DARKNESS AND THE DEEP

A murky book, which does not seem to belong in any part of Vardis Fisher's pattern. I found it exceedingly unpleasant reading, and a almost consistently bad taste. If he felt that it was necessary to explore the primitive groupings from instinctive sex urges of Neanderthal man to his first breaks with animal inheritance and his discovery of another level of emotional life, why didn't he do it as a scientific study, get it out of his system, and resist the temptation to impose his searchings on his public in the form of a novel. Let those who seek this knowledge find it in The Golden Rough etc. Maybe I'm old-fashioned and conservative, but I don't think the novel is a vehicle for intimate details of primitive sex life.