These volumes are in preparation

SINISTER STREET

_By COMPTON MACKENZIE_

LONDON: MARTIN SECKER

NUMBER FIVE JOHN STREET ADELPHI MCMXIII

TO
THE REVEREND
E. D. STONE

_My dear Mr. Stone,_

_Since you have on several occasions deprecated the length of my books,
I feel that your name upon the dedicatory page of this my longest book
deserves explanation, if not apology._

_When I first conceived the idea of 'Sinister Street,' I must admit I
did not realize that in order to present my theme fully in accord with
my own prejudice, I should require so much space. But by the time I had
written one hundred pages I knew that, unless I was prepared against my
judgment to curtail the original scheme, I must publish my book in a
form slightly different from the usual._

_The exigencies of commercial production forbid a six shilling novel of
eight or nine hundred pages, and as I saw no prospect of confining
myself even to that length, I decided to publish in two volumes, each to
contain two divisions of my tale._

_You will say that this is an aggravation of the whole matter and the
most impenitent sort of an apology. Yet are a thousand pages too long
for the history of twenty-five years of a man's life, that is to say if
one holds as I hold that childhood makes the instrument, youth tunes the
strings, and early manhood plays the melody?_

_The tradition of the English novel has always favoured length and
leisure; nor do I find that my study of French and Russian literature
leads me to strain after brevity. I do not send forth this volume as the
first of a trilogy. It is actually the first half of a complete book. At
the same time, feeling as I do that in these days of competitive
reading, the sudden vision of over a thousand pages would be inevitably
depressing, I give you the opportunity of rest at the five-hundredth
page, which reaches a climax at least as conclusive as any climax can be
that is not death. I do not pretend that I shall not be greatly
disappointed if next January or February you feel disinclined to read
'Dreaming Spires' and 'Romantic Education,' which will complete the
second volume. Yet I will be so considerate as to find someone else to
bear the brunt of dedication, and after all there will be no compulsion
either upon you or upon the public to resume._

_Yours ever affectionately,_

_Compton Mackenzie._

_Let me add in postscript that 'Sinister Street' is a symbolic title