Mr Shaw Desmond is very well known as a versatile writer and as a great champion of the Labour Cause. His book, therefore, is of singular interest at the present time. It is a critical and sympathetic analysis of the Labour Movement from the inside, by a man who, after being a member of the Labour Party for fourteen years, is frankly disillusioned. In what amounts to a sweeping but reasoned indictment, the writer shows the 'feet of clay' of the Labour Movement, and claims that though outwardly united the movement is split from crown to heel by fundamentally opposed ideals, tactics, and objectives, that it might collapse at any moment, and that such 'success' as has been obtained has been purchased at the price of principle. In so doing he gives many vivid and revealing portraits of great Labour figures of the last generation, from Keir Hardie to Rosa Luxemburg, 'the Red Tigress.' The book is not merely destructive, the latter portion is given over to a constructive examination of the problems facing democracy with a very interesting foreshadowing of what the writer calls 'The New Democracy' or 'The Spiritual Democracy.' He shows not only how Labour may set its house in order but how the House of Society itself may be saved from that 'unrest' which is slowly destroying it. Mr Desmond's writing is at once stimulating and suggestive, instructive and illuminating, and will certainly be widely discussed. The Island of Youth EDWARD SHANKS Author of _The Queen of China_, _The People of the Ruins_, etc. Small Crown 8vo, Cloth, 5/- net _The Island of Youth_ is the fourth volume of verse by a poet whose powers have been steadily maturing. Two years ago Mr Shanks's _The Queen of China_ won the Hawthornden Prize, and the present volume contains all the poems he has since written. It contains one long poem, a beautiful idyll in blank verse, and a number of short poems. Mr Shanks's language is refreshingly pure and his rhythm refreshingly musical, in an age which has made many attempts to glorify gibberish and raucous discord. He is, as all good poets must be, at once original and in the stream of national tradition, and in no respect more traditional than in his affection for and knowledge of the English landscape which has breathed its fragrance into so much of our great poetry in all ages. Those who know his previous books, or the selections from them in _Georgian Poetry_, do not need to be told this, and those unacquainted with Mr Shanks's previous work can be most emphatically assured that they will not be disappointed in _The Island of Youth_. It is one of those books familiarity with which breeds an ever deepening admiration and love. Ibsen and His Creation JANKO LAVRIN Crown 8vo, Cloth, 7/6 net