A Reporter in Europe A REPORTER IN EUROPE PARIS by Jane Kramer. Tells about the election this spring in which the party of Pres. Valery Giscard d'Estaing, the Union pour la Democratie Francaise, did surprisingly well. No one doubts that the left would have taken over the Assembly if the Communists had not decided to sabotage the alliance. It was obvious last...

Dancing by Arlene Croce.

Fiction Travel Stories by Henry Bromell. Susan and Scobie live in Iowa City, Iowa with their three year old son, Sammy. Describes one summer afternoon--Sammy selling lemonade, Susan and Sammy weeding the garden, Scobie playing baaketball. The family cooks out for dinner and Scobie says this domestic scene is the future arrived. Alone, both Scobie...

Musical Events by Andrew Porter.

The Race Track by G. F. T. Ryall. Cauthen rode Affirmed to victory in the Belmont Stakes last Saturday and thus won the 1978 Triple Crown. He is the youngest jockey ever to have won the Triple Crown. He has been busy autographing copies of "The Kid", an interesting, well-written account of his life & times by...

Comment by John Brooks. Comment about telephone solicitors' new gimmick: they tell the party to relax while they are trying to sell them something. Writer received a call from a woman who said she represented the First National Bullion Corp., a Wall St. firm. She said: "I'm not trying to sell you anything, so...

Our Local Correspondents THE MULLEIN ON THE LAKE by Eugene Kinkead. OUR LOCAL CORRESPONDENTS about the wildflowers in Central Park. A couple of decades after the Park opened in 1858, in an 1879 issue of "Harper's" a writer reported, "Nearly every wildflower of the field finds its congenial haunt there." Since 1969 the writer had made annual forays into the Park...

The Talk of the Town Pedestrians' Burdens by Anthony Hiss. Talk story about things people carry around with them in the city. Writer stops people in 3 locations to inquire about the contents of their shopping bags, purses, brief cases, tote bags. In the Village (Seventh Ave below 13th St.), one woman has a third of a novel in one...

On and Off the Avenue Feminine Fashions by Kennedy Fraser.

The Talk of the Town Forty-five by Mark Singer. Talk story about the Seventeenth National Fashion & Boutique Show at the Coliseum. The writer arrived there late and had only forty-five minutes. Lists what he chooses to ignore. Writer goes straight to the suspenders, sold by John Nemec and from there to Patty Page fashions where male models...

Fiction Contributor's Notes by Elizabeth Macklin. The Paris Review" has accepted the writer's poem, "Roosting" and requests a 5- or 6-line biographical note on the contributor. Megan Abbott Hendler signs her name ten different ways in eleven different versions of the note. First version is staid and aloof, confined to professional details. They get more...

The Current Cinema DIABOLISM SELLS by Penelope Gilliatt.

Comment by Daniel Menaker. The new standard fifteen-cent postage stamp is pumpkin orange with a white eagle in profile. The stamp has the texture of gummed address labels. The eagle looks as though he were taking off to the left when you want your letter to fly to the right. The most puzzling...

In Memoriam York: In Memoriam W. H. Auden by Joseph Brodsky. The butterflies of northern England dance above...

Fiction The New Music by Donald Barthelme. Beginning with "What did you do today?" the writer engages in an interior dialogue. He thinks of himself as a slightly old young man who is still advertising for a mate. Susie, whom he slept with after lunch, has read that other women have more orgasms than she does. Nobody...

The Theatre by Edith Oliver.

The Talk of the Town Mr. Punch by Anthony Bailey. Talk story about Englishman Peter Butchard, 69, who is celebrating his 26th year as a Punch-and-Judy man. Butchard spends winters putting on Punch puppet shows in London and summers he performs all over England, frequenting Broadstairs, a seaside resort in Kent. Tells about Butchard's career before he became...

Poetry The Bone-Duster by John Morgan. Two adolescent summers...