EDGAR WALLACE

A few years ago, when King George V was convalescing from a long illness, some light reading was suggested to divert his mind. The Queen went out on a shopping tour, and returned with six volumes by Edgar Wallace, which were referred to as "His Majesty's favorite reading." We are not told the immediate sequel, but shortly afterwards the king took up his bed and walked. Yesterday Wallace himself died, the master of literary mass-production and its victim.

The fascination of Edger Wallace to cultured minds was a phenomenon as remarkable as his productivity. It is said that an illustrious professor in our midst, among other people, subscribes to the opinion of his Majesty. The secret of that fasciculation was not merely in the relaxation he provided from mental effort; it sprang also from his tremendous virility. Those who saw "On The Spot," his play about Chicago gangsters, can appreciate the effervescing mixture of melodrama and force at which he was so adopt.

Confronted with his tireless fertility, acathetic criticism seems simply beside the point. In regard to the quality of his work, it is superfluous to emphasize a superficiality which Wallace would himself be the last to deny. These qualities which he did possess he possessed superlatively and they were both genial and amusing. Never designed to be remembered, his literary work will at least be forgotten with affection and regret.