What Germany is Reading Never in the history of Germany have so many books been purchased and read as at the present time, says Mr. Laurence Clark in "John ec' London's Weekly."' The general trend of new books is idealistic, but there is, a member of the Publishers' Verein informed me, also a larger sale for erotic works than before the war. And Germany, like the rest of the world, is occupying herself much with books dealing with life after death, Bub what one might venture to call the lighter forms of philosophy hold the field.
Hermann Keyserling is the most popular of native.philisophers of the moment. There are, indeed, a host of small philosophers who give their point of view of different aspects of life, each according to his own temperament. Keyserling's sale is phenomenal for this kind of work. His "'Reisetagebuch cines Philosophen'" (Day-book of Philosopher) is as popular here as a new novel by Hall Came would be in England. Even Keyserling, however, is out-vogued by Rabindranath Tagore, whose gentle philosophy has superseded the fiery creed of Nietzsche which nurtured the young German mind before the war. Tagore's success is astounding—he is the best seller of the year. No German novelist, dramatist, er poet is in it with the Indian gentle dreamer. A row of Tagore's works in many prices and styles appears in every bookseller's window. The cheapest edition I saw was fifteen marks the volume. But I saw many complete editions of Tagore at 250 marks to 300 marks the set. Altogether ths house of Wolff have sold 800,000 copies of the books of Rabinranath Tagore.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.