankind, each with its own symbols and social conventions and social traditions, a product of the living forces) af history (and therefore slways fluctu-sstag, never rigid...
...Anyway—they were looking for a portrait of him and an estimate...
...Now Bob was convinced that the sharp old economist had in his first version actually listed ecclesiastical establishment* along with "race-tracks, ssloons, gambling-houses and houses of prostitution...
...Imagine the shock of this juxtl-position to the innocent youths from Vermont...
...Apparently, the whole problem Fascism is solved by a magic csrd-ahhg system which the Amgot officials ffst hold of...
...Veblen, the cold realist, stands behind them, grips down on them...
...The fact that the movies snatched it up almost before it was off the presses is only the logical conclusion of a conveyor-belt syllogism...
...We would question, rather, the self-conscious, derivative primitivism of his writing (t combination of Hemingway and Silone in translat ion | which results in a curiously condescending prig-gishness, as well as the underlying belief that policies are unimportant and that only the individual human factor determines the course of events...
...By the simple process of 1 *"'»>ng jobs and civil offices to all those where, the Fascists' dossiers list as ques-tionable, Major Joppofo presumably can •» certain of tha good will of the entire HPulatlon...
...No other country has such a fund of men who speak the languages of the lands we must invade, who understand the ways sad have listened to their parents sing tat folk-tongs and have tasted the wine ef the land on the palate of their memorial...
...And to it goes all through...
...Kohn has succeeded in individualising the nationalistic theories of moat vocal nationalisms today...
...And just in case the reader may miss what It is all about, the novelist italicizes his message in a Foreword: . . Major Joppolo , , , was s good man . , , and what he did and what he was net able to do in Adano represented in miniature what American can and cannot do in Europe...
...New York: Alfred A. hum1!- V*.a...
...The hopeful oi I-lege boyR meet and live with a tough revolutionist, Harry George, meet his onslaught and learn from him...
...A Look at Veblen By WILLIAM E. BOHN THE INNOCENTS AT CEDRO...
...no plan, no hope, so treaty—none of these can guarantee anything...
...By R. L. Duffus...
...Relexalien ol Gov*rnm*nt control after thi* war may cr**l* 25,000,000 unemployed ia th* United State* and turn every American into a d**p*r*t* individualist fighting for his living in an economic jungl* where th* strong trample upon th* weakl Order THE MODERN CASE FOR SOCIALISM today...
...The MODERN CASE EOR SOCIALISM By JOHN PUTNAM 179 Pag«« Cloth Binding $1 50 postpaid "-Till HISTORIANS of a thousand years h«nc« will describe World War II •• • desperate struggle between Capitalism and Socialism (or the mattery of Europe which ended in th* complete triumph ol Socialism...
...The result it the first detailed history of nationalism in English (or in any language, for that matter) which assumes the character of a minor en-syclopedia...
...It includes *ll th* sound old argument* for Socialism •• well as some striking new arguments...
...All our idealism, our romanticism, our boundless optimism are here...
...It explain* how Socialism will benefit th* common man not only by abolishing unearned private income, but alto by making profit* and • losses mora useful a* guides to th* rational control of production...
...Picture, too, the hot questioning that went on in their minds...
...Hersey's compassionate and understanding acceptance of the varying halnts, values snd needs of those whom we "liberate...
...Th* evils of private enterprise ar* described separately for each major induetry...
...The place of the white tteeple in the American community was at ttake, This it real history, the history of inner battles...
...No, if there are any bad persons, they tie nil in the invasion forces, both Army and Navy...
...There is a certain General Marvin, who is known (Oh so co incidentally .') for "kicking soldiers in the pants" and who interrupts his cussing only to run down peasant carts and to get good men like the "Mister Major" removed from their commands...
...So shepherded and beset they tared life as it looked to them in the fabulously innocent time upon which this bleak future which has since become past and present -was already casting its shadow...
...And this symbol of abstract thought is constantly contrasted with the golden glow of youthful dreams...
...Order at jour bookstore, ar from th* publisher MeatJor Publishing Company 324 Newbury Street Boston IS, Mas...
...Just as truly as Europe once invaded us, with wave after wave of soss of immigrants...
...The simple faiths of youth are stacked against the clear cynicism of the thin and relentless thinker...
...While other students tf nationalism have been interested in its comparative aspects of the "state of mind" of dominant nationalities, Kohu is primarily interested in the historical lasts of modern nationalism and traces lbs subject from the days of the Hebrews and Greeks to the present time...
...The New Leader Literary Section Nationalism Rampant By JOSEPH S. ROUCER ffff /DJPA OF NATIONALISM...
...There is a certain Kent-Yale Navy Lieutenant, who entertains sneering suspicions about Major Joppolo's origins until won over by the latter's cagey appeal to the Navy "feeling for tradition...
...THE EUROPEAN REVOLUTION...
...But it is inflated far beyond its legitimate domain by a thesis: the kind of lucid, reasonable, stylishly over simplified thesis which the editors ef Life snd Time dream up with such incredible dexterity...
...U8T as in World War I, nationalism Plait assumed a terrible significance in Ifayid War II...
...Most of the reviewers probably didn't know whether Veblen whs a real-estate dealer or a circus clown...
...That is probably why it got such a poor press...
...Only men can guarantee, only **• behavior of men under pressure, ¦array our Joppolos...
...If evil exists in Adano, if some Italians continue to function in terms of an order of psychological conditioning two decades old, there is no hint of it in Mr...
...THE MODERN CASE FOR SOCIALISM .. th* only modern and comprehensive statement of th* ess* for Socialism by *n American Socialist...
...Since he happened to be a good man, his works represented the beat of possibilities...
...You get a sort of spiritual X-ray of the man...
...There is a brief reference *» some Interned Fascists, but even these ¦JPI ar» revealed as essentially good people by the simple expedient of releasing them ami letting them go home to their families...
...True, the former Mayor of Adano, a ridiculous little fellow both in power and out of it, does not respond to Major Joppolo's Boy-Scout talks on democrary and must, eventually, be put away...
...It points out that Socialism is inevitable not only because of th* technological chang** so brilliantly analysed by Marx and Engels, but also because of th* *v*r growing pressure for economic efficiency created by periodic world wars...
...LIUMANK, well-intentioned and competently documented, "A Bell for Adano" is precisely the kind of* Novel one would expect of a former "brilliant Time and Life correspondent...
...After this conies a cleverly worded passage in which the old master discusses whether churches should be included in this list...
...The book comes out of a mind so steeped in the knowledge of all that made nationalism what it is and such command of his material that he can write of it not only with sound scholarship but also with charm and lively interest and a form of presentation that, without losa of dignity, is attractive to the reader...
...It's a pity, for anyone who cares a penny for the history or American thought will not want to miss this charming volume...
...They got something much better, but never saw it, never sensed the value of it...
...Take this, Veblen wrote that "investments which derive profits from capital goods devoted to uses that are altogether dubious, with a large presumption of net detriment, are such establishments as race-tracks, saloons, gambling houses and houses of prostitution...
...And throughout the book, there is always* the implied and stated assumption that men are either good or bad and that most of the bad fellows are among the invaders...
...And the Duffus report of what remained of the dreams has a real importance...
...It it a picture o* life as it was lived by twu American boys, Bob and Bill Duffus, in the hopeful year of 1H07 8 in unspoiled arid sunny California...
...But some professional critics couldn't get beyond the smell of sundry chickens and goat...
...Certainly, it would be most unfair to overlook Mr...
...Hersey's book...
...America is the international country...
...Her-tey seems strangely unwilling to recognise...
...World War 1 had on* •pochal result: THE RUSSIAN REVOLUTION I World War II will hav* on* epoch-making result...
...It is also precisely the kind of book one would expect to be chosen as the "Second Imperative" of the Council on Books in Wartime...
...MacMUlan Company, N, Y. $2.00, yHIS little book is advertised as "a memoir of Thorstein Veblen...
...If this doesn't give readers* a picture of Thorstein Veblen, what would...
...And all the indication* an that nationalism aa a social force will run rampant in the decadea to come at spit* of all the plana for world re-irgaalsation which intend to abolish it, *r, st least, its excesses...
...But why does Kohn punish the specialist interested in his 145 pages of footnotes...
...Without neglecting th* incr**s*d p*r*on*l fr**dom snd political democracy which Socialism will create, th* author stresses th* economic efficiency which will result fr*m eliminating th* grot* wastes of competition...
Vol. 27 • May 1944 • No. 19
