THE PHOENIX LIBRARY The Phoenix Library, in which Messrs. Chatto
and Windus republish in a charming format at 3s. 6d. a volume the most distinguished of their books from previous lists, has just reached its century with the addition of Mr. Aldous Huxley's delightful anthology, Texts and Pretexts. (Two other additions are Professor Julian Huxley's essay on Ants, and Mr. David Garnett's novel, The Grasshoppers Come; bound together with his account of his initiation into Flying, A Rabbit in the Air.) The success of editions such as the Phoenix is one of the most encouraging features of the contemporary book-market. They cater not for the public which demands the books which make a brief sensation on the moment of publication and are then fortunately forgotten, but for the intelligent and serious reader who wants only books which have proved their worth by surviving the feverish traffic of the circulating library : these books are intended to be bought and kept, not merely to be borrowed and returned or thrown aside ; they are compact, comely, and cheap. The Phoenix Library, by giving in this way a second lease of life to important books, has done much to preserve literary standards. A glance at its list shows how much it has put the intelligent reader in its debt : no less than 16 of Aldous Huxley's books are available in it, there are 6 of Richard Aldington's, 6 of Marcel Proust's, 4 of David Garnett's, 5 of Lytton Strachey's, 7 of C. E. Montague's and other writers less fully represented include Clive Bell, Augustine _Birrell, Richard Hughes, Roger Fry, T. F. Powys, Norman Douglas and Baron Corvo. This is a list which only one other library of modern reprints can rival. Every good wish must be extended to the Phoenix Library for its future.
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