Balder Ex-Libris

Author : Reed Douglas
Title : Disgrace Abounding
Year : 1939

Link download : Reed_Douglas_-_Disgrace_Abounding.zip

Preface. All the fictions in this book are characteristic. None of the characters is fictitious, though some are disguised. A multitude of opinions is expressed. They may be poor things; in any case, they are mine own. If the book were to have a dedication it would be, in the words of the furniture removal man, to you - from me. While I was finishing the book, Insanity Fair, to which this is a sequel, events began to move so fast, and myself with them, that I never had time to go through the proofs with a microscope for the misprints of others and the mistakes of myself. The first thirty-odd impressions thus contained a large but dwindling number of slips. That they dwindled was largely due - I hardly stopped running about in the subsequent nine months for long enough meticulously to examine a single chapter - to readers in many countries, who wrote to me, or even called on or telephoned to my publishers, to point them out. To them my most cordial thanks are due. The same thing may happen, in a lesser degree, in this book. If it does, I tender thanks in advance. Those spacious and leisurely days are gone when a writer, at any rate a writer in my field, might sit in a quiet house, looking over green English wealds, weigh and apportion his words in long and tranquil meditation, and with measured gesture dip his quill pen into the ink and transfer them to paper. A writer of my type, in the mid-twentieth century, is always rushing off to catch a train or aeroplane, to keep abreast of the rush of events, and between journeys has quickly to tap his thoughts on paper. He who runs may read. To write, you have to run still faster. Possibly some of the things I have written about will begin to happen before the book is out. I shall not alter it if they do. I think, by leaving it as it was written, you get a more plastic view of the march of events. The direct form of address, 'You', is intended in most cases for British readers. ...