Throw Out Obsolete Mental Furniture
FRY, VARIAN
Books in Review Throw Out Obsolete Mental Furniture Review by VARIAN FRY THE BIG THREE: TUK UNITED STATES, BRITAI!*, RUSSIA. ?„ Daoid J. Dalli*. New Huren: Yale. Umvernty Pret», 1915. (2.75. 1...
...The Big Three is that realistic appraisal, that correct evaluation...
...a aJllST how realistic Dallin is will appear from another quotation...
...Dallin saye, "There can be...
...There are no sixteenth century gondolas here: beds are beds, not plaster enlargements of Ariel's cowslip, covered with gold leaf and touched up with gill radiator paint where the plaster has been chipped or the gold has worn off...
...merely naval operations...
...Iii- of the night...
...And we are given also to thinking of Britain as what it is fashionable today to call a "peace-loving nation...
...There isn't anything ia it—well, hardly anything—which looks like what it isn't...
...Dallin says no...
...Before beginning his consideration of this momentous question, Mr.- Dallin sounds a much-needed warning...
...To avoid armed conflicts, good will is not enough," Mr...
...A number of other nations will gradually climb the stairs to the big-power throne, and then new groupings, combinations, and coalitions will emerge.'" Was the war, then, in vain ? Sellin says no...
...No sermons or persuasion can halt this aim...
...Seme are toe busy to give it a nod...
...I apologize for earning my fee for this review by quoting, but it can't be avoided: Dallin can say what he means so much better than I can say it for him...
...Others are dubious...
...Sveighing the sonree...
...Coming to the decision hasn't been easy for me, because it has meant discarding a lot of things I had accumulated in half a lifetime, things I had grown used to and even fond of, and whose very shortcomings and weaknesses further endeared them to me...
...But now that I have taken the decision I feel a wonderful sense of relief, a kind of new freedom, like the feeling you have when you get out into,the open country after 1 week*, of being cooped up in a tawdry ami meretricious city...
...Vou know the kind of book I mean: the kind in which nothing is what it seems to be, or rather nothing seems to lie what it really is, arid In which all the expectations raised let you down sooner or later because they don't correspond to reality...
...The contrary is needed: a realistic appraiser) «I the new world which is emerging, of the dynamic forces which are active in it, of the dangers which threaten at every turn...
...At times two or three wars were being waged simultaneously...
...The war did not eradicate the divergences of Interns-tional interests, it did not abolish roali...
...but when we get our hands on the dove, we And it's all icily stuffed...
...Yet in the nineteenth century "Great Britain waged twenty-seven wars...
...Dallin does not believe that the British will ever pick a serious quarrel with us: living on sn island where they must import or die, they simply can't afford the risk...
...A wartime combination, it wili end soon after the war...
...or gilt chairs which collapse in mist when you Uy to sit on them...
...Were those wars unnecessary, the product of over-exuberance...
...prompt or reluctant intervention in international political affairs...
...Even the most hardboiled of us are likely to get a few shocks...
...I mean you can't use them in the world outside these books because they're sixteenth century gondolas or eighteenth rentury roaches float -ing in a fleece lined, rose-pink sky, and when you open your eyes they disappear...
...Dallin's three earlier books, Soviet Russia's Foreign Policy, Russia and Postwar Europe, and The Real Soviet Russia...
...There is no cure-all impossible conflict...
...But actually, Mr...
...The author has been most fortunate in her treatment of Nathaniel Baron's premature vision of the common man...
...From now on I am going to buy modern, functional fur nature, the kind which is designed with only one purpose in view, utility, and in which everything il exactly what it seems to be...
...small military expeditions...
...1 DONf know hov you feel al.oui it, I Lilt my mind is made up...
...A greater accomplishment than this cannot be expected from a war...
...or great bloody conflicts calling out sea and land forces...
...Stalin's numerous political concessions made and then retracted during the last two decades evidence his skill as a master of politics...
...were he not to apply any and all means to achieve these goals...
...To a certain extent the situation of Britain during the nineteenth rentury is analogous to that of any nation which occupies a leading position in world affairs," he writes, "and will likewise apply to the nation which aupplants Eng-laud as the strongest naval power...
...FLATTERY Some people take it as mailer of course...
...Dallin says in his foreword.'"Nor will it help if we shut our ey«s, As many do [yeah, man!], to the somber events which are transpiring in the international field, banish war from our thoughts, and reiterate words of peace...
...Richard Armour Virginia Flavor AnOTHKR in the River* of Amen'ea, series, Thr Jorne» appears now in a new, enlarged form, with 40,000 words of new material added and the entire book ierast . Blair Niles, a native Vlrginian, ha...
...no silence about the impending dangers can remove them...
...Some people gag- when it gets a hit thick...
...What are the prospects for continued peace between the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics and this United States of America...
...It did not achieve these goals because no war can achieve them...
...My fellow Americans, that's us...
...Sore spots must be studied, diseases must be called by their names...
...It marks him as one of the very few writers on international relations in America today who never indulge in Wishful thinking or give their public what they think their public expects...
...when the two nations lis v.- encountered one another In world politics, as they occasionally have, those relations have often been" far from friendly...
...no compliments paid to Stalin's wisdom can change the course of events...
...and it doesn't raise any—well, hardly any — false hopes, like those damned antique chairs I inherited from my grandmother twenty years ago, and threw away last week...
...were he not to do everything in his power to replace the vague constitution of the vague Cmted Nations organization with the cement of that other entity of United Nations—the USSR...
...A correct evaluation of the new international situation is a precondition of sound policy...
...and in Lhe third sore spot of world politics—in the Middle East...
...I'm tired of rhaiia that look pretty but can't tie aat on, mir mis and picture frames that pretentl to be gold but are really only plaster, radios disguised ss seventeenth century writing desks, beils that let you down in the tu 1.1...
...Because it is no longer Britannia but Columbia which rules the waves, Mr...
...All these books show us a glimpse of the Dove of Peace...
...It waa not...
...I'm through with antiques, and reproductions of antiques, for life...
...just think it is odd...
...In political schemes," he says, "bissed study often replaces objectivity in order that the desired conclusion may be arrived at...
...It is the only way of avoiding unexpected situations out of which we may awaken tomorrow to find ourselves in the midst of new catastrophes las I awakened one morning to find myself on the floor...
...Persistent effort and even wars are the price that nations pay to secure their status as great powers," he writes, "and once they achieve such a status, wars become a must, and the road back to safe old isolationism is barred...
...Pretty grim, isn't it...
...The illustrations, by Edward Shen ton, have an appropriate grace...
...no automatic adjustment and readjustment of their interests...
...If this is to be so, was it all futile— the sacrifices, the corpses, the cities reduced to rubble, nations in mourning, thousands of ships at the bottom of th* sees...
...And worse: "The predominance of the Big 'Three cannot be durable...
...Whether they like it or not, they'll hsve to play along with us...
...The opposite would appear to be the truth: there will lie deliberate or undesired conflicts...
...in the case of Russian-American relations the desired Conclusion is that in the future, as in'the past, eveiy-thing will be all right...
...According to tins school of thought, only friendly relations between the two powers are historically possible...
...Chairs whose highest aim in life is to hold the fanny the right height off the floor, beds which are beds and not sixteenth century gondolss or eighteenth century coaches, radir which are frankly radios, materials which do not blush to admit they are the plain and homely stuffs they are...
...F. S. H...
...Niks has strung together a series of vivid episodes selected apparently for the degree in which they reflect the flavor of Virginia life in its formative period...
...tions and alliances, rivalry and power politics...
...liven the most hardboiled of us are given, for instance, to thinking of the nineteenth century (after Napoleon) as a peaceful century, to which we can look back with nostalgia...
...they're above it, Most, though, like me, unashamedly love it...
...But it's always better to know the truth, however grim, than to live in the fond belief that everything is all right after all...
...in the history of American-Russian relations which in itself can be reassuring for the'future," Mr...
...There is nothing...
...Oddly enough, I hsve the same feeling when I read one of David Dallin's books after quantities of the aort of drivel which passes for wisdom in the field of international relations...
...Some, arching eyebio.vs, profe...
...Stalin would indeed not be deserving of Lhe title of a great leader of his movement were he to relinquish his yearning to do away everywhere with' inimical social and political groups and simultaneously to extend the Soviet social structure to nearby peoples and states...
...I recommend it...
...By contrast, Dallin's new book ia like my new furniture: it's strsight, it'* functional, it's real...
...Only forty-six entire years of that century were years of peace for Britain...
...If I had had a book about furniture as realistic as Dallin's book about international relations, instead of all those slick-paper jobs on the work of Chippendale and Adam and Sheraton, with hundreds of drawings add photographs of designs, and not' a word about construction—if I had had just Wie such book, that antique chair wouldn't have let my Aunt Mathilda down the lasl time she came to dinner, and I wouldn't be facing a damage action today instead of cheerfully awaiting the time wlieii I would inherit the old lady's fortune, as, in my unrealism, I had fondly bopeil to do...
...But for those who think they can take it, it's well worth slaying...
...His conclusion is a somber one...
...There is no new light thrown on history nor any deep understanding of basic causes, but the book is readable, smootlily written and, however briefly, informative...
...in a credible portrait of the elusive William Byrd II, and, above all, in rapturing the gentle charm and sweetness underlying Robert Lee's austerity...
...The policy of the Soviet Govern ment during the years 1O23 to 1939, when lhe force in the hands of the other powers was Overwhelming, was a policy of peace...
...Everything depends on the political course voluntarily chosen by twe nations: in the old world—in the heart of Europe...
...highlighted the history of The James from the first settlement and tribulations at Jamestown to the last grief of Appomattox...
...Others, dull witted...
...it speaks louder than Charten and covenant*, 'lhe coming period in world history will be, at liest, a period of armed peace...
...It is a worthy success or to Mr...
...above all, it'a honest...
...Hoys, it's wonderful...
...I'm telling you...
...Dallin finds, Rosso-American relations have been friendly in the past only because they have been virtually non-existent...
...Some get embarrassed and run away quirk...
...Out of the abundant material available, Mrs...
...in the new sphere of conflicts -in China, Korea, and Japan...
...It is therefore shortsighted to expect that America is headed for a long period of peace after this war...
...It » ,, a gieat fight, although one with a purely negative aim...
...The war, a ptuoit deati in uve job, had the (rest but limited aim of crushing genuine world ?.....|,la ors, oppressors of alien peoples, slaVe drivers of the twentieth rentury...
...But the Soviet Union il under no auch restraint...
...Gentlemen, I recommend The lli< Three to your respectful attention...
...How great it was, thds* nations can tell which have ben subjected to the rule of the conquerors...
...Since it comes early in the book, this statement serves the same purpose as the warning they used to run before tha newsreel shots of the Nazi extermination camps: if your stomach isn't strong, leave now...
Vol. 28 • October 1945 • No. 40
