GLYN, Elinor. The Visits of Elizabeth. Copyright edn. Leipzig: Bernhard Tauchnitz. (Collection of British authors. vol. 3504.) 1901 [1919]
Without series title. Yellow binder's cloth; spine sl. faded, maroon leather label. Peter Whitehead Armorial bookplate.
¶Todd 3504 between e & f; a publishers' note on the series title draws attention to the poor quality of the paper, which has sl. browned. This was Glyn's earliest book, epistolary fiction, and as this dismissive review from The Spectator (Jan. 1901) shows, it foreshadowed the often scandalous nature of Glyn's writing: "Miss Elizabeth is a young lady of good family who pays visits to various country houses in England and to a French chateau, and describes the society that she meets in some artlessly artful letters to her mother. The impression left on the reader is distinctly unpleasant. Pettiness, spite, intrigue, are the prominent characteristics of the life; even the manners are not good. As for a syllable indicating any interest in anything beyond clothes and love-making, sometimes of a dubious kind, it is not to be found. It may safely be said that it is impossible to think of the lives of these people as being of any sort of good. Some of them are "smart"; no other epithet of praise is possible. The book is exactly suited to readers of this class. Whether that is to its credit or no we do not pretend to judge."