Books: The Editors Like

THE JOURNALS OF ANDRÉ GIDE, 1939-1949, translated by Justin O’Brien. (Knopf, $6.00.) This fourth and concluding volume of Gide’s great Journal is notable for the discussion of his problems as a writer, the comments on literature (from Virgil to Steinbeck), and the new note of serenity in Gide’s dialogue with himself. The work of an octogenarian triumphantly young in spirit.

WILLA CATHERby David Daiches. (Cornell University Press, $2.75.) A forceful critical appraisal, blessedly free of the jargon of the “higher” criticism. David Daiches’s luminous study is a strong invitation to revisit Willa Cather’s work.

THE GEORGIAN LITERARY SCENEby Frank Swinnerton. (Farrar, Straus and Young, $4.00.) Mr. Swinnerton has caged, between the covers of his intimate, anecdotal volume, just about all of the literary lions and lionesses at large in England from 1910 to 1935.

HERMAN MELVILLEby Newton Arvin. (Sloane, $3.50.) A critical biography, both penetrating and absorbing, which recently received the National Book Award for the most distinguished work of nonfiction published in 1950.

NEITHER FIVE NOR THREEby Helen MacInnes. (Harcourt, Brace, $3.00.) The author of Above Suspicion. Assignment in Brittany, and others has east a sharp eye on Communist penetration of a Manhattan magazine. A deftly written and incisive story, with love as a counterpoint to politics.

THE WITCH DIGGERSby Jessamyn West. (Harcourt, Brace, $3.50.) A long, warmly lit American novel: Indiana at the turn of the century and a Hoosier courtship which Miss West handles with sympathy.

THE STORIES OF F. SCOTT FITZGERALD. (Scribner’s, $3.75.) This collection of twenty-eight stories brings Fitzgerald’s finest tales back into print (along with some mediocre ones). Malcolm Cowley contributes a first-rate introduction.

JUDGMENT ON DELTCHEVby Eric Ambler. (Knopf, $3.00.) An inquisitive reporter finds himself the target of mysterious gunmen when he tries to get to the bottom of a “treason” trial in the Balkans. The author of Journal Into Fear is not in top form, but still this is a good thriller.

THE NATURE OF THE UNIVERSEby Fred Hoyle. (Harper, $2.50.) The findings and theorys of modern cosmology, this book by a young Cambridge astronomer is a wonder of lucidity and compactness — and exciting to read.

SCIENCE AND COMMON SENSEby James II. Conant. (Yale University Press, $4.00.) Dr. Conant’s challenging statement of the achievements, promise, and methods of modern science. He discusses such questions as the teaching of science in the universities; the impact of scientific discovery on industry and medicine; and the now crucial relation of scientific research to the state.