The Lord's Champ

THE LITTLE WORLD OF DON CAMILLO (205 pp.)--Giovanni Guareschi --Pellegrini & Cudahy ($2.75).

The Little World of Don Camillo is a collection of sketches about the battle for community leadership between a godless mayor and a militant priest in an Italian village.

Don Camillo was no ordinary priest. He had a mortar hidden in his house and on occasion he carried a Tommy gun. At other times he lied, poached, attempted bribery and fought with his fists. Once, when he attacked the subject of sexual immorality, he draped the crucifix in his church with a cloth so that Christ might not be obliged to listen to his blunt language.

It was true that, besides the fair share of man-made sin among his parishioners, Don Camillo had a massive irritation to contend with. Peppone, the Communist mayor, was the sworn enemy of the church and kept up a running brawl with the priest. Peppone, a tough and able Communist who hadn't made his confession since 1918, set up trials for Don Camillo that ranged from swiping his clothes while he was in swimming to a clout on the head with a heavy stick.

Eventually Peppone, basically a good sort, who really has a healthy respect and fondness for his rival, reaches the point of self-doubt, and says: "I feel as if I were in jail." Don Camillo, with no doubts, has had a vast advantage all along: the benefit of Christ's spoken advice from the crucifix in Don Camillo's own church. Christ argues with him, humors him, acts as his conscience. Once, after the priest has knocked out a swaggering boxer, Christ bids him good night with "Sleep well, champ." Later, when Don Camillo grouses about the weight of the church cross he must carry in a parade, the Lord smiles and exclaims: "You're telling Me!"

Such impious bad taste mars these otherwise simple but forced folk tales, which have gone into seven editions in Italy. Author Guareschi is a magazine editor who spent much of the war in German concentration camps and has now been singled out as a class enemy by no less a figure than Italian Communist Leader Palmiro Togliatti. Guareschi is a whole imagination away from the "Italian James Thurber" that his publishers hopefully label him, but The Little World is a dual Book-of-the-Month Club selection, which ought to please them just as much.

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