Sentimental Tommy **Early Twentieth Century British Theater Associations**

London: Cassell and Company, Limited, 1907 (Fourth Printing) Hard cover, 8vo, finely bound and signed "Hatchards 187 Piccadilly" on front turn-in,(presumed by Sangorski & Sutcliffe,) in full blue morocco with decorative bandings in gilt, onlaid red circles to both boards and the spine compartments. Five raised bands terminate in hinge-like design on the boards, each finished with a three-leaf sprig tooled in blind. Board edges are gilt, as well as head and foot of spine. All text block edges gilt, pale blue end papers, with 11 black and white illustrations by the English artist, William Hatherell, R.I., 452pp., stated fourth printing.**CONDITION: About Fine. Some very small spots of rubbing to corners and edges. Offset at turn ins. ** Scottish Author J.M. Barrie ( 1860-1937), famed creator of the Peter Pan stories, as translated to both stage and screen, tells a semi-autobiographical, tragi-comic tale of the hardscrabble upbringing of young Tommy and Elspeth Sandys and their widowed mother Jean. Like Barrie himself, the characters hail from an extremely small rural Scottish village. After a life-changing incident involving the bullying and alienation of her true love, Jean finds herself cast out (literally pelted with stones) and forced to relocate to London, marries to a n'er-do-well gambler, who dies, leaving the family destitute. Themes include the dislocations of economic migration of rural Scots to London, their attempts to maintain cultural identity in the Big Smoke through shared language, celebrations and other communal activities. There is description of the effects of childhood illness and death, life in the tenements, domestic violence, drunkenness, mental illness, the plight of single mothers, as well as lampooning of patrician attempts at poor relief. In the face of a hard life, Tommy and his younger sister must adapt, and the use of their imagination plays a large role in their survival. It has been said that the story reflects some of the life-experience of the Author, who lost his mother and older brother at an impressionably young age and was forced by circumstances to move to London. **The book carries an inscription dated January 1910 from the noted British Actor and Aviator Robert Loraine (1876-1935) to Lady Bancroft. Loraine, from New Brighton, Cheshire, had a distinguished career both in London and upon the Broadway stage, playing serious as well as comedic roles. He introduced the George Bernard Shaw play "Man and Superman" to Broadway in 1905, also taking roles in plays by Shakespeare and Strindberg (TMDb). After learning to fly in France, he would have a trailblazing flight from across the Irish Sea from Britain in 1910, celebrated on a cigarette card in the collection at the New York Public Library : "So Famous British Fliers No. 6." He was awarded the DSO, MC for his military service both in the Second Boer War and as an RAF pilot in World War One. Lady Helen Bancroft, the book's addressee, was similarly an actor-manager of the British stage, and there is enclosed an original photo of her with her husband, fellow actor Squire Bancroft. ** Lady Helen Bancroft (1839-1921) was a child star who grew up on stage, playing mainly light comedic roles, beginning in the 1860's. With her husband Squire Bancroft, she would eventually co-manage the Prince of Wales Theater in London's West End, and after 1879, The Haymarket Theater. He was knighted in 1897. The couple introduced the concept of "drawing room comedy, and box sets. Lady Bancroft also wrote three plays and a novel, residing at The Albany, Piccadilly. More can be read at The Bancrofts: Recollections of Sixty Years (Dutton and Co.: London, 1909.) The book appears to have then been "re-gifted" to a Helen Rae also at The Albany, where a number of well-known British actors have resided over the years. The book was made into a movie, now lost, in 1921, starring Welshman Gareth Hughes as Tommy. . Inscribed by Actor-Aviator Robert Loraine to London Theater Owner Lady Bancroft. Hard Cover. FINE. Illus. by W. Hatherell, R.I..