John William Godward The Old Old Story painting

John William Godward The Old Old Story paintingJohn William Waterhouse My Sweet Rose painting
The reader must begin this book with an act of faith and end it with an act of charity. We ask him to believe in the sincerity and authenticity of this preface, affirming in return his prerogative to be skeptical of all that follows it.which we firmly assert -- was called into question even prior to the manuscript's receipt, as has been everything about the book since, from its content to its authorship. The professor and quondam novelist whose name appears on the title-page(our title-page, not the one following his prefatory letter) denies that the work is his, but "suspects" it to be fictional -- a suspicion that two pages should confirm for the average reader. His
The manuscript submitted to us some seasons ago under the initialsR.N.S., and by us retitledGiles Goat-Boy, is enough removed from the ordinary and so potentially actionable as to make inadequate the publisher's conventional disclaimer: "Any resemblance to persons