I once met Henricourt and heard from him the story of his early struggles. He was a Civil Servant on £600 a year when he wrote his first masterpiece, _The Kleptomaniac_. It was one of the most realistic books of the century, and critics said that Chapter LXVII of the first volume, which begins with the hero falling into a deep, dreamless sleep, and ends just before he wakes up, was one of the most powerful things ever written. He took it to a publisher, who said there was a printers’ strike on, and they were not producing anything but school books at the moment; why didn’t he film it? He said he had thought of that, but the manager had said it would want a reel about as long as the Equator, and asked him to cut it: he said that would be false to his Art. The publisher said he’d better store the manuscript somewhere and write another book that would catch on with the public—his reminiscences, for example—and then have the Klep. in reserve. He said it was the one thing they weren’t allowed to do in the Civil Service, write Reminiscences, it was so apt to create a false impression. Couldn’t the publisher see his way to producing the first volume, anyhow, dividing the risks? The publisher said it couldn’t be done unless he could guarantee a sale of 4,000. In despair, he went to a Touting Agency, and asked them if they could find him 4,000 subscribers for what was really rather a remarkable novel. They asked if any important public characters came into the book under pseudonyms. He said no, that was against the principles of his Art. Finally the agent said he thought he could get the signatures if Henricourt wouldn’t mind his pretending that the book was a translation from the Lithuanian, written by a blind Lithuanian patriot. Henricourt agreed to this, and so the subscribers were procured and the great work was produced after all. Poetry in those days had hardly felt the influence of the neo-classical school, and our poets still went in for using the language of common life, the commoner the better. To show the sort of thing that was popular, I don’t think I can do better than give you a page from the Index of First Lines in a volume of collected Edwardian Poetry, which Lady Travers-Grant[14] gave me on my fiftieth birthday: EDWARDIAN POETRY 1960‒1965—INDEX