John Simon on Penelope Gilliatt

GENTEEL RAZZLE-DAZZLE

Penelope Gilliatt has brought out a collection of her film and drama reviews chiefly from The New Yorker and some of the more high-toned British weeklies under the curious title Unholy Fools, and the explanatory subtitle Wits, Comics, Disturbers of the Peace. She is, clearly, more at ease with comedy, and the book contains at least a half-dozen disquisitions on the nature of farce, each more or less contradicting the others. But serious stuff can be brought in under the catchy catch-all, “Disturbers of the Peace,” which Miss Gilliatt herself prefers not to be: One is almost halfway into her book before the first really damning review appears. Except in the occasional profiles and recollections of beloved children’s books, which are open love letters, Miss Gilliatt generally espouses the tone of our glossiest magazines: the via media between delicate sensibility and unabashed pizzazz. As a contriver of genteel razzle-dazzle, she is just about tops.

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John Simon

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GENTEEL RAZZLE-DAZZLE

Penelope Gilliatt has brought out a collection of her film and drama reviews chiefly from The New Yorker and some of the more high-toned British weeklies under the curious title Unholy Fools, and the explanatory subtitle Wits, Comics, Disturbers of the Peace. She is, clearly, more at ease with comedy, and the book contains at least a half-dozen disquisitions on the nature of farce, each more or less contradicting the others. But serious stuff can be brought in under the catchy catch-all, “Disturbers of the Peace,” which Miss Gilliatt herself prefers not to be: One is almost halfway into her book before the first really damning review appears. Except in the occasional profiles and recollections of beloved children’s books, which are open love letters, Miss Gilliatt generally espouses the tone of our glossiest magazines: the via media between delicate sensibility and unabashed pizzazz. As a contriver of genteel razzle-dazzle, she is just about tops.