Walter de la Mare: Anthologist

"De la Mare's anthologies should be numbered among his creative works; for in them the quoted passages are woven together on a web of imaginative comment as highly wrought and as often as long as the quotations themselves; so that the whole emerges less as a collection of other men's writings than an expression of the thoughts aroused in the anthologists by these writings, and coloured by the mood in which he read them. These anthologies represent a new literary form invented by Mr de la Mare, which he has employed as yet another mode to express his unique vision of reality."
           Lord David Cecil

In addition to his Poetry, Prose and Critical Writings, de la Mare also compiled and edited a number of individualistic - and acclaimed - Anthologies of poetry and prose for both adults and children. The most significant of these are Come Hither (1923), Desert Islands (1930), Early One Morning in the Spring (1935), Behold, This Dreamer (1939), Animal Stories (1939), and Love (1943).

                                                                

Come Hither, illustrated by Alec Buckels, London, Constable, 1923; London, Constable, 1928

Readings: Traditional Tales Told by Author, illustrated by A.H. Watson and C.T. Nightingale, six volumes, Blackwell, 1925-28; one volume, Knopf, 1927

Desert Islands, and Robinson Crusoe, illustrated by Rex Whistler, London, Faber, 1930

Tom Tiddler's Ground: A Book of Poetry for the Junior and Middle Schools, illustrations from Thomas Bewick, three volumes, Collins, 1931; illustrated by Margery Gill, one volume, Knopf, 1962

Old Rhymes and New, Chosen for Use in Schools, two volumes, Constable, 1932

Early One Morning In The Spring, London, Faber, 1935

Behold, This Dreamer, London, Faber, 1939

Animal Stories, Chosen, Arranged, and in Some Part Re-Written, London, Faber, 1939; Scribner, 1940

Love, decorations by Barnett Freedman, London, Faber, 1943