The Hoofmarks of the Fawn

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First Publication

Published by Martin Secker in April, 1911.

Availability

Out of print.

Background

The Hoofmarks of the Fawn consists of a number of short stories and one critical essay, written between 1904 and 1910. This was a considerable portion of the young Ransome’s career to date, so it is no surprise that the tone is uneven. Ransome acknowledged this in his introductory note, saying that the gaps between these stories “must explain their apparent inequality in craftsmanship. I tried to correct them, but found in doing so I was imposing one mood on another and blurring both with contradiction. I left them as they were. Craftsmanship is not everything, and those old moods seem to me almost worth regretting, because they are irretrievable.”  

Synopsis

This volume contained: The Hoofmarks of the Fawn (1908, dedicated to Ivy Ransome); The Footways of Dream (written in 1905, but dedicated to Ivy Ransome in 1911); Peter Swainson: a Criticism (1910); Rolf Sigurdson (1904, dedicated to Dora Collingwood); The Little Silver Snakes (1905, dedicated to Barbara Collingwood), and The Aging Fawn (1910).