Eminent Victorians: Cardinal Manning; Dr. Arnold; Florence Nightingale; General Gordon (The Folio Society)

London: The Folio Society, 1967. First Thus. Hard Cover. Very Good/Good. 9x6x1. First thus (Nash, Folio 50 #239). Includes publisher's slipcase. Slipcase stained, minor split starting along top seam, corners a bit rubbed. 1967 Hard Cover. 286 pp. Photographic frontispiece portrait of Strachey, facsimile of manuscript page on endpapers. Eminent Victorians by English writer, biographer, Bloomsbury group member, and literary critic Lytton Strachey, was originally published in 1918. The work consists of biographies of four leading figures from the Victorian era. Its fame rests on the irreverence and wit Strachey brought to bear on three men and a woman who had until then been regarded as heroes: Cardinal Manning, Florence Nightingale, Thomas Arnold, and General Gordon (although Nightingale is actually praised and her reputation was enhanced). The book shows its other subjects in a less than flattering light; for instance, the intrigues of Cardinal Manning against Cardinal Newman.