Editing Arthur Ransome (section)

==Writing career==
After a year at Yorkshire College, he abandoned his studies and went to London to become a writer. He took low-paying jobs as an office assistant in a publishing company and as editor of a failing magazine, ''[[Temple Bar Magazine]]'', while establishing himself as a member of the literary scene.

Some of Ransome's early works were ''The Nature Books for Children'', a series of children's books commissioned by Anthony Treherne. Only three of the six planned volumes were published before the publisher went bankrupt. They are available on the ''[[All Things Ransome]]'' website.<ref>[http://allthingsransome.net/literary/naturebooks.html ''Nature Books for Children'' PDFs]</ref>

In his first important book, ''[[Bohemia in London]]'' (1907), Ransome introduced the history of the city's [[Bohemianism|Bohemian]] literary and artistic communities and some of its current representatives. A curiosity in 1903 about a visiting Japanese poet, [[Yone Noguchi]], led to an ongoing friendship with Japanese painter (and [[Chelsea, London|Chelsea]] neighbour) [[Yoshio Markino]], who in turn introduced him to the Bohemian circle of [[Pamela Colman Smith]], an artist best known for illustrating the [[Rider–Waite tarot deck]].

Ransome married Ivy Constance Walker in 1909 and they had one daughter, Tabitha. It was not a happy marriage; Ransome found his wife's demands to spend less time on writing and more with her and their daughter a great strain; his biographer [[Hugh Brogan]] writes that "it was impossible to be a good husband to Ivy". They divorced in 1924.<ref>Brogan (1984), pp 84; 281</ref>

Ransome began writing books of biography and literary criticism on various authors; one on [[Edgar Allan Poe]] was published in 1910 and another on [[Oscar Wilde]] in 1912. However, the latter embroiled him in a libel suit with [[Lord Alfred Douglas]]. His wife attended the 1913 trial, sitting in the public gallery as Ransome would not let her sit beside him. Her apparent enjoyment of the public notoriety the case attracted added to the stress on their marriage. The publisher Daniel Macmillan dined with the couple every day during the trial so that Ivy could not quarrel with Arthur.<ref name= Brogan90>Brogan (1984), p 90</ref> Ransome won the suit, supported by [[Robbie Ross]], the editor of ''[[De Profundis (letter)|De Profundis]]''. Douglas was bankrupted by the failed libel suit.<ref>[https://www.thegazette.co.uk/Edinburgh/issue/12530/page/77 The Edinburgh Gazette Publication date:17 January 1913 Issue: 12530, Page 77]</ref> Ransome did, however, remove the offending passages from the second edition of his book<ref>Ransome, Arthur, ''Oscar Wilde – A Critical Study'', 2nd edition, Methuen, 1913</ref> and refused all interviews, despite the obvious publicity value.<ref>Chambers (2009) p 69</ref>

Adding to Ransome's "wretched" 13 months waiting for the case to come to trial was the action of his publisher, [[Charles Granville]]. ''Oscar Wilde, a critical study'' had been prepared under the guidance of publisher [[Martin Secker]], but Granville had promised better returns and a guaranteed and steady income. Secker agreed to release the rights, and Ransome handed ''Poe'' and ''Wilde'' over to Granville. The work on Wilde was well received and successful, running to eight editions, but Ransome saw little in return; in 1912 Granville was charged with embezzlement and fled the country, leaving Ransome to struggle even to register himself as a creditor of Granville's ruined company. Furthermore, his neglect of his health (he suffered from [[Hemorrhoid|piles]] and a [[peptic ulcer|stomach ulcer]]) had been exacerbated by the pressure of defending the legal action.<ref>Brogan (1984), pp 77; 84</ref>
Ransome had also been working on a similar literary biography of [[Robert Louis Stevenson]], but that was abandoned with the manuscript in the first draft and not rediscovered until 1999. It was subsequently edited and finally published almost a century later in 2011 as ''Arthur Ransome's Long-lost Study of Robert Louis Stevenson''.

As an enthusiast for [[detective fiction]], between 1939 and 1940 Ransome contributed to ''[[The Observer]]'' as a reviewer of new detective novels, using the pen-name of ''William Blunt''.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Lovelock |first1=Julian |title=Swallows, Amazons and Coots : a reading of Arthur Ransome |date=2016 |publisher=[[The Lutterworth Press|Lutterworth]]|location=Cambridge, United Kingdom |isbn=9780718894368 |page=153}}</ref>