A STREETLAMP AND THE STARS

For me, goodness is a physical force which must be harnessed to life as we find it. The streetlamp is nearer to us than the stars."" Thus speaks Don Borrelli, a priest who put aside his cassock to take on the rags of the scugnizzi, the homeless urchins who live on the streets of Naples, who collect and sell stub tobacco, pilfer and steal for a living. Don Borrelli taught school by day, and learned scugnizzi ways by night until he felt the time had come to reveal himself. He led the boys to shelter at the reconstructed church he had made ready for them and which he operates as a home today. While his experiences are of interest, his aims are irreproachable and his personality agreeable, the Father's book is written at a simple, somewhat sentimental level where it only engages momentarily, and somehow makes the boys and their problems seem rather distant.