Books: Mixed Fiction, Nov. 5, 1956

THE INSURGENTS, by Vercors (308 pp.; Harcourt, Brace; $3.95). The hero of this odd novel is a weird doctor-poet who puts himself in a state of suspended animation for the good of humanity, or so he thinks. Fiftyish and French but drenched in decadent German romanticism, Egmont no longer practices medicine or writes poetry, but takes drugs and drifts through rooms replete with twisted vines, oddly shaped chemical phials and stuffed animals. As he confides to a friend: "I wouldn't be so bored if someone explained to me what it was all about, here...

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