Word: colliers
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...JOHN COLLIER READER by JOHN COLLIER 571 pages. Knopf...
Among the reasons that the shuddery miniatures of British short-storyist John Collier are so satisfactory is that his fine talent is given direction by an equally splendid gift of malice. He does not much like man and his works, and is even less fond of woman and hers. He also has a deep and evident distaste for the dreary stuff that silts up lives and is called Reality. Collier's fictional method is to spit neatly into Reality's eye, and then watch mockingly as Reality fishes for its soiled handkerchief. To the reader, the spectacle...
...Collier's themes is Beating the Game. In his Season of Mists, a rotter named Bert goes girl hunting at a seaside resort. His manner is sleazy, his person shopworn, and in August, as he knows, he would not have stood much chance. But it is November, the bitter end of the season, and the girls still to be found will settle for less, which is to say for Bert. He worms his way to the good side of a gorgeous and lonely barmaid named Bella, only to find that she has an identical twin named Nellie...
...Chronicles of Narnia, by C.S. Lewis, Collier; 7 vols., 95? each...
...enjoy the unexpected virtues of this version. The most substantial improvement is in the gamekeeper Mellors, who is called Parkin here. Mellors is too good to be true, an ex-officer who keeps books on India, Soviet Russia and the atom in his cottage. Parkin is a rough, laconic collier's son who can understand neither his own mean circumstances nor the sources of Connie's passion for him. Lawrence lacked Thomas Hardy's gift for making the inner lives of simple people eloquent, but at least this Parkin makes the reader aware of the social chasm...