author

C. S. Sleight

Best known today for a contribution to the 19th-century collection An Arrow in a Sunbeam, and Other Tales, this little-documented writer remains something of a literary mystery. The surviving record suggests a clergyman-author whose work fit naturally alongside moral, family-centered fiction for young readers.

1 Audiobook

An Arrow in a Sunbeam, and Other Tales

An Arrow in a Sunbeam, and Other Tales

by Sarah Orne Jewett, active 19th century Frances Lee, C. S. Sleight

About the author

C. S. Sleight is a scarce figure in the historical record, but available library and bookseller listings consistently connect the name with An Arrow in a Sunbeam, and Other Tales, a late-19th-century story collection also associated with Sarah Orne Jewett and Frances Lee. Several modern editions describe Sleight as Reverend C. S. Sleight, which suggests a clerical background.

Because reliable biographical detail is limited, it is safest to say that Sleight is remembered chiefly through this collection rather than through a well-preserved personal history. The stories linked with the volume are aimed at younger readers and reflect the gentle moral tone often found in children's literature of the period.

That mix of obscurity and period charm gives Sleight a certain appeal today: a writer known less for a public life than for leaving behind a small piece of the 19th-century reading world.