Once again I must confess to a lack of personal enthusiasm for Dos Passos. Of course, I realize that I am probably missing out on one of the modern creators of the literature of the future, but the fact remains that I am bored. Having confessed as much, I go further and acknowledge that Dos Passos, seen from a distance and on a large scale canvass, grows in stature; that he handles the flashback manner better than any of his contemporaries; that he has a certain vigor and boldness in drawing types (rather than humans) and that he knows his proletarian background. This new novel is the first in a series of contemporary fictional portraits, again stemming from the industrial-social problems of today. He has gotten away from his usual technique, the story is more direct, he has drawn the odyssey of a young man of good will, through the industrial and economic sore spots of the world. He is ripe for the Communists -- then for the C.I.O. -- but he escapes into the backwash of all such idealists in modern literature, the Spanish Civil War. This book seems stereotyped, there is little that is new, little of dramatic interest, and it lacks the vigor of his more important books. Or so it seems to me. BUT he has his following.