Final Edition

Description

This memoir spans the whole life of E.F. Benson (1867-1940), describing his family and London snobs, literary sybils and the Lotus Eaters of Capri - where he shared a house with John Ellingham Brooks and Somerset Maugham and where his neighbours included Norman Douglas, Compton Mackenzie, Axel Munthe and Maxim Gorki. He evokes the little world of Rye, immortalized in "Mapp and Lucia", where he gloried in the splendid robes of Lord Mayor, happy to end as "a big fish in a small pond". "Final Edition" is Benson's own final tribute to those he loved, completed ten days before his death. E.F. Benson, one of six children of the Archbishop of Canterbury, wrote biography, essays, memoirs and fiction, including such novels as "Paying Guests" and the "Mapp and Lucia" series. A previous memoir, "As We Were" is also published by Hogarth.