A Childhood

Allinson, Francesca

First edition. Hogarth Press, London, 1937. Hardcover, 8vo, pp. 187, [1]. Seven black and white wood engraved headpieces by Enid Marx. Original blue cloth, spine lettered in gilt. General edgewear, stain to bottom of spine. Scatter of fox spots to edges and endpapers, gently toned. Rare dust jacket designed by Enid Marx. Toned all over, spine darkened, rubbing at joints. Significant loss to the top of spine, numerous closed tears. Dust jacket has been previously repaired and reinforced [photos for details]. One of 1210 copies of the only Hogarth Press run, published under Leonard and Virginia Woolf. An interesting memoir with some of the character of what today we would call auto-fiction, written by Francesca Allinson, a lesser-known figure in the Bloomsbury Group. Allinson was a polymath; writer, musician, and puppeteer. Known as Fresca to her friends, she lived an extraordinary life surrounded by artists and thinkers. She was a pacifist who established a community of conscious objectors during WWII. She died in 1945 by suicide, drowning herself in a river, echoing the death of her editor Virginia Woolf. She left letters to only two people: her friend and composer Michael Tippet, and her lover, Judith Wogan.