cally. The homosexual roles are played by the Superintendent of a nursery school and his butch lover. Whatever research was done in order to portray these characters must, it seems apparent, have been confined to the writings on latrine walls. And it seems equally apparent that much of this writing must have been virtually illegible. So much for the plot.

Can we get back to the Grandma Moses comparison? The conversation and descriptions are priceless-they have to be quoted to be appreciated for their high corn content. Here, for example, is Elena, the twenty six year old sophisticate peeking through the blinds at the neighborhood mansions -"Fiddle dee dee to the whole damn bunch of crumbs around here. Hypocrites, that's what they all are!" Want to accompany Elena while she bathes in her mansion? "Finally, she got up and put on her robe. Before anything else, she was going to take a shower. She bustled out of her room and walked down to the end of the hallway. She opened the door leading into a huge lavendar shower-room. She wiped herself thoroughly and went back to her bedroom to dress." (I wonder if Grandma wouldn't have painted the privy lavendar.)

...

relationships

Employer-employee among the upper classes have not, it seems to me, been delved into sufficiently for the enlightenment of the less fortunate. Here's Elena meeting the handsome gardner for the first time when he comes to the kitchen door for the key to the tool shed. (Tool

shed?) "Would you like some coffee, Kurt? Oh, I'm terribly sorry, I completely forgot myself." "Oh, that's all right. No harm done. I would rather have you call me Kurt anyway." "My name is Elena," she said. “I would like it if you would call me that, too."

...

.. They were at each other like two sex-crazy animals, and the whole world was gloriously ablaze with splendid colors of crimson and purple. He took her, just as she was, on the library floor. Took her with all the passion of a lover. He took her with a zest that demanded everything he was worth. He took her... but good! (Don't look now, Jerry, but your imagination is showing.)

Just to show that Jerry's imagination is no less active when it comes to deviation, let's follow Mike up to Brian's apartment. "They both shed their clothing and wrestled heatedly. Their faces were contorted a mixture of hell, pain, sadism, vengence, disregard, apathy, ruinous corruption, agony, rapture, ungrasped ecstacy.

...

Shouts of joy and madness rang through the muffled silence of the room. The pain, puzzlement, despair subsided. A deadening silence prevailed and the world lay in darkness." Personally, that "ungrasped ecstacy" gets me.

Well, for quotes from the book, that about does it. These are sufficient to arouse your interest if you're the type of person who can be amused by the hilarious tripe that results when an author attempts to enter fields with which he is completely unfamiliar. But even if this type of writing doesn't

mattachine REVIEW

just for contrast. In comparison it will make every other piece of litera you possess smell like a rose. And, as I said before, it actually is marvelous reading.

amuse you, you'd better buy the book time female friend (straight) of Laurie's, and a gruff, pitying affection for him. Laurie is jealous of the girl, but helplessly goes out of his way to help them before and after they are married. The marriage itself is a shock to Laurie, and he seeks respite in the sophisticated arms of an older man who takes him to Italy to encourage his painting. After a quick affair with a young Italian boy-of-the-streets behind the half-turned back of his benefactor, Laurie is sent home. He again becomes involved in the lives of the guardsman and his wife and again

THE PLASTER FABRIC by Martyn Goff, London: Putnam's 1957. 255 pages, $3.95. Reviewed by Gail D. Dennis.

The Plaster Fabric is a promise of even better things to come. This "first" is an intricate psychological web of the chipping and rebuilding of a young man's character. The story is gently strong and well interlaced with his (the author's) own confession aids them, now helping their flounderand confusion. Habitual camouflaging ing marriage. His attraction to the of truth and blending reality with make guardsman has not lessened, and his believe presents a question of: how jealousy of the girl as a rival is dimhonest is honesty? The protagonist, inished only by his sympathy for her. a young painter and book shop employee He is faced with the problem of helpis distressed by his inability to seping her gain back the love of her husarate truth from fiction. Constant fear band and therefore jeopardizing his of discovery of his homosexuality own possible happiness, or forgetting prompts him to fabricate tales which her and hopefully following the guardshe invariably regrets as they only man who has left his wife. complicate his life further. Also, his desire for honesty is deep-rooted and earnest, but he seems incapable of speaking up regardless of possible consequences.

Laurie is attracted to a guardsman with "calculating eyes" and a face "at once threatening and stupid, to be distrusted and protected." The guardsman is definately not homosexual, but he vaguely realizes the nature of the hero, even while not consciously understanding it. The character of the guardsman is never wholly clear. He seems to alternate between a dubious love for a long-

The struggle for self-honesty is especially apparent. The protagonist is admittedly weak-willed, but his selfanalysis is constructive without being technical or tiresome. Author Goff is adept at simple but moving description; a fluent storyteller, he is perceptive and discerning, yet not a moralist. Though not necessarily exciting as gay-books go, the story is wellwritten and believable.