WRITERS OF THE DAY (NISBET & CO. LTD.)
Series Note: This book series was published by Nisbet & Co. Ltd., of 22 Berners Street, London W., United Kingdom. It was also published by Henry Holt and Company of New York, United States.
"Messrs. Nisbet have just started a series of little books that promises to be interesting and should in some cases be amusing. It is called 'Writers of the Day' (1s. net each volume); and the idea seems to be that young writers of the day should be asked to give their opinions of middle-aged writers of the day. If this work is done candidly and freely, we shall thus have a glimpse of two generations of writers--the middle-aged as they appear to the young, and the young as they reveal themselves in their handling of the middle-aged. Moreover, it is apparently only 'creative' or imaginative writers--not professed critics or reviewers--who are asked to contribute to the series; and that ought to mean another breath of freshness in the treatment."
Source: "Youth on Middle Age", The Times (London), 27 April 1915, p. 24.
"Another Nisbet venture deserves a word or two. It is their new series called 'Writers of the Day.' Many publishers, in the past, have fought shy of such a series, for there has always been a difficulty to find writers to fit the subjects, and when they have been found, to get them to do their work in a moderate manner. The average writer, when estimating the work of a contemporary, usually goes to excess in praise or blame, and this tends to deprecate the critical value of the series. The Nisbets have evidently considered the failures of the past in laying their plans, and are giving to their new series a 'twist' that may make it a big success. 'The most distinctive feature,' they say, 'of the 'Writers of the Day' will be their authorship. The publishers have arranged that these studies of established writers shall be written by those who are themselves their fellow-craftsmen of a younger generation -- that is, who are already distinguished for imaginative and not merely critical work.' The series will be published at a shilling net in cloth and half a crown net in leather. 'It is proposed to include only living authors whose recognised reputation is the daily subject of discussion wherever books are mentioned. Each of these will form the topic of one self-contained volume, not over 20,000 words in length, and devoted to a succinct and impartial survey of the subject's career and place in modern literature.' "
Source: J. Walter Smith, "The Book in London: How the English Public Gets Its Reading Cheaply", Boston Evening Transcript, 10 April 1915, p. 40.
"Monographs on living writers are becoming quite the fashion, and a very good fashion, too, because without in the least trying to say the last word they help to stimulate interest in good work and to train appreciation. A new series has been started with Mr. Bertram Christian as its general editor. The first two volumes, neatly printed and neatly bound in blue, are on Arnold Bennett by Mr. F. J. Darton, and on H. G. Wells by Mr. J. D. Beresford (Nisbet, 1s. net each). Both are capital pieces of criticism."
Source: "Writers of the Day", The Observer, 18 April 1915, p. 3.
Series Number / Author or Editor / Title
J. M. Barrie
by Frederick Joseph Harvey Darton
1929
Arnold Bennett
by F J Harvey Darton (Frederick Joseph Harvey Darton)
1915; 1924
With portrait
Joseph Conrad
by Hugh Walpole (Sir Hugh Seymour Walpole)
1916
Anatole France
by Walter Lionel George
1915
John Galsworthy
by Sheila Kaye-Smith
1916
Thomas Hardy
by Harold Child
1925
Henry James
by Rebecca West
1916
Rudyard Kipling
by John Palmer
1928
Bernard Shaw
by Edward Shanks (Edward Buxton Shanks)
1924; 1925
With portrait
Bernard Shaw
by Edward Richard B Shaw
1925
Mrs. Humphry Ward
by Stephen Gwynn
1917
H. G. Wells
by J. D. Beresford
1915
Author of this page:
David Paul Wagner
