One of a series of yearbooks Nathan produced, principally in the 1940s, which surveyed a Broadway season. On occasion, Nathan goes beyond the play itself to discuss related issues; one spectacular example in this book talks about the relative ineffectiveness of "message plays" when theatregoers want to be entertained. Nathan does seem to take a positive glee in machine-gunning some plays; comments on how certain plays were done before, decades before, in other guises is a common theme. He also notes, brusquely, how some plays lost money ($300,000 is his estimate in some cases, serious money for that era). This does not appear to have been a particular vintage year for Broadway, coming at the tail end of the war and its immediate aftermath. ( )