girls with his fierce intellectuality, writingnpoems and short stories, readingnH.L. Mencken, and imitating the masternin crusading editorials for the schoolnpaper. But then he had dropped out ofnlaw school (“you have to lie toonmuch”). He hadn’t lasted as a collegenEnglish teacher, either (most studentsnwere “satisfied with football, rah-rah,nand Commerce A”). He had writtennand burned several novels and collectednrejection slips for his short stories. Inna brief flurry of success in 1929-30, henhad placed three iconoclastic essays onnthe South in Mencken’s AmericannMercury; one, “The Mind of thenSouth,” won him a book contract withnKnopf. Then it had been back tondithering.nHe wrote now and again for Charlottennewspapers, turned down offersnof better newspaper jobs in Clevelandnand New York for vague reasons ofnhealth, and edited a small-town weeklynbefore his health made him give thatnup, too. (Clayton concludes that Cashnsuffered recurrent depression, broughtnon by hyperthyroidism and endocrinenimbalance, and aggravated by hardndrinking.) Cash’s parents weren’t welloff,nbut when his doctor recommendednrest and travel they staked him to anEuropean tour. He loved the Parisiannvie boheme and burst into tears atnChartres, then returned to BoilingnSprings, his parents, and his unfinishednmanuscript.nSo everyone was surprised (not least,nit seems, his publisher) when he finishednThe Mind of the South. Yetnduring his seemingly unproductive andnaimless 20’s and 30’s, Cash had beennobserving and thinking about what hensaw: the Gastonia strike, the Klan,npolitical demagoguery, lynchings, thenDayton “monkey trial” — it all comesnout in the book, and it’s not a prettynpicture.nThose Southerners who wanted unstintingnloyalty to the homelandnweren’t pleased. Donald Davidsonndidn’t like the book at all, and said so innone of the few negative reviews thenbook received. (Characteristically gallant,nDavidson regretted that the newsnof Cash’s suicide reached him too latenfor him to pull the review.) I hate tondisagree with Mr.. Davidson on thisnmatter, but I do. Twenty-odd yearsnago, C. Vann Woodward wrote thatn”social scientists, especially sociolo­n42/CHRONICLESngists,” seem to have “a special affinity”nfor The Mind of the South. Maybenthat’s it.nAnyway, it’s true that Cash hatedna lot about the South. Occasionallynhe was imagining things, sometimesnhe was just being fashionable, but oftennhe was right. And it’s obvious that henloved the place, too, because whatnstarted out as a smart-aleck essay fornMencken’s magazine wound up as anbook that any reader should recognizenas a cry from the heart.nIt’s easy to criticize Cash’s picture ofnthe South. His almost completely unsympatheticntreatment of Southern religion,nfor instance, strikes me as perverselynobtuse. Even when he gets itnpretty much right — as I think he doesnwith Southern individualism — hentends to go overboard.nBut that almost doesn’t matter now.nCash’s South may not correspond perfectlynor even very well to the real one,nbut it’s certainly a fascinating place.nScholars differ and, I guess, always willnabout the accuracy of Cash’s descriptionsnand the validity of his explanations,nbut as a work of the imagination.nThe Mind of the South is a remarkablenachievement — far better, as Claytonnsuggests, than any novel Cash was evernlikely to write.nVann Woodward observed once thatnCash himself “was merely illustratingnonce more that ancient Southern traitnthat he summed up in the word ‘extravagant'”—nand that’s exactly whatnsome of us like about the book: thensound of its words, the sweep of itsnhistory, the boldness and the flamboyancenand the very exaggeration of itsncharacterizations. (“Softly; do you notnhear behind that the gallop of JebnStuart’s cavalrymen?”)nAnd that suicide? Some said thatnCash was driven to it by worry aboutnthe Southern reaction to his criticism,nthat he was thus a victim himself ofnwhat he called the “savage ideal” ofnconformity. Can we see his self-destructionnas a last extravagant Q.E.D.?nNo. As Clayton shows, nearly allnSouthern reviewers liked the book.nThe real story is less ironic, but evennsadder. Shortly before his death he hadnbeen hearing nonexistent voices, andnhe thought the Nazis were out to getnhim. Clayton concludes that Cashnprobably killed himself during an episodenof delirium tremens caused bynnninvoluntary alcohol withdrawal, the resultnof a severe case of Montezuma’snrevenge.nFor once in his life. Jack Cash wasn’tnthinking about the South.nJohn Shelton Reed is a sociologistnfrom Ghapel Hill, North Carolina,nwriting this year from northernnCalifornia. Parts of this letternappeared in his review of BrucenClayton’s W.J. Cash: A Life, in thenRaleigh News and Observer.nLetter FromnCanadanby Kenneth McDonaldnSaving the ChildrennOn September 30, 1990, Prime MinisternBrian Mulroney addressed thenWorid Summit for Children, of whichnhe was co-chairman, at the UnitednNations in New York. The eventnclimaxed 18 months of work by over 30nCanadian non-governmental organizations,nmuch of it at the expense ofntaxpayers whose opinion had not beennsought, but who would certainly bearnthe cost of the consequences.nSure enough, the next day, in Ottawa,nthe Mulroney government announcednthe establishment, within thendepartment of National Health andnWelfare, of a central children’s bureau.nIts purpose is to coordinate federalnpolicies on children and to ensure thatn”the need to respect children’s specialnneeds is recognized at all times.”nPapers presented beforehand by thenumbrella group — the Canadian Coalitionnfor the Rights of Children — expressedngratitude to two governmentndepartments for their contribution,nwhile Canada’s spifly summit brochuren— Children of Canada, Children ofnthe World—was acknowledged to ben”a collaborative effort involving manyndepartments and agencies of the Governmentnof Canada.”nThe Canadian Coalition acts “as ancollective advocate for children andnmonitors the role Canada plays vis-avisnits own children and childrennabroad.” It was established to monitornthe signing and ratification by Canadan