Rebecca West

"World War I, in the background of Rebecca West's first novel, was "the first war that women could imagine," writes Samuel Hynes in his eloquent introduction, "and so it was the first that a woman could write into a novel." Narrated by a woman who, like West, has never experienced war and yet for whom the war was very real, The Return of the Soldier (1918) takes place not on a battlefield, but in an isolated country house. It examines the relationships...

The children of the unstable and eccentric Piers and Clare Aubrey must learn to make do, in a story taking place in the London suburbs in the years leading up to World War One.

West's posthumously published semi-autobiographical novel. A beautiful actress of the 1920s faces painful decisions about her lovers and her future. Star of the stage, Sunflower has everything but the attention she craves from her long-time - and married - lover, Lord Essington, a brilliant and intense man occupied with more intellectual thoughts. Eager for a more rewarding experience, Sunflower must decide whether another "great man," the Australian...