MITFORD (Mary Russell): - Recollections of a Literary Life; or, Books, Places, and People

London: Richard Bentley..., 1852. FIRST EDITION. 3 volumes. Large 8vo, 185 x 113 mms., pp.xi [xii blank], 323 [324 blank]; [iv], 302; vii [viii blank], 296, contemporary calf, gilt spines, red and green morocco labels; lacking the numbering label on volume, spines a bit rubbed, top of spine volume 3 chipped, but a goodish set, with various newspaper cuttings loosely inserted, as well as a short piece of verse by a previous owner. John L. Idol, Jr. in "Mary Russell Mitford: Champion of American Literature" (Studies in the American Renaissance, 1983) writes, "Mary Russell Mitford overcame an early distaste for American literature and worked tirelessly to support the careers of many American authors. Prompted by her disappointment with American authors, she anticipated in 1818 Sidney Smith's notorious charge against the state of arts in America. Writing to one of her many correspondents, Mitford asserted that Americans 'are a second-hand, pawnbrokers-shop kind of nation - a nation without literature, without art, and totally unconscious of the beautiful nature by which they are surrounded.' But she was to changer her mind when she later read more works by American authors, began to meet them and their publishers, and started to exchange letters with them. She could even proudly claim, before her death and with considerable justice, that few English writers had done as much as she to promote American literature in England. Her advocacy of American writers appeared in numerous letters and in Recollections of a Literary Life (1853), an autobiographical and critical work containing selecti8ons from her favorite writers,"

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