Books: Horse Opera

D’ANNUNZIO—Tom. Antongini—Little, Brown ($5).

Enthusiastic biographers often go out of their way to find reasons for praising their subjects. But few have wandered so far afield as Tom. Antongini, once secretary to the late Gabriele D’Annunzio. To praise of D’Annunzio as poet, novelist, war hero and conqueror of Fiume, he adds praise of D’Annunzio as a politician, businessman, husband, father, and hero of many highly,publicized love affairs. He praises D’Annunzio’s “savage modesty” and his desire not to have company in the bathroom when he was taking a bath. He even praises D’Annunzio’s bald head. But in this he falls short of D’Annunzio himself, who declared that his “highly polished cranium,” as a thing of beauty, could be ranked with a greyhound or the legs of Actress Ida Rubinstein. One of the worst pieces of horse opera to find a U. S. publisher, D’Annunzio runs to 583 pages, carries conviction in none of them. To U. S. readers it is a striking demonstration of Author Antongini’s ability to write much and say little, an even more striking demonstration of his ability to get het up over trifles.