The Vanity Girl (1st,, Signed)

Sir Edward Montague Compton Mackenzie, OBE (1883 - 1972) was a Scottish writer of fiction, biography, histories and a memoir, as well as a cultural commentator, raconteur and lifelong Scottish nationalist. He was one of the co-founders in 1928 of the National Party of Scotland along with Hugh MacDiarmid, Cunninghame Graham and John MacCormick. The Vanity Girl is one of Mackenzie's early novels and is set in early 20th-century West Kensington, chronicling the life of Norah Caffyn, a spirited and ambitious young woman yearning to escape the constraints of her conservative, middle-class household. Surrounded by a large family and dominated by her overbearing father, Norah struggles with societal expectations and her own desire for independence and artistic expression. Her beauty and determination lead her to reject a conventional engagement in favor of pursuing a career on the stage, symbolizing her rebellion against domestic banality and the pursuit of self-identity. The story blends humor and social critique to explore themes of vanity, ambition, and the shifting roles of women in modern society. This copy is Good+ in blue cloth with gilt titles on the spine and blind-stamped titles on the front cover. The spine is faded where the jacket had chipped at the top and bottom of the spine. Corners and spine ends are bumped. End papers show some age darkening, but the contents are otherwise unmarked and undamaged. The unclipped dust jacket is quite sun darkened on the jacket spine, and there are large chips missing at the top and bottom of the jacket spine. (See photos) The author has inscribed the book to the notable collector, Herbert Marx Meyer, and dated it 1930. Signed copies are quite scarce, particularly with the original jacket. Herbert Marx Meyer (1903-1988) was a noted Detroit book collector who assembled a large collection of early 20th century literature. He corresponded with many of the authors of the time, and thus many of his books bear friendly and warm authorial inscriptions. . PO25.…