from MESSRS COLLINS' LIST
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Old England BERNARD GILBERT
Royal 8vo, Cloth, 20/- net
A God's-Eye view of a village. This book is unique in English literature both in conception and treatment. The author presents a whole community to the reader, taking for his subject our largest social unit—an English village—where everybody knows everything about every one. He has taken a typical village during one day of the war and given a camera obscura presentment of the multitudinous intrigues, ambitions, desires, disputes, relationships, and interests which thread its fabric so closely. There is no hero or heroine, for the author presents some hundreds of characters, each all important to himself. These speak their own thoughts, throw startling sidelights on their neighbours; and from the whole, a picture of a village community takes definite shape. The author has snapped his village at one instant on one day, so that there is no 'action.' The village is frozen motionless whilst the reader inspects each inhabitant. There is no sentimentalism, no 'kailyard' gloss; the villagers expressing themselves with immense force from the Earl to the mole-catcher. Mr Gilbert has done intensely for the English countryside what Balzac did for his nation on a great scale. Not only is each of the great array of characters set forth vividly, but the larger problems of the countryside are illuminated from various angles. A map of the village shows every cottage, some fifty genealogical trees explain the relationships of the villagers, and a 'Who's Who' gives full information about each inhabitant. The author has taken three years to write this book, and it is the fruit of a life-time's close observation. All who were born in the country or have any interest in rural life and problems must be interested in Old England.
The Carpenter and His Kingdom Dr ALEXANDER IRVINE