The Man Who Lost Himself (1920) is a novel by Henry De Vere Stacpoole. Although he is more widely known for his novel The Blue Lagoon (1908), which inspired the 1980 hit drama starring Brooke Shields, Stacpoole was a prolific bestselling author whose dozens of literary works continue to inspire and entertain a century after they first appeared in print. “With no financial foundation, Victor and a Philadelphia gentleman had competed for a contract to supply the British Government with Harveyised steel struts, bolts, and girders; he had come over to London to press the business; he had interviewed men in brass hats, slow moving men who had turned him over to slower moving men. […] [T]his morning their tender had been rejected.” In this thrilling tale of mistaken identity, Stacpoole moves away from his favorite setting of the South Pacific to the frenzied streets and barrooms of London’s financial district. There, a desperate businessman learns that his proposal to secure a lucrative contract has been denied. With no money and a slew of creditors to appease, Victor Jones heads for the hotel bar to drown his sorrows. In his bleakest moment, he meets his doppelganger, an Englishman named Mr. Rochester. After a night of hard drinking, Jones awakens in a strange bedroom surrounded by the finest furniture money can buy. Before he can gather his senses, a servant enters with the paper and greets him as the Earl of Rochester. What he learns next will change his life forever. The Man Who Lost Himself was adapted into a 1920 silent film as well as a 1941 Hollywood feature starring Brian Aherne and Kay Francis. This edition of Henry De Vere Stacpoole’s The Man Who Lost Himself is a classic of British literature reimagined for modern readers.
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Henry De Vere Stacpoole (1863-1951) was an Irish novelist. Born in Kingstown, Ireland―now Dún Laoghaire―Stacpoole served as a ship’s doctor in the South Pacific Ocean as a young man. His experiences on the other side of the world would inspire much of his literary work, including his revered romance novel The Blue Lagoon (1908). Stacpoole wrote dozens of novels throughout his career, many of which have served as source material for feature length films. He lived in rural Essex before settling on the Isle of Wight in the 1920s, where he spent the remainder of his life.
