Books in Brief

My Fathers and I, by Eric Linklater (Harcourt, Brace, $3.95). Though analysts’ couch-springs may still squeak to the fact, the news itself is well over a generation old. Laius is to blame. The fault for us poor Underlings lies with our fathers. Now at last we have Mr. Linklater carrying the process even further back. For—novel idea—every father had his own, father. In My Fathers and I there are indeed seven generations of fathers from eighteenth-century Moses Vanbrugh to the immediate Edward Vanbrugh. Each son in turn as he reaches the botched close of his career is brought to the sorry realization that but for his father he might have led the good life. Only old Moses, who was a foundling, is denied this solace. Mr. Linklater reconstitutes each Vanbrugh era with an extraordinarily deft wit and malicious historical accuracy. Moses rises from a domestic to the peerage. Eustace flies England to become a domestic in the household of a Texas oil millionaire. In this delightful book one could wish for nothing more, except perhaps illustrations by Osbert Lancaster.

F. RUSSELL

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My Fathers and I, by Eric Linklater (Harcourt, Brace, $3.95). Though analysts’ couch-springs may still squeak to the fact, the news itself is well over a generation old. Laius is to blame. The fault for us poor Underlings lies with our fathers. Now at last we have Mr. Linklater carrying the process even further back. For—novel idea—every father had his own, father. In My Fathers and I there are indeed seven generations of fathers from eighteenth-century Moses Vanbrugh to the immediate Edward Vanbrugh. Each son in turn as he reaches the botched close of his career is brought to the sorry realization that but for his father he might have led the good life. Only old Moses, who was a foundling, is denied this solace. Mr. Linklater reconstitutes each Vanbrugh era with an extraordinarily deft wit and malicious historical accuracy. Moses rises from a domestic to the peerage. Eustace flies England to become a domestic in the household of a Texas oil millionaire. In this delightful book one could wish for nothing more, except perhaps illustrations by Osbert Lancaster.

F. RUSSELL