The intricate architectural structure of Valle-Inclán's Ruedo ibérico is one of the trilogy's most original features. Not only does the work portray what is going on throughout that ruedo during the last months of Isabel II's reign, but the individual novels and their constituent parts have been constructed in the form of circles as well. Books i and ix, ii and viii, iii and vii, and iv and vi in both La corte de los milagros and Viva mi dueño bear many and close relationships with each other, leaving Book v in each case as the axis upon which the others revolve. Therefore, every book of Corte and Viva, with the exception of the two central books, has a sister book within the given novel with which it shares setting, characters, and subject matter. However, this broad general circularity is the merest beginning of the total revolution of the Ruedo. In addition to the relationships between certain books within a novel, each book is itself constructed in the form of a circle, as are some of its chapters. Finally, given books in one novel are parallel to their counterparts in the other. Valle-Inclán's use of the circle as an organizational device was not an arbitrary choice. On the contrary, the Ruedo ibérico is a synthesis of form and content whose origin will be found to lie in certain concepts expressed in such earlier works as La lámpara maravillosa and La media noche.

George Winchester Stone, Jr. What can be added to the four pages of tributes to President—then retiring Secretary—Stone in the June 1964 issue of PMLA? After a year of restoration on a combined Guggenheim and Fulbright in London (1963–64), he became Dean of the Graduate School of Arts and Science at New York University. His part (3 vols.) of the great annals of The London Stage (12 vols.) is now complete. He has continued to be active on the Board of Directors of ACLS. He has been elected a Vice President of the International Federation for Modern Languages and Literatures. He is on the Executive Committee and Chairman of the Cultural Committee of the U. S. National Commission for UNESCO. We are particularly fortunate to have had him as MLA President this year while—after 40 years—the MLA moved from New York University buildings. We owe much to him for the ease of the move and the amiability of our new relationship with the University. Vive le grand GWS!

The writing of La Porte étroite occupied André Gide from May 1905 to October 1908. During at least part of that period, the novelist was certainly reading the Essais of Michel de Montaigne, for he notes in his Journal on 24 November 1905 that he has carried a Montaigne with him on a visit to the Louvre, and, although in early March of the following year he declares that Pascal has replaced the essayist in his readings (JAG, p. 200), on 21 March we find him “patiently advancing” in the “Apologie de Raymond Sebond” (JAG, p. 203), very probably a deliberate choice on his part, since that essay has long been considered the most complete statement of Montaigne's religious philosophy, and La Porte étroite was to have distinctly religious overtones. If we consider, as we must, the element of mysticism and Jansenism in the novel and the actual place the great seventeenth-century French classicist has in it (OC, v, 193—194, 230, 235–236), it is understandable that Gide should at this moment have turned to Pascal, but it is significant that this self-confessed “creature of dialogue” whose works demonstrate a constant search for balance recognized that there are and always will be in France “division et partis; c'est-à-dire dialogue. Grâce à quoi, le bel équilibre de notre culture: équilibre dans la diversité. Toujours, en regard d'un Pascal, un Montaigne; et de nos jours, en face d'un Claudel, un Valéry” (JAG-S, 13 Feb. 1943, p. 191). On 8 April Gide takes a copy of Montaigne with him on a stroll to the bois (JAG, 1906, p. 206), and home in Cuverville in May 1906, he again records that he has read some Montaigne (JAG, p. 220).

ASA national meeting. The American Studies Association will hold its first independent national meeting 26–28 October in the Hotel President in Kansas City, Mo. An interesting program ranging over literature, the arts, and the social sciences has been announced. A job placement service will be conducted at the meeting by the U. S. Employment Service. ASA will continue its Joint sessions at MLA and other national meetings, but this evidence of maturity in an important cross-disciplinary area is most encouraging. We wish the meeting well. For information, write Warren French, Univ. of Missouri, Kansas City 64110. GENERAL TOPICS 6. The Bibliography Committee of GT 6 (Literature and Society) under the chairmanship of Paul J. Carter (Colorado), has sponsored the publication of a third volume in the series dealing with its topic. Literature and Society, 1961–1965: A Selective Bibliography is edited by Paul J. Carter and George K. Smart (Miami). The price is $2.50; orders should be addressed to Univ. of Miami Press, Box 8104, Coral Gables, Fla. The annual mimeographed bibliography of Literature and Society is available free to anyone interested. Write Paul J. Carter, Hellems 105 West, Univ. of Colorado, Boulder 80302.

Hauptmann hat es eigentlich vermieden, über sein Schaffen zu sprechen. “Bilde, Künstler, rede nicht!” ein Lieblingswort Goethes, zitierte er mit Vorliebe. Aber in seinem Geleitwort zu Shakespeare-Visionen spricht er von dem Schöpfungsprozess, diesem geheimnisvollen Verlauf des dichterischen Genius: “was wissen wir über den Schöpfungsprozess, der den Visionen und Gestalten Shakespeares ihre besondere Art von Realität, Dauer und Weite gibt? … Es geschehen vielleicht in der Dichterseele Ballungen stürmender Rotation, erzeugen im Verdichten Wärme, Licht und zuletzt das Leben. Dabei ist etwas wie Kampf zwischen Ormuzd und Ahriman.”Sein unablässliges Arbeiten, die regelmässigen Stunden des Diktats, die Produktivspaziergänge, die Visionen der einsamen Stunden sind von Behl, Kästner und Voigt wiederholt beschrieben worden. Hauptmann, der naive Künstler, konnte das schöpferische Geheimnis nicht benennen. Wenn er jedoch beim Diktat auf falsche Pfade geriet, spürte er es bald und brach ab. Selbst beim Vorlesen aus neuen, im Entstehen begriffenen Werken, konnte er plötzlich unmutig aufhören, weil er einen falschen Ton hörte. Andererseits war er der glücklichste Mensch, wenn ihm die Arbeit gelang, wenn beim Diktat wundervolle Verse hervorsprudelten oder die Wucht einer Szene ihn mitriss. Es dichtete in ihm, und er wurde zum Sprachrohr einer inneren Stimme. Seine naive Freude daran war rührend. Ein gequältes “Produzieren” im engsten Sinne des Begriffs war ihm fremd. Seine künstlerische Eigenart, das tief Persönliche und Wesentliche seiner dramatischen Arbeitsweise, ist unlösbar mit dem Werke selbst verbunden und nicht davon zu trennen. Die innere Einheit dieses immer noch nicht zu überschauenden Werkes zu erfassen, bleibt die Aufgabe der Zukunft.