Books: No Takers?

SANTA CLAUS: A MORALITY (18 pp.)—E. E. Cummings—Holf ($ 1.50).

Wrapped in a style as translucent and endearing as white tissue paper (with here & there a spangle), this playlet uses none of the stunting with language by which E. E. Cummings is known as the most wayward—as well as the freshest—of U.S. lyricists. But it definitely belongs on the grown-up side of the Christmas tree.

Its hero is a moth-eaten Santa Claus who finds no takers for his gift of "understanding." The carnival figure of Death appears, as in a medieval morality play, gives him a skull mask and persuades him to...