Mrs. Sherwood and Her Books for Children : A Study

Oxford University Press, London, first edition, 1974. Cloth, 8vo, 20 cm,. xi, 157, [71] pp, ills facs. A study of the popular English children's writer, Mrs Sherwood, 1775-1851 considering her style, writings, relations with publishers, etc. Includes reprints of The little woodman and his dog Caesar originally published: London, Houlston, 1850 and Soffrona and her cat Muff originally published: Wellington, Salop, Houlston, 1828. Includes a 38 page bibliography. "No study of nineteenth - century children's books in England can afford to ignore Mrs. Sherwood. She produced over four hundred different titles - books, tales, tracts, texts, magazines, articles in periodicals, cbapbooks, and Sunday School rewards. There is evidence that the writings of her Evangelical period, in particular, had a remarkable influence upon Victorian literature for the young. In this survey of Mrs. Sherwood's life and work, Mrs. Cutt traces the changes that took place in the author's attitude towards her craft during her lifetime. The two facsimiles included in this volume have been selected to give a balanced view of Mrs. Sherwood's writing for the very young during the years in which she rose to fame. The Little Woodman and his Dog Caesar, of the same period as The History of the Fairchild Family, Part I, displays similar reIigious teaching, but in a simpler form. The chaphook Saffrona and her Cat Muff, published in the 1820's like so many of Mrs. Sherwood's shorter tales, indicates in its lively detail and sympathetic presentation of childish emotion that she was just as much a precursor of Mrs. Ewing and Mrs. Molesworth as she was the literary descendant of Bunyan and Janeway. The Bibliography is intended to provide as complete a check4ist as possible of Mrs. Sherwood's multifarious publications in book form; and the Appendices include a list of her illustrators, as well as a note on the publication of her books in the United States." - from the blurb. Very Good in price-clipped dustwrapper.