Books with author Sheila Smith

This is a pre-1923 historical reproduction that was curated for quality. Quality assurance was conducted on each of these books in an attempt to remove books with imperfections introduced by the digitization process. Though we have made best efforts - the books may have occasional errors that do not impede the reading experience. We believe this work is culturally important and have elected to bring the book back into print as part of our continuing commitment to the preservation of printed works worldwide. This text refers to the Bibliobazaar edition.

This work has been selected by scholars as being culturally important, and is part of the knowledge base of civilization as we know it. This work was reproduced from the original artifact, and remains as true to the original work as possible. Therefore, you will see the original copyright references, library stamps (as most of these works have been housed in our most important libraries around the world), and other notations in the work.This work is in the public domain in the United States of America, and possibly other nations. Within the United States, you may freely copy and distribute this work, as no entity (individual or corporate) has a copyright on the body of the work.As a reproduction of a historical artifact, this work may contain missing or blurred pages, poor pictures, errant marks, etc. Scholars believe, and we concur, that this work is important enough to be preserved, reproduced, and made generally available to the public. We appreciate your support of the preservation process, and thank you for being an important part of keeping this knowledge alive and relevant.

Excerpt from Tamarisk TownThere was a ring at the bell of the outer office, and the next minute one of the clerks thrust his head into Becket's room.About the PublisherForgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.comThis book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.

This is a reproduction of a book published before 1923. This book may have occasional imperfections such as missing or blurred pages, poor pictures, errant marks, etc. that were either part of the original artifact, or were introduced by the scanning process. We believe this work is culturally important, and despite the imperfections, have elected to bring it back into print as part of our continuing commitment to the preservation of printed works worldwide. We appreciate your understanding of the imperfections in the preservation process, and hope you enjoy this valuable book.

This book was originally published prior to 1923, and represents a reproduction of an important historical work, maintaining the same format as the original work. While some publishers have opted to apply OCR (optical character recognition) technology to the process, we believe this leads to sub-optimal results (frequent typographical errors, strange characters and confusing formatting) and does not adequately preserve the historical character of the original artifact. We believe this work is culturally important in its original archival form. While we strive to adequately clean and digitally enhance the original work, there are occasionally instances where imperfections such as blurred or missing pages, poor pictures or errant marks may have been introduced due to either the quality of the original work or the scanning process itself. Despite these occasional imperfections, we have brought it back into print as part of our ongoing global book preservation commitment, providing customers with access to the best possible historical reprints. We appreciate your understanding of these occasional imperfections, and sincerely hope you enjoy seeing the book in a format as close as possible to that intended by the original publisher.

heila Kaye-Smith (1887 –1956) was one of a number of early twentieth century rural novelists writing in what has become known as “the English regional tradition”. Like Thomas Hardy, from whom they took their inspiration, most of them set their novels in one particular part of the country. Others who can be regarded as belonging to the tradition include Mary Webb (Shropshire), John Moore (the West Midlands, particularly Herefordshire and Worcestershire), H E Bates (originally Northamptonshire, later Kent), and Hugh Walpole (the Lake District), and possibly also Henry Williamson (Devon), D H Lawrence (Nottinghamshire) and Winifred Holtby (the East Riding).In Kaye-Smith’s case her literary province included the Weald of Kent and her native county of Sussex (she was a native of St Leonards), together with the adjoining parts of Surrey. “Sussex Gorse” is an agricultural epic telling of the irresistible rise of Reuben Backfield, a farmer from Peasmarsh near Rye in Sussex. (Unlike Hardy, Kaye-Smith did not bother to disguise real places under invented names). The story spans the period between Backfield’s teenage years in the 1830s and his old age around 1906. When we first meet him he is taking part in a riotous protest against the Enclosure Acts. These were a series of measures in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries which enabled landowners to fence off what had previously been common land and to exclude other people and their livestock from it. These Acts were highly controversial; some defended them as necessary in order to feed a growing, increasingly urban, population; others bitterly criticised them as an attack on the rights of the rural poor. Young Reuben’s opposition, however, arises less from political principle than from the fact that, owing to a legal technicality, his father has been excluded and ownership of the newly enclosed land has been awarded to the local squire and another farmer.This event marks the birth of the obsession which is to dominate the rest of Backfield’s life. When he inherits the family farm a few years later he forms the plan of gradually acquiring the whole of Boarzell, as the former common land is known. This seems like a useless ambition. Boarzell is a rough, stony heathland with poor, sandy soils which seem to support little but gorse. The two landowners who have acquired it use it for little except rough grazing. Armed only with his iron will and a huge capacity for hard work, however, Backfield is determined to built up his land, to acquire the capital necessary to buy Boarzell piece by piece and then to transform it into productive farmland.Backfield’s ambition is not easily realised; the novel is subtitled, with good reason, “The Story of a Fight”. This is not, moreover, a fight without casualties. His brother Harry is terribly injured in an accident. His first wife Naomi dies young, worn out with childbearing. His second wife Rose leaves him for another man. He misses the opportunity to make Alice, the one woman he has really loved, his third wife because she is the only person with the courage to criticise his way of life to his face. (There are plenty who will criticise him behind his back). His many sons all desert him, in different ways and ostensibly for different reasons, but in each case the underlying cause is his lack of love and understanding and his inability to see them as any more than a source of free labour for his farm. Of his two daughters, one ends up as a prostitute and the other as the wife of a hated rival, and it is hard to say which fate Backfield regards as the more shameful. He never makes a friend, except perhaps for Alice, but makes plenty of enemies. His farm is named “Odiam”, and although there are farms of this name in East Kent its use here may be a deliberate pun on “odium”.

This book was originally published prior to 1923, and represents a reproduction of an important historical work, maintaining the same format as the original work. While some publishers have opted to apply OCR (optical character recognition) technology to the process, we believe this leads to sub-optimal results (frequent typographical errors, strange characters and confusing formatting) and does not adequately preserve the historical character of the original artifact. We believe this work is culturally important in its original archival form. While we strive to adequately clean and digitally enhance the original work, there are occasionally instances where imperfections such as blurred or missing pages, poor pictures or errant marks may have been introduced due to either the quality of the original work or the scanning process itself. Despite these occasional imperfections, we have brought it back into print as part of our ongoing global book preservation commitment, providing customers with access to the best possible historical reprints. We appreciate your understanding of these occasional imperfections, and sincerely hope you enjoy seeing the book in a format as close as possible to that intended by the original publisher.

This scarce antiquarian book is a facsimile reprint of the original. Due to its age, it may contain imperfections such as marks, notations, marginalia and flawed pages. Because we believe this work is culturally important, we have made it available as part of our commitment for protecting, preserving, and promoting the world's literature in affordable, high quality, modern editions that are true to the original work.

This scarce antiquarian book is a facsimile reprint of the original. Due to its age, it may contain imperfections such as marks, notations, marginalia and flawed pages. Because we believe this work is culturally important, we have made it available as part of our commitment for protecting, preserving, and promoting the world's literature in affordable, high quality, modern editions that are true to the original work.