NEVER has a biblical personnage encountered such ultra-modern handling as ancient Samson experiences at the hands of Mr. Washburn whose first novel stamps him as a twentieth century vulgarizer of the first rank. The classic shades of Milton's "Samson Agonistes" and Saint-Saens' "Samson and Delilah" will have a difficult time adjusting themselves to the ribald ghosts of this most recent characterization of the deliverer of the children of Israel. In fact, "Samson" stands in a fair way to be a literary pariah because of its uncompromising frankness and defiance of the literary code of ethics. If someone questions the ethical importance of the modern novel, the least any reader can say is that Mr. Washburn displays a diabolical clever less in the thin veneer of coarseness he spreads over his famous plot.

It is perfectly clear that the author's intention is to lay bare without any compromise the real significance of the story of Samson and Deliah. Not the moral side, however. He gives us the bald sexual narrative in all its conspicuousness. The sapping of the powerful muscular strength of the giant because of his infatuation for philistine women is hardly pleasant when the veil of old narrative in directness is stripped aside. Especially when the