The Young Visiters
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- $0.99
Publisher Description
A short “society novel” written by Miss Daisy Ashford at the age of nine. The notebook containing the novel was rediscovered by her in adult life and sent by a friend to Frank Swinnerton, the English novelist, critic, editor and essayist. Published in 1919 by Chatto and Windus, with its original misspellings and an arch introduction by “Peter Pan” author J. M. Barrie, it was an immediate bestseller. Its child's view of high society (dukes and earls having ‘levies’ and residing in the ‘Crystall Pallace’) and its heavily romantic plot make it an engaging and enduring popular work.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Fiction by nine-year-olds is rare, but the precocious Ashford redeems her unremarkable story in ways she could never have imagined. Written in 1890 but not published until 1919 (and kept in print in Britain since that time), this novel proves to be a completely innocent yet inadvertently amusing spoof of Victorian society. The guileless author (whose photo nonetheless shows a deep self-satisfaction) writes of 42-year-old Alfred Salteena, who, born on the wrong side of the blanket, wishes to become a gentleman. The suave and well-connected earl of Clincham imparts to his apt pupil (without irony and with telling accuracy) the essence of becoming one of the upper class: have plenty of money, keep your unsavory past hidden, wear the right clothing and, above all, know how to hunt, shoot and ride. Armed with this knowledge, Salteena is instantly transformed into Lory Hyssops and gets a job with the royal family. His story is a perfect vehicle for the author's parade of pious, hard-drinking, tight-fisted, socially stratified and hypocritical Victorians. Ashford's fractured syntax, phonetic spelling and imaginative grammar eventually become wearing, but fortunately the book is brief. According to Kendrick's prefatory note, Ashford gave up literary ambitions after she wrote a second novel at age 14; she died in England in 1972.
