Books

London: William Heinemann Ltd. 1949. 8vo. Rebound in full dark blue morocco, spine with raised bands and gilt turn-ins, marbled endpapers, original front cloth and spine bound in, t.e.g.; pp. [vi], 3-338; with illustrations by Ruth Steed, from sketches by the author; occasional spotting, very good. First U.K. edition of this perennially popular coming-of-age classic, set in Suffolk in the 1930s. This is Dodie Smith's first published novel, preceding her possibly better known The Hundred and One Dalmatians by 8 years, but she was already a very established playwright. The novel, which takes place over a few months in a single year, tells the story of an eccentric family occupying a derelict castle and is narrated, in the first person, by Cassandra Mortmain. She is an intelligent teenager who develops into a young woman by the end of the story. In 2019 BBC News included it in a list of the 100 most influential novels.

I Capture the Castle is a novel by Dodie Smith, written in the form of the journals of 17-year-old Cassandra Mortmain. She chronicles her eccentric family's life in their dilapidated English castle and her own coming-of-age experiences.