CHARACTER AND SITUATION

Mr. Christopher Sykes' six short stories are introduced by Mr. Evelyn Waugh- and they are all peresptive, intelligent, measured, detailed, precise, serious and amusing. Sykes gathers all the elements together- character, atmosphere, conversation, description and idea. He is a real story teller, uses exotic countries as a montage. Me and My Brother is set in Teheran, Persia and concerns Sykes (who is assumed to be the narrator of each story) and a black chauffeur whom he detests. Phillips, the chauffeur, who is a Christian native of Madras, lies cheats, swindles, but a bond is nevertheless established between the two men. In Not Far Psychologists a psychiatrist tinkers dangerously with a ""middle class"" workman's sub-conscious and gets his theories scraped along the bottom. Conflicting Pass follows a leftist Canon on an impetuous trip to Spain where he tries to get involved with a non-existent leftist committee. In The Sacred and the Profane set in North Africa, a Father Macdo rides in a horse race to recover a stolen chalice. In Saint George, a famous London beauty is kidnapped and rescued in India. Each story is full-bodied yet clean-out, has a kind of philosophic calm. Mr. Sykes is the author of which had a very fine press.