The Theater: Farewell Appearance

At one time or another, Mississippi-born Stark Young has labored in virtually all the artistic vineyards that might attract a courtly, sensitive Southern gentleman: he has taught at two universities, painted, translated (Chekhov, Moliere, Machiavelli), directed for the stage, written poetry, plays and novels (including 1934's best-selling So Red the Rose).

But Young's specialty has been the drama criticism which he wrote, in the New Republic, for a quarter of a century. Last year he quit the magazine, which had completely changed its style under the corn-fed editorship of Henry Wallace. Now he has published Immortal Shadows (Scribner; $3), a collection of...