Sourball

THE HORSE THAT COULD WHISTLE "DIXIE"--Jerome Weidman--Simon & Schuster ($2.50).

Few months ago a report went around that Jerome Weidman's two novels, I Can Get It For You Wholesale and What's In It For Me?, were being withdrawn from circulation. The circumstances were unusual. Reviewers had praised them, ranked Weidman with such sourball writers as John O'Hara, James M. Cain, Hemingway. But Weidman's Semitic hero was such a heel that he roused antiSemitism. Author Weidman, and many a reader, regarded his villainous Harry Bogen as a deliberately horrible example. Publishers Simon & Schuster denied the report, announced that they were selling 100 copies a month of the books.

Last week they brought out a big collection of Author Weidman's short stories, The Horse That Could Whistle "Dixie." Published in a wide variety of magazines over the past five years, these 28 stories will not add much to Author Weidman's strong reputation with friendly readers. But they should be good medicine for his noisy, self-appointed censors. The majority deal with the Manhattan East Siders he grew up with, including a few embryo Harry Bogens, but a good number show that Author Weidman's range, human and geographical, goes well beyond the East Side, that his sympathies can be as warm as his satire is cold.

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