1914 ^pres 1918
WAY
REVELATION
Wreaths and
Photography of Graves.
The Ypres Times.
173
"Lest We Forget."
OF
The Great Novel of the War
By
WILFRID EWART
Seventh Impression 116 net.
There are nowhere, we are sure, more moving
pictures of battles than are contained in this book.
There is no monotony in Mr. Ewart's descriptions.
Neuve Chapelle has one kind of horror, the water
logged trenches of Ypres another. It is from golden
harvest fields they march into the massacre of the
Somme. To quote from these chapters would be
to spoil their effect as a whole. They should be
turned to whenever the impression of those
grievous years seems to grow dim in the memory."
a, Nation and Athenaeum.
G. P. PUTNAM'S SONS,
24, Bedford Street, W.C.2.
A GREAT NOVEL.
Way of Revelation. By Wilfred Ewart.
G. P. Putnam's Sons. Is. 6d. net.
Way of Revelation is Mr. Ewart's first novel,
and there can be no doubt that it will not be by
any means his last. It is not easy on a first read
ing to say exactly how Mr. Ewart manages to
achieve what is undoubtedly a solid and unchal
lengeable success. Way of Revelation is com
pounded of ingredients, all of which have become
the commonplaces of war fiction, his characters
are well-known types entirely drawn from within a
narrow range of war-time society, his story verges
perilously on crude melodrama, his three chief
backgroundsa pre-war country house, the Ypres
Salient, and the West End at warhave been ob
served and described ad nauseam by a hundred pre
decessors. Yet, as the Morning Post observes,
Mr. Ewart contrives to preserve a convincing veri
similitude which is not short of amazing, and he
plays on the emotions of his readers in a manner
which a master might envy. The experienced
reader of fiction will say at once, Ah, yes, I know
that young man's novelthe one readable story
which we can all write. Compounded out of the
writer's most vital experiences. Entirely sincere
because it is not art but a transcript of life." The
Laurel or Flower Wreaths,
16x14 ins., fresh Evergreen
or Flowers, with photograph £1 17s.
Special Wreaths as requested, £2 2s.
Apply:—CAPT. PHILLIPS.
The Bungalow,
Vlamertinghe, YPRES.
Late Manager
Chateau des Trois Tours, Brielen.
experienced reader will be entirely wrong. It is
true that in all his pictures of life in Flanders dur
ing the war Mr. Ewart writes of matters which
must have burnt themselves into his consciousness.
But he uses them with remarkable restraint and
tact merely as the material of his art.
It is unnecessary to use many words in describ
ing the events of Mr. Ewart's narrative. A group
of young people, lapped in illusions, gather at a
country house to live through the first four days
of August, 1914. The two young men on whom
the story turns reappear in a sterner setting a
year later, and the reaction of the war on them
and those they love is the theme of Mr. Ewart's
story. The book, as a whole, deserves un
hesitating praise. Its author might havebeen en
gaged to instruct some of the successful young
novelists of the day. He could teach them, for in
stance, that the first aim of novel writing is to tell
a story and to interest your readers that before
you can write a good novel you must learn to
write, must learn to handle your dialogue, and to
preserve a just proportion between the arts of
description and construction.
As we go to Press the news of Mr. Ewart's
tragic death in Mexico-comes to hand.
