THE CHILD OF THE MOAT, A STORY OF 1550, BY I.B. STOUGHTON HOLBORN.
Reading edition
12mo. About 320 pages. $1.25 net
This is a book for girls of from 13 to 16 written for a child rescued from the Lusitania. Many complain that girls' books are too tame and prefer those written for boys. Mr. Holborn therefore promised to write a girls' book with as much adventure as Stevenson's "Treasure Island." He has succeeded and the hair-breadth escapes of the heroine should satisfy the most exacting. The scene is laid in the stirring times of the Reformation and those who know the author as an archaeological lecturer will recognize his bent in several picturesque touches, such as the striking dressing scene before the heroine's birthday-party. The book is a remarkable contribution to children's literature and suggests a raising of the standard if more were written by men of learning and scholarship who are true child-lovers. After all was not "Alice in Wonderland" written by an erudite Oxford don and everyone who has read the present author's volume of poems "Children of Fancy" will know him as a lover of children.
G. ARNOLD SHAW, PUBLISHER TO THE UNIVERSITY LECTURERS ASSOCIATION
GRAND CENTRAL TERMINAL, NEW YORK
Recommended by the A.L.A. Booklist
Adopted for required reading by the Pittsburgh Teachers Reading Circle
VISIONS AND REVISIONS
A BOOK OF LITERARY DEVOTIONS
By JOHN COWPER POWYS
8vo, 298 pp. Half White Cloth with Blue Fabriano Paper Sides, $2.00 net
This volume of essays on Great Writers by the well-known lecturer was the first of a series of three books with the same purpose as the author's brilliant lectures; namely, to enable one to discriminate between the great and the mediocre in ancient and modern literature: the other two books being "One Hundred Best Books" and "Suspended Judgments."
Within a year of its publication, four editions of "Visions and Revisions" were printed—an extraordinary record considering that it was only the second book issued by a new publisher. The value of the book to the student and its interest for the general reader are guaranteed by the international fame of the author as an interpreter of great literature and by the enthusiastic reviews it received from the American Press.
REVIEW OF REVIEWS, New York: "Seventeen essays … remarkable for the omission of all that is tedious and cumbersome in literary appreciations, such as pedantry, muckraking, theorizing, and, in particular, constructive criticism."
BOOK NEWS MONTHLY, Philadelphia: "Not one line in the entire book that is not tense with thought and feeling. With all readers who crave mental stimulation … 'Visions and Revisions' is sure of a great and enthusiastic appreciation."
THE NATION AND THE EVENING POST, New York: "Their imagery is bright, clear and frequently picturesque. The rhythm falls with a pleasing cadence on the ear."
BROOKLYN DAILY EAGLE: "A volume of singularly acute and readable literary criticism."
CHICAGO HERALD: "An essayist at once scholarly, human and charming is John Cowper Powys…. Almost every page carries some arresting thought, quaintly appealing phrase, or picture spelling passage."
REEDY'S MIRROR, St. Louis: "Powys keeps you wide awake in the reading because he's thinking and writing from the standpoint of life, not of theory or system. Powys has a system but it is hardly a system. It is a sort of surrender to the revelation each writer has to make."
KANSAS CITY STAR: "John Cowper Powys' essays are wonderfully illuminating…. Mr. Powys writes in at least a semblance of the Grand Style."
"Visions and Revisions" contains the following essays:—
Rabelais Dickens Thomas Hardy Dante Goethe Walter Pater Shakespeare Matthew Arnold Dostoievsky El Greco Shelley Edgar Allan Poe Milton Keats Walt Whitman Charles Lamb Nietzsche Conclusion