Old Lady

HARVEST--Selma Lagerlof--Doubleday, Doran ($2.50).

Of all the old ladies who can count their medals few can finger so many that ring true as Selma Lagerloef (pronounced Lahgerlef). A Swede who, in spite of international temptations, has remained stoutly Scandinavian, she has won her country's Nobel Prize (1909) without the slightest implication of local favoritism. She has written not only an international classic for children (The Wonderful Adventures of Nils) but an international classic for grown-ups (The Ring of the Loewenskoelds). She is one of those rare writers whose flavor is not spoiled by translation. And at 76 she remains a concentratedly salty, not a feebly sour human being.

Harvest, her 21st translated book, is little more than a literary scrap-book-- Swedish and Biblical legends, reminiscences, travel sketches, reprinted speeches. And the book is not an anthology of brilliant blossoms; epigrammarians will find slim pickings here. But for stout-hearted oldsters who still swear by convention, old fashions, common sense and straight talk, Harvest will be a comfort and a quotable aid. Author Lagerloef, like all her contemporaries, has been through the mill; unlike most of them, her final comment transcends platitude: "Thanks and praise be to God that the hard truth came wrapped in happy memories, in feelings of regret and gratitude!"

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