A JOURNEY TO BOSTON
By
A wisp of plot serves to summon up the real story of Mary Ellen Chase's little book: the feelings that Polish immigrants in the Connecticut Valley have for the country they have left behind. The generations in themselves offer the familiar differences, from the desire to return and see it all again, to the desire to shuck the Polish names and language for their American equivalents. Miss Chase uses the trip to Boston of two farmers, Jan and Stanislaw, to market their squashes, to permit the men and their women their say. A fatal accident involving a young boy to whom they were doing a kindness proves its significance in the lives of those left behind...The warm feeling for her folks must fight an uphill battle with the freighted incident and its substitution for a story in what is termed a novel. Regional interest aside, by-pass this for First Papers (Laura Hobson).