Life — June 8, 1922 — page 24: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

EMOIRS OF A MIDGET, by Wal- years of research, he has unearthed a all is said and done, a greater man than ter de la Mare (Knopf). To the number of Boswell’s letters which throw Johnson himself?” public wearied of bad-plumbing fiction— floods of light upon hitherto unknown A word of gratitude is due the publish. fF all “Main Street,” “Moon Calf,” ct al—and of — passages in Boswell’s life: his love affairs, ers who have done this book in a hand. Are petting fiction—‘This Side of Paradise,” his visits to Rousseau, General Paoli, John some manner, as “commercial” books go v ‘ “Cytherea,”—"Memoirs of and who were almost able fp! a Midget” should come asa at the same time, to get its The grateful relief. We never price down to a pre-war Hani learn exactly Miss M.'s level. Mar “measurements,” but we do (Are know that her bones were HE EVOLUTION oF B a “wren’s picking,” that MODERN MEDL-B fay the volume of air that she CINE, by Sir iam) Beat required would chill a dew Osler (Yale 3 drop, and a hundred other Press). Des (Are indirect evidences of her xare f thumping big title, th Boot tinyness. Miss M. was ex- ~~ B $ a book for that pathetic Boot quisite, she was sharp. She figure, the layman, prof) All could be cruel, and she vided, of course, he is onef) Ten could be bitter. In a of those laymen with af} Hall thousand ways, normal passion for information inf) Pour mankind caused her the painless, homeopathic Zing most refined torture; a ; doses, Its author—“theB) proy torture only bearable be- A * best-balanced, be W cause she could bury it in equipped, most sagaciousf) )* her woods, in solitude, and- most lovable of af) (A* and under the stars; in modern _ physicians” short, in beauty. Then, scribed it as They asks Miss M., what differ- flight over the progre Rigt ence does mere sise make? medicine through theP Rigt Men are pitiable, “They ages.” The volume is prof .. > seem to fly to one another fusely illustrated, and whep) 12 for company; and half you have finished it yup, Zing their comfort is in their will be able to hold a Zing numbers.” Hulking they charm your family phy As | are, to be sure, but why cian with all sorts of littl) (4, throw their coarsenes their faces? To rail against the world, to court an evil greater than the world’s _loutishness : the pigmy mind and the pigmy spirit. And so Miss M. comes to the end of her story—a story of well- nigh incredible hardship of body and soul—thanking stories about the Big Wish) and the ailments of t profession, -from nt Colonel Gorgas, and fror the use of castor 0: ancient Egyptians to th} conquering of beri-beri yf)" modern Americans. WHIFFLED) “3 The Age of Reason LIFE NDE “Why don’t you like this animal alphabet Aunt Abbie ETER HIS God that she has lived. sent you?” WORKS, by Carl Vi sae One puts down “Memoirs Ralph Waldo Higginthwate: It does not interest me, Vechten (Knopf). Awful of a Midget” with the feel- mamma—it takes no cognizance whatever of the theory advanced and meaty. Itis ing that the jacket blurbs of evolution. a kind of Social Regis “Ef have not over-stressed their claims, that it is to be classed with “The Pilgrim's Progress,” with “Alice,” and with “Nostromo.” for the All Wise and t | Dilatory Without Domi ciles. Do you want to know what were th restaurants that Mr. Van Vechten, or, % all the great people in the book call hi Wilkes. They are virgin soil; and it is our great good luck that they fell into the hands of the man who, of all living John- a OUNG BOSWELL, by Chauncey sonians, is perhaps best qualitied—by his Carl, went to in Paris on his memorall Brewster Tinker (Atlantic Monthly thoroughness and by his entertaining style 1907 visit? See page 54 and_ following Press). It has been the fashion, ever —to give them to the public. Boswell was Are you curious to know who Edith Dak : since Macaulay’s day, to laugh and sneer — shrewd—had he been a fool, the great men was, and who went to her parties? Se E ~ at James Boswell. To the average per- of his time would hardly have taken him Chapter VII. And there you will find %, son, therefore, his name, if it means any- up—he was humorous, he was a thoroughly the name of Peter Whiffle, and in no tim thing at all, means a ridiculous buffoon, good fellow, at times too thorough, it is to at all you will see what a very wild young teetering on the verge of downright idiocy. be feared, and he was a man of genius. man he was. Not only wild, you know, No one has done more to correct this And the more one learns of him, the more but clever. My, the things he would think “Co injustice than Professor Tinker. Through insistent the question, “Was he not, when (Continued on page 30) comicbooks.com