Homo Americanisatus

PEP--Lion Feuchtwanger--Viking ($2).

Pep began as a literary hoax. The Berliner Tageblatt in 1924 received and printed a series of satiric poems signed by one J. L. Wetcheek, "famed" U. S. poet, translated into German by Lion (Power) Feuchtwanger. Soon, however, someone discovered that Wetcheek was unknown to U. S. Kultur, that wet-cheek, moreover, was a literal translation of Feuchtwanger. Hoaxes will out. Said Author Feucht wanger, dehoaxed: "If these poems, to some extent, are an attempt to put Babbitt into lyrics, I certainly do not claim to be representative of America, a country I do not know. I wanted to hit at the European bourgeois, who [is becoming] . . . more 'American' than most inhabitants of the United States. ... Mr. B. W. Smith is less 'Homo Americanus' than 'Homo Americanisatus.' " Excerpt from Author Feuchtwanger's pasquinade:

He opened up his checkbook to the sky

But the sky showed no expression.

Between the clouds there peeped no envious eye.

Great was Smith's depression.

See him sitting there, with twenty good teeth,

And six porcelain--five gold,

Chagrined and disappointed, underneath

A sun not bought nor sold.

Credit for the translation is due Dorothy Thompson, for the drawings to Constantin Aladjalov. The book is dedicated to Sinclair Lewis, "that good American."