BOOKS
59
its theme convincing. In a story like Leonard Spier's
Battle in Embryo,
on the other hand, we find too many traces of the "placard" manner.
The action-is not developed fully enough to give the situations and the
characters life; the result is a blurred impression of slogans.
Dry Summer
by Sanora Babb, the lead-off story in the current
Anvil,
is a sensitively
written story about a western farming family that is hit by the drought.
The revolutionary viewpoint of the writer is not defined in this story by
the obvious cliches that so many of our young revolutionary writers fall
into, but by the tragic implications that emanate naturally from its well
developed theme.
Leftward,
a magazine published by the John Reed Club of Boston,
makes it re-appearance with an issue which purports to be "The New
Masses of New England." The magazine has an impressive staff of con–
tributing editors, but it can hardly hope to achieve th<: facilities that the
New Masses
already has. Since [he scope of the
N ew Jl1asses
is to reach
the entire nation, it seems a serious mistake for the John Reed Club to
assume New England is not part of the audience that the
New Masses
is trying to reach. The wisest bet of the editors would be to publish a
literary magazine that would draw out the creative revolutionary talent
of writers in Boston--or anywhere else, for that matter, rather than a
magazine which, at its best, would be a poor competitor of the
New Masses.
JERRE
0
MANGIONE
