Nets for the Wind by Una Taylor Keynote series first UK edition 1896

TAYLOR, Una Ashworth (1857-1922). Nets for the Wind. London: John Lane; Boston: Roberts Bros., 1896.

First UK edition. Keynotes Series, No. XXIV. Octavo. [viii], 228 pp., followed by 14 pages of reviews and a 16-page publisher's catalogue. Original orange-brown cloth, front board pictorially blocked in dark blue, spine lettered in gilt, with ornamental key devices to spine and rear board. Cover and title-page designs by Patten Wilson. Some leaves unopened. A near fine copy, with only the slightest rubbing to the corner tips; the cloth bright and the decorative blocking well preserved.

A collection of fantastical and symbolic tales by Una Ashworth Taylor, daughter of the poet and dramatist Sir Henry Taylor. Combining dreamlike imagery with medieval settings, the stories belong to the experimental fiction of the 1890s. Published in John Lane's Keynotes Series, with its distinctive pictorial cover and matching title page designed by Patten Wilson, who succeeded Aubrey Beardsley as designer of the later volumes.