This sumptuous reissue of the twelve prints in both their monochrome and their hand-coloured versions, complete with Piper’s accompanying text (“written in the manner of a postcard to an intelligent godchild”, according to one critic) and Lord Alfred Douglas’s quaint introduction (reminiscing, slightly inaccurately, about boyhood visits to Brighton with his father), with a meticulously researched and well-illustrated commentary by Alan Powers on the background, conception, production and reception of the book, will delight devotees alike of Piper’s idiosyncratic artwork and of Brighton – that “siren among watering places, something between a mermaid and a barmaid” (in the words of William Plomer, reviewing the book in December 1939). — TLS Review by Graham Chainey - April 17, 2020
