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Publishing Info: 1st Edition / 2nd Impression. Originally published in 1936. Signed by author. Signed letter from author on headed paper. Signed "Mauro". Description: Green cloth with blind stamped border and title to upper and lower edges. Gilt titles and star border to spine. Letter from author tipped in on ffep. Language: English. Book Condition> Very Good: Light wear to corners, edges and spine ends. Lightly sunned spine with faint run mark across front cloth. Lightly tanned intact endpapers with minor faint marks. Tightly bound with strong hinges. Clean unmarked pages. DJ Condition> No DJ. Pages [viii], 325. Size: 8vo, 23cm by 15cm. ADDITIONAL ITEMS: Signed letter from author attached to ffep. Author compliment slip. Provenance: Letter from author to unknown recipient. Possibly A Breal as purchased with another book ("C" two volumes) which were inscribed to Auguste Breal (Artist, son of Michel Breal Philologist) dated 1924. Pencil note "A Breal" to upper ffep. Author: Born in Mayfair in 1874 son of Edward Charles Baring (1828-1897), who was a banker and became the first Baron Revelstoke in 1885 Educated at Eton and Trinity College he left Cambridge University without taking a degree Joined the diplomatic service in 1898 and served in Paris, Copenhagen, and Rome Joined The Morning Post where he reported on the Russo-Japanese War writing a book With the Russians in Manchuria (1905) After working in St Petersburg and Constantinople he moved in 1912 to The Times where he became their special correspondent in the Balkans According to his biographer, Robert Speaight: "During these years he learned Russian and developed an abiding sympathy for the Russian people which political changes could not disturb" Joined the Royal Flying Corps and in 1915 he was appointed as "mentor and guide" to Hugh Trenchard In 1918 Baring became a staff officer of the Royal Air Force The death in action of many of his friends inspired him to some moving verse, which he published in 1919 According to William Orpen, Barings poem, In Memoriam "is the greatest work of art thats come out of this whole war" Baring later wrote about his war experiences in his autobiography, The Puppet Show of Memory (1922) Close friend of G K Chesterton After the war Baring wrote a series of successful novels including Passing By (1921), C (1924), Cats Cradle (1925), Daphne Adeane (1926), Robert Peckham (1930), In My End is My Beginning (1931) and The Lonely Lady of Dulwich (1934) In the early 1930s Baring began to suffer from paralysis agitans He continued to write and Have you Anything to Declare?, an anthology of favourite quotations in several languages, was published in 1936 By 1940 he was forced to leave his Rottingdean home and was looked after by friends in Scotland Maurice Baring died unmarried, at Beaufort Castle, near Inverness, on 14th December 1945. Book Resume: REVIEW OF BOOK - "His Have You Anything to Declare? has been on my bedside table since I can remember Baring was fluent in at least half a dozen European languages, and they are all represented here; but he is generous with his translations and one is constantly amazed by the breadth of his reading' Coming from one of the masters of this form, as his annual Christmas Cracker, testifies, this is high praise And it is deserved One of the pleasures of dipping in to commonplace books is serendipity and in Baring's the quotient could hardly be higher From Achilles to Xanthus, by way of Robert Browning, William Cowper, Goethe, Thomas Hood, Michael Lomonosov, W H Mallock, Skelton and HG Wells, just to take a few of the authors that enrich the journey, this is, as all commonplace books should be, one to refer to endlessly for the constant joy of unexpected knowledge and entertainment". PLEASE ASK for additional photographs if required. Seller Inventory # 6756
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