of New Russia, Ever since the Bolshevik Revolution there has not been a more popular theme apong writers, po-ans, journalists, and various
Russia. Daily there are published Soviet from different standpoints books, articles, and pamphlets containing "the truth about the Bolsheviks." In 99 cases out of a hundred they present very dull reading' consisting of vague and violent discourses of politied! nature, of historical reflections, or dendly'ser-fous expostulations full of isms and Such literature deals with not with humanity; with not with everyday life; ities. son to welcome the publication of this book of modern Russian stories, even if it is only a remind Isler of this very neglected truth in spite of the greatest historical upheavals and changes, men and women remain fundament: tally unchanged, and that their inner: lives are never moulded anew in accordance with some Marxian The book is extremely valuable because while some of its stories are, on the surface, meant panegyries of the Soviet system, it is taken as a whole, neither a criticism nor a panegyric, but shows, fon the contrary, a return to very sane realism which had been neglected in Russia since the death of Tehekhov. It is almost. extraordinary how throughout these year: of turmoil young, and some of the colder, writers have suceseded in taking a detached artistic view ings. With so much political and. propaganda floating it, they nevertheless succeed telling' plain tale without much emphasis on political ideology, and one receives from it more. truth: ful, more genuine impression of everyday life in Soviet Russia than from a dozen different "reports." The book is also" well compiled, because the stories in it reflect very numerous aspects of Soviet life. "Some deal with the Rel Army, others with Government employees, others again with peasants, schools and s0 forth.
Kasatkin's "Flying Os Army soldier whose family hax been massacred by the White who therefore seeks vengeance! and death in battle, is as fascinating a figure as any hero of the past; Vsevolod Ivanov's peasants are us kindly and good-humoured as any in Tolstoy or Turgeniev; Lydia Seifulina's Soviet' Botstal boys are really quite harmless, and with something fundamentally good in them, which reveals itself as soon as they are taken out of their sordid "city surroundings into the green fields: The longest and most remarkable story.is Semenov's "'Hubger," depicting, life among humble Government employees in Petrograd during the years of itary Communism, Here is painted with a calm but all the more effective brush the most horrible incident of the Russian revolution—the slow death of the brilliant capital of Peter the Great; the story is an extraordin. arily graphic study of the fear. ful peycholegical changes caused by a lice of bread, when on ae-
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.