Books: South America

IMPRESSIONS OF SOUTH AMERICA— André Siegfried—Harcourt, Brace ($2). André Siegfried has made a name for himself as a critical visitor, not only of the U. S. but of England, Canada, Australia, New Zealand. French to the core (which thinks itself sounder than that of any other nation) he looks about him in his travels with a penetratingly shrewd eye. On a swift tour of South America two years ago he wrote a series of diary letters to friends in France, telling what he thought about what he saw. Collected, they make a short book (192 pp.) but a brightly written, informative one. In the Canal Zone, Traveler Siegfried was much impressed by the mechanics of the Gatun locks. “The silence is positively religious, giving an impression of safety, strength, and calm. It does honor to the Americans, and classes them with the Romans among the great builders of history.” In Lima he found the people as climate-loyal as Californians; though in winter there is usually a misty drizzle, no one carries an umbrella. “You will even be treated as a Chilean—supreme insult! —if you carry one.” In Peru “there is no public opinion, no consideration whatever of the general good.” Siegfried did not care much for Buenos Aires, but of Rio de Janeiro he says: “If there are seven wonders in the world, this city is one of them!” Politically and economically, he does not regard South America as grownup. “The trouble with the South Americans is that they see everything too big. These people, so charming and optimistic, launch out as soon as they have any money without ever considering whether they will be able to carry on afterwards or not. . . . Absenteeism is the trouble everywhere in South America. . . . The most frequent mistake made in studying South American politics is the determination to find deep currents of opinion where there is in reality nothing more than personal contests.”