Brian Urquhart, who was Ralph Bunches chief assistant from 1954 until Bunches death in 1971, succeeded him as United Nations Under-Secretary-General for Special Political Affairs?a position cre ated for Bunche by U.N. Secretary-Gen eral Dag Hammarskj?ld in 1953. Some years ago, Urquhart published a fine and rich biography of Hammarskj?ld. He has now given us a sensitive, informative, comprehensive, and often heartbreaking biography of Bunche: a great book about a great man. There are three main topics in it: race, the role of the United Nations in world politics, and that of Bunche in the United Nations. He was the great-grandson of a Bap tist preacher and freemason. Orphaned at the age of 11, he was raised by his grand mother, Lucy, the daughter of a house slave. Bunche later said that she instilled in him "a desire to do my best in anything I tried to do ... she taught me the value of self-respect and dignity." He went to college at ucla, majoring in political sci ence; thanks to a fellowship, he went to Harvard's Department of Government for graduate study, earning money by working in a bookshop. After receiving a master's degree, he was invited to become an instructor at Howard University and to set up its political science department. GOING TO CLASS Bunche met his future wife, Ruth Harris, while at Howard; she was the daughter of the chief mailing clerk in Montgomery, Stanley Hoffmann is Douglas Dillon Professor of the Civilization of France and Chairman of the Center for European Studies at Harvard Uni versity.