Uncle Sam-Highbrow or Babbitt? THAT does the swift rise WH of the Book-of-the Month Club signify? The obvi ous explanation, that more Americans want to read the best new books than do, and that this potential demand has not previously been satisfactorily catered to, has usually been overlooked. Few people realize that for many years a beggarly two or three hundred thousand Tin the book world in re cent years has been the rise of or individuals in this country, habitual book-readers, have kept all our book-publishers, book-sellers and authors alive. A frequent explanation of the rise of the Club is that the American is a boob anyhow, and that the Club is supported by lazy-minded people Who Want some authorities to chap or been, and still is, distilled within the or irresponsible and careless. Even when you are sure, from a review you have read or from the favorable comment of a friend, that a certain book will be to your taste-frequently you overlook getting it, through busyness or procrastination. One always has to go to some trouble to get a book that one wants. The result is that there are few of us, who have not, time and again, missed important new books we were really keen to read! The Book-of-the-Month Club has grown so swiftly because it is the first attempt ever made to meet these difficulties of the book-reader, psychological and economic, in a sensible and adequate way. The erone them in their reading. This, time for reading as formerly, and this plan of operation is simplicity itself. of course, is absurd. The most cursory inquiry into the Club's method of operation would show that its members exercise a far more intelligent discrimination among the new boks than those who buy their fact makes them regard as all the more And because expectation is so books in other ways. The truth is that, far from conClub's list of members really reads ssing of border-line literates, the individuals, in every line of endeavor far too frequently. kea Who's Who. The most eminent -education, government, law, Indeed, the first question the intelligent person asks, when the plan is explained, is not, "Why should I join this club?"-but "Why in the world should I not take advantage of all these conveniences, since they cost me nothing?" For the system keeps you authoritatively informed about all the important new books, (not merely a few), automatically insures you against missing those you decide you want, and it also completely protects you in your book purchases, by a guarantee against It follows because of an economic sence, industry and social life; the fact: there are so many new books tintelligent group in each of published, thousands of them! No dissatisfaction. thousands of communities, large and thoughtful person would change this There is no space here to describe exactly how the Book-of-the-Month book-reader that has taken advan- questioned: the person who can only Club operates. If you are interested, tage of the conveniences it provides. read comparatively few books, say send the coupon below for a booklet i, in reality, due to a combination of completely confused by this wealth detail. The phenomenal rise of the Club from ten to twenty-five a year, is which explains its methods in full o factors-one psychological, the of offering. Everybody other economic. The first is the more reads books on the rec 4-G BOOK-OF-THE-MONTH CLUB, Inc. the-Month Club operates. This request involves me interesting, and the least recognized: ommendation of someone azine, for a thought of humankind has always reader newspaper. The best tions are found by the T 68 in no obligation to subscribe to your service. THE An Atlantic Prize $5,000 for the most interesting BIOGRAPHY of any kind, sort or description Submitted before May 1, 1929 THE work may be the life of a man or woman who has lived in any age of recorded history, including the present. It may be a career distinguished or undistinguished, the life of a statesman, conqueror, poet, reformer, scientist a laborer in a wide field of human achievement, or a successful cultivator of his own cabbage patch. Or it may be autobiographical - the personal record of any life which has been interesting to the one who has lived it, and can be made interesting to those who read of it. If the biography is of a man or woman of eminence, it must be sound in scholarship. If it is autobiographical, it must be truthful and responsible. In either case, the book will be judged according to its interest. The Prize paid to the winner is for serial and book rights, and will be in addition to all royalties accruing from book publication. The biography will be published in book form as an Atlantic Monthly Press Publication by Little, Brown and Company. We do not specify whether the book should be long or short merely that it be reasonably full-sized. We desire that authors of all nationalities compete, stipulating only that, whatever the original version, the final manuscript must be submitted in English. We hope to print in book form other biographies besides the winner, but we reserve the right to reject any or all. All books submitted in this contest will be considered not only for the Prize but for publication on terms to be arranged with the author and are submitted with this understanding. Every book published by us as a result of this competition will be given wide and continued publicity. No effort will be spared to make each an outstanding individual success. The Contest will be judged by the editorial staff of the Atlantic Monthly and the Atlantic Monthly Press; and the winning manuscript will be serialized in whole or in part in the Atlantic. There are no hampering rules in this competition - merely that all manuscripts must be unpublished work, typed and submitted before May 1, 1929 THE ATLANTIC MONTHLY PRESS 8 Arlington Street 111 Boston, Massachusetts Three-Fourths of Your Electric Bill Pays Political Graft! Senator George W. Norris, of Nebraska, harpoons the Power Senator Norris' figures and data prove that government operation of power plants brings electricity to American users at onefourth the rate charged by Power Trust stations. A striking example concerns the lighting of Niagara Falls: Ontario with municipal control pays $8 per lamp per month - the United States pays $43 per lamp per month. Both have the same source of supply. Who gets the difference of $35? He tells all about the bribing, lobbying and political conniving that three-fourths of our monthly electric bill pays for. This Insanity Farce "Cold-blooded murderers should be stripped of their armor of fakery, through the functioning of a State department devoted to the study of subnormal mental conditions." This is the recommendation of John Walker Hargton, internationally famous journalist, in his article in July Pix Talk. He exposes the inside facts of the George Remus and Harry K. Thaw trials, which he thinks are national disgraces. General William Mitchell's first of a series of four articles appears in July Plain Talk. In this outspoken magazine, General Machell takes advantage of an unbridled opportunity to speak his mind about the Army and Navy. He boldly and vigorously charges dickering between the Navy and lobbies of armament makers and a consequent puny, inefficient, badly directed air force. Since Noah Got Drunk man has made marvelous advances e allowing himself the unrestricted use of alcoholic drink. Its falsehood to say that liquor has the deleterious effect the propagandists ascribe to it." says Former Chief Justice Frank Doster of Kansas in July Plain Talk. Judge Doster writes with the vigor, fire and logic of a Jim Reed or Darrow in his article, "Kansas Puritanism and Prohibition." This "Busy Bee" Bunk-"the lilies and twittering birds" may have worked with Bertrand Russell's child, but it failed to impress Mrs. Elizabeth W. Smith's little girl, aged five. Worse, this method of imparting sex information raised merry Hades in the Smith family. Mrs. Smith tells, in July Plain Talk, all about her fatal experiment. Her article, "Mr. Russell and Sex Education," will be of intense interest to all parents who are today face to face with the sex education problem. Does England Mean War? If "history repeats itself" and if "the best of prophets of the future is the past," an Anglo-American war would actually seem to be entirely logical. Without in the least resorting to jingoism, Brockholst Livingston, in July Plain Talk, shows clearly that for a certain reason war with England is entirely likely within a few years. One gets to the bottom of this menace in Mr. Livingston's article and finds a basis for forming his own conclusions. "Is Wall Street Necessary?" asks Don C. Seitz in July Plain Talk. "Are we better off without a Stock Exchange? And how much? During the war when the stock exchange was closed the country prospered. Would it be just as well if it were closed for good?" These are pertinent, timely questions that Mr. Seitz answers shrewdly and entertainingly. Other Features "A Liberal's Problems in the South," by Howard T. Dimick; "Pastor Baltzly of Omaha," by Howard Erickson; "Why Not Choose Presidents by Lot?"; "The Germans in China"; "Backhill Worship in Arkansas"; "Sweet Land of Democracy";- Book Reviews; Fiction; Editorials. Plain Talk for July-You will recognize it by the blazing red cover. Get a copy today at your news stand - or use this convenient coupon. PLAIN TALK for July 35c a Copy AT ALL NEWS STANDS $4.00 a Year A BLESSED COMPANION IS A BOOK The Fall of the Russian Empire, by Edmund A. Walsh. Boston: Little, Brown & Co. 1928. 8vo. xiii+357 pp. Illus. $3.50. FATHER WALSH was a member of the American Relief Commission which went through Russia in 1922. He had unusual opportunities for studying conditions and he has embodied his impressions in numerous magazine articles and public addresses before writing the present volume, which is largely historical, and which is to be followed by another, descriptive of 'The Soviet State' itself. Father Walsh proceeds frankly upon the theory that 'facts are largely useless unless they result in something more lasting than mere entertainment.' He has a distinct purpose in his work, which is, first of all, to arouse the public to an understanding of the facts concerning the terrific cataclysm which is taking place in Russia, and then just what these facts mean. 'Bolshevism,' says Father Walsh, ‘is an international reality which only the hopelessly intransigent can ignore.. The victors of the second revolution frankly and brutally took the road to the extreme left. That way madness lies, as they have now learned and reluctantly admitted, taught by the inexorable laws of nature operating through economic pressure . . . but it is my deliberate judgment that no lasting peace is possible in Europe or Asia until the breach between Russia and the West is securely bridged.' It is frankly to the task of erecting that bridge that Father Walsh sets himself, feeling that first of all the facts must be thoroughly investigated. The present volume, therefore, traces the development of the Russian Revolution back through hundreds of years of Russian history, maintaining that 'Bolshevism is a natural phase in the evolution of a strictly historical process originating in the soil, the culture, and the politics of Russia itself.' He details with great eloquence and dramatic skill the tragic story of the persecutions and the sufferings the Russian people endured through the tyranny and corruption of the Czarist régime. There is, to be sure, an approximation of sensational journalism in the amount of detailed attention he devotes to the sordid and revolting story of Rasputin and his malign influence upon the Russian Court. Likewise, the book embodies a rather unnecessary amount of detail concerning the interesting and absorbing — yet not historically important story of the experience of the Czar and his family from the time of his abdication to the ultimate assassination at Ekaterinburg. Father Walsh is clearly of the opinion that Kerensky's fall was primarily due, not to cowardice or duplicity, but largely to 'circumstances which he could neither control nor dominate.' In brief, the fundamental cause of the collapse of the first Russian revolution was that 'Kerensky had no lieutenants or counselors capable of matching wits with the Machiavellian cabinet that surrounded Lenin.' Father Walsh has written an exceedingly interesting volume. Everyone knew that he was a very eloquent speaker. This book shows him to be an extremely able journalist. One question, however, may be raised with reference to the book's accuracy historically. Father Walsh is obviously of the opinion that the German Government, in very large part, instigated the Bolshevist Revolution. He even goes so far as to intimate that the removal of the Czar and his family from the relatively safe loneliness of Tobolsk to the hazardous exposure of Ekaterinburg was directly instigated and actually arranged in detail by Mirbach, the German Ambassador to Moscow, the intimation being that Mirbach had sought to inveigle Nicholas back to Moscow for the purpose of aligning Russia with the Teutonic Powers and that Nicholas refused to participate in such a plot. The Czar, as Father Walsh suggests, 'redeeming an inglorious past by one heroic choice, was murdered because of his unshakable loyalty to the cause of the Allies.' But Mirbach was subsequently assassinated himself and, as Father Walsh very correctly states, 'only time and the opening up of all European archives can determine' the truth. IVY LEE Daisy and Daphne, by Rose Macaulay. New York: Boni & Liveright. 1928. 12mo. 334 pp. $2.50. MISS MACAULAY'S latest novel has been called with thorough inaccuracy the story of a dual personality. Daphne Daisy Arthur may be said to be a dual personality only as everyone alive, except those persons wholly lacking both in the dramatic instinct and in vanity, tries to foist upon all who seem to him worth the trouble an ameliorated representation of himself. But it is true that Daisy's amelioration is rather a transformation, and that her efforts to impose it upon her chosen public are above the average in violence and continuity: hence the tightness of the coil in which she winds herself. Like the delectable Crewe Train, the new novel has for its central figure a maid whom there will be none among readers to praise, and very, very few to love. Indeed, Daisy is more |