Books: Sign of the Bird

INDIAN AIR—Paul Morand—Houghton Mifflin ($2). “Air, water, earth and fire, the four elements of ancient science, are divided between the continents,” believes observant Paul Morand. “Africa is consecrated to fire, Asia and Europe to earth, Oceania to water, but America has its principles in air—the open air, an air that is young and free, without shadow or wrinkle, exciting electricity.” A Frenchman born in Russia, schooled at Oxford, a diplomat in Italy and Spain, Author Morand (Open All Night, Black Magic) has exorcised in his latest and most delightful travel book the air demons of Latin America—those of the Inca and those of Pan American Airways. Some impressions of this traveled and tolerant man who thinks in the international terms of shillings, feet and quintals and who sees nothing that he does not somehow cherish and enjoy: The great fortress-like grain elevators of Buenos Aires, and the secluded ladies placidly reading novels in their gardens. A colt on an estancia, flinging itself up with angry tears in its eyes after the humiliation of branding. The lovely flowered race course at Santiago, somehow English and somehow Swiss. The miracle of a transatlantic telephone conversation, across the mighty Andes, across the pampas and the sea wrack to one’s own apartment in the Champ-de-Mars. Bristling, pastel-colored Andean peaks whose ice-covered escarpment separates like some fabulous wall-top of broken glass the nations of Argentina and Chile. Nitrates waiting at the port of Antofagasta to enrich the Guggenheims. The atrocious destitution of the little cities of northern Chile. The cathedral at Arequipa, built of honey-colored volcanic stone, young and fresh throughout the centuries as the face of a nun. Arequipa, where beggars ride horseback. La Paz, where giant mushrooms are split with an axe, used for fuel. Lake Titicaca, world’s highest, where one suffers from seasickness and mountain sickness at the same time. Lima, founded on the Epiphany and shaped like a king cake. The not quite homicidal climate of the Canal Zone.

Urbane Observer Morand draws few conclusions. When he does, however, they are pithy:

“America is the land of the straight line.”

“From the tristes (which are the blues of Spanish America) to the saudades of Brazil, the whole Continent weeps and regrets in music; the Indians on their flutes, made from a hollowed human tibia, weep for the Incas, Brazilian Negroes weep for Africa (though they have benefited considerably by their change), the gentlemen of fashion in Santiago weep for Piccadilly, the intelligenzia weep for Moscow, and lovely women for Paris.”

“In these days when men work with indifference or hatred in their hearts, pride of profession has taken refuge in flying. . . . One of the most charming things about aviation is that everyone to do with it is so young.”

“The whole of America lives under the sign of the bird.”