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[| i en |. at ee Pe ee ee, at cet a A ae ne nae | PRACTICES, UNNATURAL ACLS By Donald Barthelme Now al your bookstore FARRAR, STRAUS & GIROUX pre-industrial England. We are reminded that such a 17th- century swell as Lord Guilford thought littl of “installing a pump to drive the piled ordure from his cellar into the street.” However elegant the facade, we are made aware of the onflow- ing sewage through the years un- til we come to industrial Man- chester, grimly pumping it into the polluted Irk. However full the earlier centuries may be of beautiful people we are not spared their plumbing failures — or their cruelties: How they filled papal effigies with live cats “to make them scream realistic- ally when burnt .. .” Vet if these times hefors the Ei is PESS CS sale bas spinning jenny had their harsh _side, their dominant texture lies for Sir Arthur in clear and graceful landscapes, in good diets, in an easy social structure where class wasn’t caste, nor discrimination snobbery. The peopie are vigorous and poetic, tough, jealous of reputation, sporting, extravagant and — of course — fiercely Protestant. Edwin M. Yoder Jr. writes fre- quently for Book World..- fining a bit too sharply. Of course we are told today that history so defined——history with a theme, especially nationalistic —is “romantic.” Themes, we are warned, are devices of art not history and are best left to the vanities of patriotic and genea- logical societies. - If Sir Arthur Bryant knows of this fusty academic war cry he ignores it, and for that we may be thankful. The grim men at the computers have their own style of historical falsity, if fal- sity is at issue. I miss only one thing. As he has shown elsewhere, with por- traits of great figures like Wil- liam the Canqnersy and Thames Me WGC i ae Becket, Sir Arthur has a Dau- mier-like genius for caricature. Great characters are largely missing here, and their absence is felt. The narrative perks up when he introduces Lord Pal- metston, the mid-Victorian Prime Minister; but this is the only major portrait eseayed. I wish there were more of such portraits, But that is a trivial complaint about a beautifully textured, entertaining book. + Ne devastation, holocaust. Forty-three killed. White man. Biack man. Sniper and cop. Bystander: and arsonist. Who were they? Why did they have to die? What makes law- abidinipmitizens burn their own city down around'them ? Twa voteran néwspapermen Fear Frere eee have explored the lives and deaths of the 43 who perished while the Governor and President played politics and the anguished Mayor watched his city burn. A report on Detroit '67 that could become a forecast fOfem, summer '68. IN DEIROMT A Rebellion and Its Victims Van Gordon Sauter and Burleigh Hines $4.95 at your bookstore Henry Regnery Company BOOK WORLD Ma; ot