336p PERSEPHONE BOOKS ISBN 1903155363
AFTERWORD BY WENDY POLLARD
This 1946 novel (by the author of the Worzel Gummidge
books) is about a woman who goes on a cruise and is swept
overboard; she lives for three years on a desert island
before being rescued by a destroyer in 1943. When she returns
to England it seems to her to have gone mad: she cannot
buy clothes without 'coupons', her friends are only interested
in 'war work', and yet she is considered uncivilised if
she walks barefoot or is late for meals. The focus of Barbara
Euphan Todd's satire is people behaving heroically and
appallingly at one and the same time. Rosamond Lehmann
considered Miss Ranskill Comes Home 'a work of great
originality, and delightfully readable, a blend of fantasy,
satire and romantic comedy... a very entertaining novel
and less light than it seems.' This has been an especial
Persephone favourite.
The endpaper is 'Sutherland Rose',
a 1946 screen-printed cotton textured fabric designed
by Graham Sutherland for Helios.
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