SCOTT KING'S MODERN EUROPE

Returning more nearly to the mood of his earlier works, this short novel, of a traditional English schoolmaster's exposure to the materialism and totalitarianism of a middle-European country, is a skillful satiric exercise and one which- in its intellectual subtlety- is well above The Loved One. Scott-King, for whom the epithet is "dim", is attracted by a "blood-brotherhood in dimness" to the study of Bellorius, a Neutralian poet of the 17th century. To take part in the centennary celebration of Bellorius' death, Scott-King accepts an invitation to Neutralia- a country which "has suffered every conceivable ill the body politic is heir to". There he is lost in a cataract of official hospitality, political perversion, personal discomfort, and he escapes from Neutralia more firmly convinced than ever in the enduring values of the classical tradition.... If, in contrast to The Loved One, the satiric content here is of a more cerebral rather than sensational nature, the Waugh name will carry this to a wider market than he reached earlier in his career.