Ideas and Places
by .Harper, $3.50.
A collection of Cyril Connolly’s essays in the British literary magazine Horizon, which he edited from its inception in 1939 to its demise in 1950. Mr. Connolly is inclined to dwell, with a somewhat tearful masochism, on the unhappy state of the arts in this age of “Inflationary Decadence" (an age in which rewards increase as standards decline); but he is highly exhilarating when he is on the warpath against second-rateness, commercialism,
“the blah and blare of broadcasting and journalism.”The book includes pieces on post-war French literature; impressions of a visit to the U.S. and other travel sketches; a symposium on the writer’s finances (by the leading contributors to Horizon); and several delightful parcdies, among them a hilarious item about the Crutch Foundation for the Redemption of Middle-Aged Hacks. Mr. Connolly is a stylish, cultivated, and amusing writer, with a stirring sense of artistic integrity. These short pieces of his make an attractive platter of caviar canapés.