| OCR Text |
Show 'jthfnl CJ,V about: The Big Book Craze. SANTA MONICA, CALIF. We're promised a historical histori-cal novel longer than any yet say half a million words or so. Of course, the author probably uses some words at least twice, but that won't reduce re-duce the gross tonnage unless un-less they're very short words. I can't take it. While still convalescent con-valescent from "Anthony Adverse," I was stricken down by "Gone With the Wind" and had such a relapse that even now I barely can hold on my stomach such comparatively iight and trifling stuff as volume VET to ZYM of the encyclopedia. en-cyclopedia. When reading this if""., o s ture, it upsets me to irvjn s. Cobb find my legs going to sleep before I do. And the constant con-stant pressure makes callouses on my second mezzanine landing. I admit these mass production books serve nicely as door stoppers and for pressing wild flowers. I also heard of a chap who detected a prowler under his window and dropped a frothy little work of fiction fic-tion weighing slightly less than nine pounds on the back of the fellow's neck, dislocating three vertebrae. At last accounts, the surgeons were still picking long jagged chapters out of his spine. In my present mood, what I crave is the romantic stuff of olden days, in which our sainted Aunt Sophie was wont to inscribe "Alas, how sad!" or "Only too true!" in pale violet ink on the margins. What happened to all the Aunt Sophies, anyhow? An Actor's Temperament. WE'VE all been waiting for something to top it, but the best wheeze of the month remains the one that was emitted, not by a paid gagster, but by a simple stagehand stage-hand at one of the studios when Mr. Leslie Howard refused to go on making a picture until a group of distinguished visitors, including Mr. Charles Norris, the novelist, had been shooed off the set. "He ain't sore at you gents," stated stat-ed the stage-hand to the ousted parties, par-ties, "but he's been playin' 'Hamlet' 'Ham-let' on the rep.ular stage and he ain't usci ts hifviil' a crowd watchin' him while he's actin'." If Mr. Norris and his friends wanted want-ed to see some really great acting they should have patronized the professional pro-fessional wrestling matches. That's where they put on the heavy dramatic dra-matic stuff beautifully rehearsed, perfectly done. Children's Education I LIKE the way the wealthy classes in England rear their children. Little Rosemary doesn't recite for the company after dinner, and if Master Jones-Terwillager Minor Mi-nor gets uppity at school, he gets thrashed. Many a rich American has known how sharper than a serpent's tooth it is to see his daughter grow up a wanton and his boy turn out a waster. wast-er. Yet, with a few exceptions so few that the newspapers comment on them it never seems to occur to these fond fathers that less of coddling and pampering and spoiling spoil-ing in adolescence and more of wholesome discipline might produce a higher average grade of heirs. What set me to thinking along this line was being t'other night at a party where a poor little four-year-old, having already the pitiable assurance as-surance of a veteran prima donna, was fetched in to give impersonations. impersona-tions. She never again could impersonate imper-sonate natural babyhood though, more's the pity! And her pert small brother was encouraged to dominate domi-nate the talk. Mark my word for it, that kid is going to come to no good end not even a well-spanked end, which would help. ... Mr. Pir.cus' Cou).. JN THESE topsy-turvy times lib-eral-minded patriots who are ' striving to steer a middle course I between ultraenthusiastic left-wing- ers and ullraconservative rightists j might do well, methinks, to follow ; the example set by Mr. Pincus. i Mr. Pincus had opened a clothing , store. Immediately on one side of ! him was the clothing store of Mr. ; Ginsberg and immediately on the other side was the clothing store of , Mr. Dreifus; and three clothing stores in a row were too many even for Essex street. So the adjacent competitors framed a plot to put the newcomer out of business. Next morning their rival, coming down to open up, found over Mr. Dreifus' establishment establish-ment a flaming legend, to wit: BANKRUPT SALE And above Mr. Ginsberg's door ! was this equally prominent announcement: an-nouncement: i CLOSING OUT SALE ! Within an hour, smeared across I the entire front of Mr. Pincus' store, exactly in between the other two, appeared a huge sisn reading as (olluws: i MAIN ENTRANCE, i IRViN S. COBB, j WNU Service |
