DOWN THE SEINE AND UP THE POTOMAC WITH ART BUCHWALD

Approximately 25 years of Buchwald's follies are gathered in this omnibus collection which shows the humorist's wide-ranging concerns to fair advantage. For students of US foreign policy there's the instructive case of La Enchilada, a small but bellicose Latin American nation famous for its coups. For hurried/harried art lovers, there's ""the Six Minute Louvre"" with tips on tennis shoes. Reformers of assorted stripes will appreciate Buchwald's suggestions for ""Upgrading Prison Requirements,"" and jaded parents might consider a proposal for ""Kid-Swapping in the United States."" When he's not hobnobbing with world potentates and movie queens, Buchwald is just pondering the vicissitudes of living in 20th-century America. Take fresh air; these days it can make you queasy as he discovered on a trip to Alaska: ""Isn't there a diesel bus around here that I could breathe into for a couple of hours?"" Or pornography, it's everywhere. Snow White, according to the latest jacket blurbs, is actually ""The story of a ravishing blond virgin who was held captive by seven deformed men, all with different lusts."" And of course there are those little Buchwaldian asides on Washington politics. Of Watergate, the interminable: ""like the Forsythe Saga, it was hard to keep the characters straight."" Not everything in this collection is so apt, and the editors have unaccountably neglected to date the columns, which may be arranged chronologically, but seem to follow the harumscarum organizing principle.