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Fantasy Commentator, v. 1, issue 1, December 1943
Page 13
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FANTASY COMMENTATOR 12 for work. But on the particular morning of this story Capper was sure something was wrong, for it felt like Sunday. This seemed rather odd, to be sure, for yesterday had been Sunday also. So he sat himself down upon the curb to think matters out, and finally hit upon the solution in the form of a very logical syllogism: he waked people up on weekday mornings, but not on Sundays; today he was not waking people up; therefore today must be Sunday. Therefore the day became Sunday, as did the next day, and the next, and soon the news had spread throughout all Yorkshire that in Polkingthrope Brig the days of the week had somehow got stuck. No one in the town appeared to mind except Mr. Bloggs, the mill-owner, who was furious at losing time because of his employees' extended holiday. Eventually the sixth consecutive Sunday arrived, and with it the official news from Greenwich Observatory that the day was Saturday, which caused some confusion, for how could the day be Saturday unless the week ran backwards! But Sam Small reminded them that since Mr. Bloggs always gave them their week's wages on Saturday, being paid today would be a sure sign that Saturday it was. And Mr. Bloggs, purple with rage but seeing no other way to start the days of the week rolling in proper order once more, paid. But if that day were Saturday, the next must surely be Sunday---so Capper Wembly reflected---whereupon he sagely remarked that if it were Sunday than one and all could lie abed late and get "a bit o'extra sleep for a change". The charm of the fantasy is in the telling, and each of the ten stories in the book is told appropriately in its own unique way. Mr. Knight's prose is bright, yet not showy, and his subjects show a pleasant variety that never cloys. As an added attraction the collection is decorated with drawings by Donald McKay, which happily do full justice to its roguish spirit. Fantasy readers are advised not to search for substitutes for Sam Small: there simply aren't any. TWO BOTTLES OF RELISH: a Book of Strange and Unusual Stories edited by Whit Burnett. xi-395pp. New York: The Dial Press, 1943. $3.00 Outstanding anthologies of fantasy are indeed few and far between, so that a reviewer's enthusiasm over the advent of one should not merely be condoned by his readers, but shared. This volume is one of those select few; more, it lives up to its advance notices and jacket-blurbs---and praise cannot reach a higher level. In a previous review (Unknown Worlds, April 1943) I lamented that habit, so frequently indulged in by anthologists, of collecting and recollecting stories with which everyone has been long familiar. Happily, such criticism cannot be levelled against Two Bottles of Relish. Granted, we encounter a few well-known authors on the title-page; but Anton Chekov's "A Carp's Love" has been but newly-translated from the Russian, while "Two Bottles of Relish", the tale that gives the book its name, is a recent and little-known work of Lord Dunsany, and shows that master of crystalline fantasy in a far more macabre light than any in which lovers of the outre have hitherto viewed him. And although Stuart Cloete's novels are doubtless familiar to many, his bizarre psychological study "Congo", here included, probably is not. It is true that Robert Ayre's charming novella "Mr. Sycamore" has been anthologized previously in one of the O'Brien Best Short Stories volumes, as well as twice dramatised by the Columbia Workshop radio players; but is also true that this tale of a meek little postman's miraculous transformation into a tree has lost no whit of its delightful and sparking appeal since its recent appearance in 1938. But enough of apologies, for Mr. Burnett is certainly in no need of it. You'd best begin at the beginning with "The Camel", in which Lord Berners tells
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FANTASY COMMENTATOR 12 for work. But on the particular morning of this story Capper was sure something was wrong, for it felt like Sunday. This seemed rather odd, to be sure, for yesterday had been Sunday also. So he sat himself down upon the curb to think matters out, and finally hit upon the solution in the form of a very logical syllogism: he waked people up on weekday mornings, but not on Sundays; today he was not waking people up; therefore today must be Sunday. Therefore the day became Sunday, as did the next day, and the next, and soon the news had spread throughout all Yorkshire that in Polkingthrope Brig the days of the week had somehow got stuck. No one in the town appeared to mind except Mr. Bloggs, the mill-owner, who was furious at losing time because of his employees' extended holiday. Eventually the sixth consecutive Sunday arrived, and with it the official news from Greenwich Observatory that the day was Saturday, which caused some confusion, for how could the day be Saturday unless the week ran backwards! But Sam Small reminded them that since Mr. Bloggs always gave them their week's wages on Saturday, being paid today would be a sure sign that Saturday it was. And Mr. Bloggs, purple with rage but seeing no other way to start the days of the week rolling in proper order once more, paid. But if that day were Saturday, the next must surely be Sunday---so Capper Wembly reflected---whereupon he sagely remarked that if it were Sunday than one and all could lie abed late and get "a bit o'extra sleep for a change". The charm of the fantasy is in the telling, and each of the ten stories in the book is told appropriately in its own unique way. Mr. Knight's prose is bright, yet not showy, and his subjects show a pleasant variety that never cloys. As an added attraction the collection is decorated with drawings by Donald McKay, which happily do full justice to its roguish spirit. Fantasy readers are advised not to search for substitutes for Sam Small: there simply aren't any. TWO BOTTLES OF RELISH: a Book of Strange and Unusual Stories edited by Whit Burnett. xi-395pp. New York: The Dial Press, 1943. $3.00 Outstanding anthologies of fantasy are indeed few and far between, so that a reviewer's enthusiasm over the advent of one should not merely be condoned by his readers, but shared. This volume is one of those select few; more, it lives up to its advance notices and jacket-blurbs---and praise cannot reach a higher level. In a previous review (Unknown Worlds, April 1943) I lamented that habit, so frequently indulged in by anthologists, of collecting and recollecting stories with which everyone has been long familiar. Happily, such criticism cannot be levelled against Two Bottles of Relish. Granted, we encounter a few well-known authors on the title-page; but Anton Chekov's "A Carp's Love" has been but newly-translated from the Russian, while "Two Bottles of Relish", the tale that gives the book its name, is a recent and little-known work of Lord Dunsany, and shows that master of crystalline fantasy in a far more macabre light than any in which lovers of the outre have hitherto viewed him. And although Stuart Cloete's novels are doubtless familiar to many, his bizarre psychological study "Congo", here included, probably is not. It is true that Robert Ayre's charming novella "Mr. Sycamore" has been anthologized previously in one of the O'Brien Best Short Stories volumes, as well as twice dramatised by the Columbia Workshop radio players; but is also true that this tale of a meek little postman's miraculous transformation into a tree has lost no whit of its delightful and sparking appeal since its recent appearance in 1938. But enough of apologies, for Mr. Burnett is certainly in no need of it. You'd best begin at the beginning with "The Camel", in which Lord Berners tells
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