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Show AMOMG THE MEW BOOKS ; nllllllMnilllMlltlllllHinilllllltlllMllllliiiiiiiiiiiiiiiMiiiiiHitiiiiiiiiiiiir ii iii ii it THBf FOUR HORSEMEN OF THE APOCALYPSE.' By Vincent Ibanoz. Translated from the Spanish by Charlotte Brewster Jordan. Book by courtesy of D. A. Callahan. NOTE, in the first place, that this notable novel already is in its sixty-second edition, although the first printing was no longer ago than July of last year.. Accustonfed as we are to "best sellers" that sell best in the imagination of advertising agents, it is a comfort to be able to record the genuine success of a work of art. If I were to attempt a ready characterization charac-terization of the romance I would say that it pictured the struggle of nations as a war between two cultures the Latin and the modern Teutonic. The sympathies of the illustrious Spanish author are on the side of the Latin tradition. In fact no more damning damn-ing indictment of the Hun philosophy and morality has been written, and that is because the author Is deeply versed in the 'IKultur" of the Teuton as well as in the culture of his own civilization. It would be far from the truth, however, to say that the Castil-ian Castil-ian is an apologist for the culture of the Latins. He is a realist who re-, re-, spects Ideals while selecting as his characters men and women who wander wan-der amid ideals hardly sensing them. When we have finished the book we are saddened by the thought that neither among the Teutons nor the Latins has the author been able to suit his artistic purpose by choosing a genuinely noble character. If he makes demons, intellectual and otherwise, other-wise, of nearly all his Teutonic characters, char-acters, he seems to be at great pains not to exalt unduly any of his French or Spanish characters. The culture of our civilization is Greco Roman, modified by a religion come down to us from the Hebrews. How true this is we can tell at a glance if we contrast our culture with that of the Chinese or Japanese. We see that all Europe has been mastered by one culture. How then can Ibanez picture the war as a conflict between two cultures cul-tures if Germany as well as its enemy nations are all under the dominion of what, to be brief, we may describe as the Latin culture. The ancient culture has been profoundly pro-foundly affected by a number of intellectual intel-lectual cataclysms. First came the conquest of the Roman empire by the barbarians. Then came the conquest of the barbarians by ChriBtion civilization. civili-zation. At a much later period the discovery of America, the invention of gunpowder and of the printing press, the Renaissance and the Reformation, Refor-mation, the development of science and the French, English and American, revolutions transformed the ancient culture, but did not change its substantial sub-stantial form its soul. Within a century perhaps only within the last half century the Germans Ger-mans havo tried to throw off the Latia "Ml HIHI I Mill II I IIIIHimilllHIllllll I llllllll 11111111111111111 III llllllllil II lllllll I It 1 culture. They adopted the only method by which any culture can bo sapped of its vitality. They sought to change absolutely its standard of morals. mor-als. If the moral precepts of Confucius Con-fucius were universally adopted in thiB country the character of our culture would be completely transformed. trans-formed. None of the intellectual cataclysms to which we have referred resulted in changing the basic morality of the Latin tradition. There was a sporadic attempt during the French revolution to substitute a new morality, but it simply resolved itself into an attack on sex morality. The Frenchman, Italian and Spaniard, whether Christian Chris-tian or skeptic, always remained faithful to the old ethical tradition to justice, to human brotherhood and to liberty. It was different with the Teuton. While professing these Christian principles prin-ciples upon occasion, yet he and here I am speaking of the Teuton who shared in the propaganda for the Ger-manizatlon Ger-manizatlon of the world. attempted to substitute for the old ethics the theory that might makes right. At one stroke that theory does away with justice, liberty and fraternity. To obtain his contrast the author adopts the expedient of having a French and a German branch of the same family. The French are the Desnoyers and the German the Von Hartrotts. The head of the French branch had fled from France to Argentina Ar-gentina during the Franco-Prussian war. Von Hartrott had been persuaded persuad-ed to leave Germany because of some army scandal. Each wed a daughter of Madariaga, a Spaniard who had become be-come a multi-millionaire as a cattleman cattle-man in Argentina. Although Madariaga Madari-aga does not figure In the main development devel-opment of the plot, I cannot refrain from calling attention to the author's wonderful success in delineating this iron-willed, brutal,' generous, lecherous lecher-ous plainsman who, in his old age, when dining at this of that cabin on his immense ate, cannot help wondering won-dering if the oung woman who is waiting on him is not one of his granddaughters. grand-daughters. After the death of Madariaga the Desnoyers go to France, the Von Hartrotts to Berlin. The Von Hartrotts Hart-rotts become Germans in the now well-understood significance of the word. All the propaganda sophistries become as the warp and woof of their existence. The Desnoyers, in Paris, count themselves rather as Argentlnans. Julio, the son, a handsome rake cast off by his father, takes up painting in diletante fashion, but passes most of Ills time in love affairs, dueling and tangoing. On the eve of the war the be-spec-tacled cousin from Berlin, a Herr Professor, Pro-fessor, calls on Julio to tell him about the glories of Germanism. This Von Hartrott, who has been a spy in Paris, ((Continued on page 11.) HHHHHHHHH AMONG THE BOOKS 1 (Continued from page 7.) ia the incarnation of German "Kultur" and it is he who states the German itf case Every familiar doctrine of the " Hun propaganda is set forth by him in detail. He is the spirit of modern Germany. Julio listens in some amazement, not much interested because he is an Ar-gentinan Ar-gentinan and because patriotism is far from his thoughts. His mind is preoccupied by the married woman with whom he has engaged in an intrigue in-trigue that has led almost to a duel I with the wronged husband. Such are the two characters chosen to represent Latinism and Germanism. ft- There are of course many other characters char-acters men and women who represent phases of the two cultures. The f father, for example, who had run away from the !Pranco-Prussian war because he did not believe in war, is now an ardent patriot, lost in admiration of the calm heroism of his countrymen and filled with remorse because he has learned so late to be affected by the lofty motives which are making martyrs of the men and women of France. "Julio's paramour, repentant, deserts , him to take care of her husband, who haB been wounded. Julio, who is beginning be-ginning to be looked upon with disgust dis-gust by his father and by his comrades, com-rades, pursues her, but relents when he finds that she is attending a blind husband and wishes to escape him. I From no very worthy motive he 1 joins the army as a private, is wound- 1 ed in a brave encounter, is idecorated A with the war cross and returns home I to a worshiping father, mother and sister. He passes his time in Paris, I resuming old love affairs, returns to 8 the trenches and is stain. I One regrets that -the novel did not I take a nobler flight. It would have J been a simple matter to select august I characters and thus to lift the , , I story into the regions of the ideal. But such was not the author's object. It ,is clear that he defends the Latin culture cul-ture as against the German, but it is quite as clear that he Is trying to give i a realistically faithful portrayal of B Latin culture as he finds it. I All in all he has produced a great novel, not one that appeals to us as .powerfully, perhaps, as some of the I older masterpieces, but one that as- I serts in every chapter its supremacy I I aa a work of art. F. P. G. |