THE WHITE PEOPLE .. by Burnett, Frances Hodgson - 1917

New York and London: Harper & Brothers Publishers, 1917. Octavo, pp. [1-12] 1-111 [112] [113-116: blank] [note: first two and last two leaves are blanks used as front and rear free endpapers and paste-downs], four inserted plates with illustrations by Elizabeth Shippen Green, original pictorial green cloth, front and spine panels stamped in gold. First edition. First printing with "Published February, 1917" and code "A-R" on copyright page. Supernatural novella set in contemporary Scotland about a little girl who can see ghosts ("the white people") that are unobserved by everyone else around her. A fairly typical Burnett tale, depicting the loneliness of a child despite her rich surroundings, a bit sentimental perhaps, but with a good deal of genuine pathos as well. "... her later ventures into the supernatural, THE SECRET GARDEN (1911) and THE WHITE PEOPLE (1917) contain some of her most artistic effects." - Quinn, American Fiction, p. 407. These two stories have been successfully filmed in recent years, and her power to move one is undeniable, despite the strident objections of those modernists such as F. Scott Fitzgerald, who, in an aside, once referred to "the vicious little tales of Frances Hodgson Burnett." Surely she must have seemed the epitome of all that the modernists found hateful in the high Victorian sensibility, with her lush emotionalism and idealism -- and huge popular success. Bleiler, The Guide to Supernatural Fiction 1755. Bleiler (1978), p. 35. Reginald 02253. BAL 2125 (state C of sheets; binding state A). Some foxing to front free endpaper and last leaf of text (interaction with jacket flaps), hairline cracks along inner hinges, but a sound, very good, externally bright copy in about good pictorial dust jacket with chipping at head and tail of spine panel, corners, and along top edge of front panel, as well a several closed tears. Formerly, Donald A. Wollheim's copy with his name stamped in ink on penultimate blank. (#10413)