Description

The collection opens with a quiet park encounter between a seasoned narrator and a small, earnest boy who dreams of becoming a writer. Their simple conversation about favorite stories, reading habits, and the desire for success sets a gentle, reflective tone that invites listeners into the world of Victorian literary life. This opening vignette hints at the book’s broader aim: to capture the thoughts and experiences of a remarkable group of authors.

From there, the volume moves through a series of candid sketches and reminiscences contributed by a diverse roster of novelists, poets, and adventure writers. Each piece offers a glimpse of the creative process—whether recalling the thrill of a first publication, the challenges of serial writing, or the personal influences that shaped beloved characters. Illustrated with more than a hundred black‑and‑white drawings, the anthology feels like a lively salon where the great voices of the late nineteenth century share their joys, doubts, and occasional humor.

Details

Full title

My First Book: the experiences of Walter Besant, James Payn, W. Clark Russell, Grant Allen, Hall Caine, George R. Sims, Rudyard Kipling, A. Conan Doyle, M.E. Braddon, F.W. Robinson, H. Rider Haggard, R.M. Ballantyne, I. Zangwill, Morley Roberts, David Christie Murray, Marie Corelli, Jerome K. Jerome, John Strange Winter, Bret Harte, "Q.", Robert Buchanan, Robert Louis Stevenson, with an introduction by Jerome K. Jerome. the experiences of Walter Besant, James Payn, W. Clark Russell, Grant Allen, Hall Caine, George R. Sims, Rudyard Kipling, A. Conan Doyle, M.E. Braddon, F.W. Robinson, H. Rider Haggard, R.M. Ballantyne, I. Zangwill, Morley Roberts, David Christie Murray, Marie Corelli, Jerome K. Jerome, John Strange Winter, Bret Harte, "Q.", Robert Buchanan, Robert Louis Stevenson, with an introduction by Jerome K. Jerome.

Language

Duration

~7 hours (418K characters)

Publisher of text edition

Project Gutenberg

Credits

Produced by Chuck Greif and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This book was produced from scanned images of public domain material from the Internet Archive.)

Release date

2010-07-13

Rights

Public domain in the USA.

Source

https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/33148