OBOLER OMNIBUS

Arch Oboler presents"" -- this is a collection of the plays of one of radio's lone fighters, who for the record, presents his opi, accompanied with his personal, biographical career in that medium. For all its interest in the developing technique, the insistence on the importance of headline immediacy, the stress of the limitations of radio's time and mechanics, and the propaganda angles -- this is a surprisingly absorbing roundup. The biographical data has its own fresh, ""tell-all"" appeal (radio, moving picture, theatrical figures and conflicts of policy) -- and the plays themselves show an ingenious imagination -- buttressed on ideas -- imbedded in holding plots and the whole with a contemporary time-sense that has value, not only for radio-writing classes, but for this particular era. It is -- in other words -- of wider appeal than one might think -- a tribute to these pre-television days.