Ackerley

Though British author-editor Ackerley (1896-1967) didn't cut a particularly wide swath in his lifetime, this engaging biography and the recent reissuance in this country of My Dog Tulip , My Father and Myself and We Think the World of You , his minor classics, should help to ensure him the literary niche he deserves. He was for 20 years literary editor of the BBC's prestigious magazine The Listener , and was considered one of the finest editors of his day; he did a stint, in India, as secretary to an eccentric maharajah; he had a close relationship with many leading men of letters, in particular E. M. Forster; and as an unabashed homosexual he seems to have spent most of his life in search of the perfect friend. Ackerley's hallmarks are honesty, an extraordinary frankness and a dash of Swiftean misanthropy reflected in his passionate regard for animals. Parker wrote The Old Life. Illustrations. (Nov.)