BOOKS

THE SEA AND THE WEDDING, by Pamela Hansford Johnson, Harcourt, Brace & Co., $3.95, 298 pp.

A contemporary high-middleclass group of the English is fascinatingly portrayed in the Proustian style, with much different-slanted personality probings, including sexual. The people come wonderfully to life, including a major character, Junius, the homosexual architect, butch enough to pass but choosing not to with his hetero close friends, who are adjusted to his chi-chi interior decorations and gay boy friends. This portrayal is remarkable for being a large and very successful portrayal of a homosexual as-seen-by-the-hetero's-and

even

more remarkable since the hetero "I" of the novel ends by becoming a close friend of Junius.

If Proust is your cup of tea, this is a must. If not-well, it's kind of Proustian the-au-lait, and I think you might like it anyway. A. E. S.

ODD GIRL, by Artemis Smith, Beacon paper-back, 1959, 35c,

187 pp.

Miss Smith examines the "coming out" of a particularly unreal young lesbian whose desire to find a permanent relationship with someone of her own kind causes her to sleep with so many different girls in such a short space of time as to cause one to lose count before completing the book. The young lesbian's name is Anne, and she is nicknamed Alice by a very feminine student actor who aids and abets her in her search. Terms like "Alice" and "Mary" are used frequently to show the nonhomosexual reader that they really

one

are seeing the inside of lesbianism. The story which relies on the rapid changes of bed-partners to keep it going is told in the third person and a remoteness in the characterizations is felt. Miss Smith's conclusion isor seems to be that the reason Anne had so much difficulty in finding a soul-mate was that the women she was attracted to were not real lesbians, but were either using it for temporary release or fighting it. Not until Anne found Johnson, a self assured lesbian, did she find peace. Anne's personality is so mixed up and unlikely that one cannot waste time wondering about her. But one does wonder, for a moment or so, about Miss Smith, who has appeared in ONE Magazine under a different name and in the past has shown herself to be a skillful writer with firsthand knowledge of her subject. The only conclusion to be drawn is that Miss Smith wrote this book to appeal to the heterosexual male market. The initiated could never be taken in.

If Miss Smith had realized that her heroine is either a nymphomaniac or just plain hysterical she would recognize that Anne never would be able to last in the relationship she finally found. She would shortly after that recognize that she had no book. The writing, such as it is, is hackneyed. D. S.

A WAY OF LOVE, by James Courage, Putnam's Sons, 1959, $3.75, 255 pp.

There is a great deal to recommend this English novel. Mr. Courage is a writer of no little talent and this book makes both a modest contribution to literature in general and a significant contribution to homophile literature in particular. Mr. Courage has a free and natural style which he uses to advantage in his treatment of his subject which he approaches without apology and yet without pity or sentimentality.