Firbank’s final novel had a chequered publication due, initially, to labour unrest in the industry and the complication of Grant Richards’ bankruptcy, and then followed the General Strike: hence, the date change on the dust jacket, and the cancel title page. Firbank died in January 1926, six months before his novel reached print. It is, perhaps, his vainest outing, in featuring not one, but two portraits of himself. While “Wilde's presence, as stylist, aesthete, and homosexual martyr, can be felt in different ways throughout Firbank's writing life,” following the death of his mother in March 1924, his work showed “a new candour in its treatment of homosexuality” (ODNB). Indeed, his American publisher, Brentano, declined Concerning the Eccentricities of Cardinal Pirelli (1926) on “religious and moral grounds”.
1000 copies were printed.
Benkovitz A11