Review: Final Forensic Fables
| Published date | 01 October 1932 |
| DOI | 10.1177/0032258X3200500418 |
| Date | 01 October 1932 |
| Subject Matter | Review |
REVIEWS
6°5
no
work;
no work, no
permit:
he has reason indeed to regret having yielded
to his home-sickness for the Fatherland, which he cannot even leave again
for lack of a passport, as no one will ' go
bail'
for an out-of-work convict.
Every attempt to get work fails; those to obtain apassport, first by
fraud then by force, are thwarted and punished by further imprisonment.
The
omnipotence of uniform and the unquestioning obedience it
commands
run
through the several scenes of the first two acts.
Magistrates and other officials who have served in the army all suffer
from vanity where uniformis concerned and accordingly become the laughing-
stock of their friends.
The
glories of uniform and army drill are dinned into the ears of the
very convicts by their governor, abenevolent old general on the retired list.
Thus
Voigt learns in prison all the drill and army catchwords he needs
for the perpetration of his hoax on the Mayor of Kopenick.
He realises that here in Germany , one can do whatever one likes in
uniform';
procures one from an old clo' man, and, masquerading as a
captain, arrests both Mayor and Treasurer and secures their funds.
But like many clever tricksters he has made one bad mistake; forla
passport is what he really wants and none are issued in the
Town
Hall. So
he surrenders at the Passport Office, and is found at last being freely enter-
tained by the police, who heartily enjoy the joke against the Mayor.
In this ' modern fairy
tale'
the characterisation is excellent, and the
story moves on all the time with surprising plausibility, to an amusing
denouement,
but
the text would require bowdlerizing to fit it for the English
stage.
FINAL
FORENSIC
FABLES. Second Series. By O. With
Thirty
Illustrations. 5s. net. (Butterworth &Co. Ltd.)
MEMORIES of previous efforts raised
our
anticipations when we received this
book, and we are glad that the author so far violated his own resolution as to
perpetrate a Second Series of Final Fables.
They
are even better than their
forerunners, and that is saying much.
There
is something in the dignity
of the Law which lends itself peculiarly to humour, and this delicious little
volume will be appreciated by a lay public as well as by members of the legal
profession.
Not
the least pleasing part of the book are its illustrations. But
the best of all are its italicised morals.
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