Books: Unrelieved

GOOD-BYE WISCONSIN—Glenway Wescott—Harpers ($2.50).

If by his title Author Wescott implies that he is finished with his native haunts as literary copy it is just as well, since Wisconsin appears to him in unrelieved grey—a monotone of ugliness. And so do the people. Not a one of them has charm or gentleness or pleasant impulses; and the thoughts of each, tortuously analyzed, hark back to a frustration or forward with resignation and despair. Typical in the collection of stories are the drab blunderings of Amelia and her loutish husband (“The Runaways”) who weary of their sterile farm, and burn the house for the insurance. Too scatter-brain scared to collect the money, they run away and finally trail along with a traveling carnival. Amelia, as ticket-collector in shabby velvet, attains a certain dreary happiness.

Her flat emotions; a young musician’s painful maladjustment on returning home from the greater world (Paris left-bank); a young girl’s brooding over an implied sadistic horror-these are subject to Author Wescott’s youthful scrutiny. He has a marked gift for creating atmospheric effects, and a keen sense of human drama (“In a Thicket,” “Like a Lover,” “The Sailor”); but, immature in his aping, he caters too much to Proust and Joyce.