Books: Printed Movie

ROSE OF THE SEA—Paul Vialar—Carrick & Evans ($2.50).

Rose of the Sea, winner of the Prix Femina for 1939, is about a worn-out ship. At less than seven knots she won’t steer; at seven, every plate groans and every loose object “strolls.” She is a hopeless, unsalable piece of property, and no one knows it better than her owners, hard-boiled Jerome Jardeheu and his noisome Uncle Romain.

Not until they are well out of Cherbourg does Jerome realize what his uncle is up to: the cargo, valued at 1,200,000 francs, is fake; the ship, just insured for 300,000 francs, will be sunk; the seven piteous, hastily recruited members of the crew, who might ask embarrassing questions, will be locked in and drowned; Jerome and Romain and an agent ashore will split the proceeds. There isn’t much Jerome can do about it. He has signed all the papers; if the Rose docks at Constantsa with its cargo of “machinery” he faces a long jail sentence.

Here a nicely managed plot thickens and begins to curdle. Not only do they find a stowaway, but she gives birth to a baby. Rough sailors with hearts of Holland Rusk are softened by a Helpless Mite. After shipping this comber of sentiment the story rights itself and moves ahead with almost its old blend of sinister excitement, rather brilliant writing, and psychological veracity. But the diaper sequences are not quite forgivable in an author who can produce the rest of the book.

Many a 20th-century writer has shown the influence of the movies. Two who have thus added to the vitality of contemporary writing are Malraux and Dashiell Hammett; Paul Vialar is a third. Jerome himself so inescapably suggests Cinemactor Jean Cabin that the latter must have inspired him. Rose of the Sea is rather a printed movie than a novel, and with a few passages cut would be expert and beautiful.