A Gallery

by Philip Guedalla

1924. A collection of essays and profiles by the historian and irreverent biographer, Guedalla. Of the literary people he writes about in this volume are M. Anatole France, Mr. Thomas Hardy, Mr. H.G. Wells, Mr. Bernard Shaw, Mr. Arnold Bennett, Mr. Joseph Conrad, and Mr. John Galsworthy.

260 pages, Paperback

About the author

Philip Guedalla was an English barrister, and a popular historical and travel writer and biographer. He was educated at Rugby and at Balliol College in Oxford, where he was the President of the Union. In 1913, he qualified as a barrister and practised for ten years, retiring to stand for Parliament five times as a Liberal candidate (he was never elected, however), and to write a series of travel books and historical biographies, often reflecting his interest in the Empires of both Napoleons. His final book, written at the height of the Second World War, was Mr. Churchill, A Portrait.

His wit and epigrams are well-known. He also was the originator of a now-common theory on Henry James, writing that "The work of Henry James has always seemed divisible by a simple dynastic arrangement into three reigns: James I, James II, and the Old Pretender".