Lucas Malet

Malet, Lucas [Mary St. Leger Kingsley] (1852– 1931). English novelist. In September 1901, Methuen published what would be their longest and perhaps most controversial novel, Lucas Malet’s The History of Sir Richard Calmady . Originally contracted in 1894, the much-anticipated book, a candid treatment of the life of a disabled aristocrat, was an instant bestseller. In 1901, it was second only to Rudyard Kipling ’s Kim [O’Connell 2012: pp. 108– 22]). But the book, which controversially featured a (later excised) scene of genital stimulation, met with mixed reviews. One Times reviewer proclaimed the novel “an offence against good taste [and] manners,” while William L. Alden remarked that the book would rank its author “high on the roll of living English novelists” (“Recent Novels” 1901: p. 12; Alden 1901: p. 722). And yet despite Malet’s commercial and critical success in her own lifetime, she is little-known today.