Barbara Pym hidden in brown paper – Telegraph Blogs

Friday 22 August 2014 | Blog Feed | All feeds

Christopher Howse

Christopher Howse writes leaders and features and reviews for The Daily Telegraph, which he joined in 1996 as obituaries editor. His Saturday column, Sacred Mysteries, is on religion. He lives in Westminster.

Barbara Pym hidden in brown paper

A detail form the Virago cover for A Glass of Blessings

A detail from the Virago cover for A Glass of Blessings

I was looking for a Barbara Pym novel to take on holiday and found to my consternation that the covers which Virago has put on its newly published series belong to the "chick-lit" genre in colouring and general treatment.

My choice has been to cover them in brown paper, like an old school algebra textbook, or to keep to secondhand copies.

I find the same thought had occurred to my friend Deborah Asher on buying some paperbacks of Nancy Mitford books.

Is this a widespread problem?

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