Editing E. F. Benson (section)

==Works==
[[File:Title Page of Miss Mapp.png|thumb|right|190px|Title page of ''Miss Mapp'', 1922.]]

Benson was a precocious and prolific writer. His first book was ''Sketches from Marlborough'', published while he was a student. He started his novel-writing career with the (then) fashionably controversial ''Dodo'' (1893),{{Explain|date=September 2023}} which was an instant success,{{Citation needed|date=September 2023}} and followed it with a variety of satire and romantic and supernatural melodrama. He repeated the success of ''Dodo'', which featured a [[List of composers in literature|scathing description]] of composer and militant suffragette [[Ethel Smyth]],{{refn|Ethel Smyth "gleefully acknowledged" the description, according to actress [[Prunella Scales]].<ref name=scales />|group=Note}} with the same cast of characters a generation later: ''Dodo the Second'' (1914), "a unique chronicle of the pre-1914 [[Bright Young People|Bright Young Things]]" and ''Dodo Wonders'' (1921), "a first-hand [[social history]] of the [[World War I|Great War]] in [[Mayfair]] and the [[Shire]]s".<ref name=scales>Introduction by Prunella Scales to [https://archive.org/details/dodoomnibus0000bens ''Dodo: An Omnibus'']. Introduction in 1986 edition from The Hogarth Press. Original publication of novels 1893, 1914, 1921.</ref>

The [[Mapp and Lucia (novel series)|Mapp and Lucia]] series, written relatively late in his career, consists of six novels and two short stories. The novels are: ''[[Queen Lucia]]'', ''[[Miss Mapp]]'', ''[[Lucia in London]]'', ''[[Mapp and Lucia]]'', ''Lucia's Progress'' (published as ''The Worshipful Lucia'' in the United States) and ''Trouble for Lucia''. The short stories are "The Male Impersonator" and "Desirable Residences". Both appear in anthologies of Benson's short stories, and the former is also often appended to the end of the novel ''Miss Mapp''.

Benson was also known as a writer of atmospheric and at times humorous or satirical [[Ghost story|ghost stories]], which often were published in story magazines such as ''[[Pearson's Magazine]]'' or ''Hutchinson's Magazine'', twenty of which were illustrated by [[Edmund Blampied]]. These "spook stories", as he called them, were reprinted in collections by his principal publisher [[Hutchinson (publisher)|Walter Hutchinson]]. His 1906 short story "The Bus-Conductor", a fatal-crash premonition tale about a person haunted by a hearse driver, has been adapted several times.{{refn|The catchphrase from "The Bus-Conductor", "Room for one more", created a legend,<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.snopes.com/horrors/ghosts/onemore.asp |title=Snopes entry on the urban legend based on the Benson story |website=Snopes.com |date=19 September 1999 |access-date=2014-04-23}}</ref> and also occurs in the 1986 [[Oingo Boingo]] song "[[Dead Man's Party (song)|Dead Man's Party]]".|group=Note}}

Benson's story ''David Blaize and the Blue Door'' (1918) is a children's fantasy influenced by the work of [[Lewis Carroll]].<ref>Morgan, Chris, "E. F. Benson" in, [[E. F. Bleiler]], ed. ''Supernatural Fiction Writers''. New York: Scribner's, 1985. pp.491–496. {{ISBN|0-684-17808-7}}</ref> "Mr Tilly's Seance" is a witty and amusing story about a man flattened by a [[traction engine]] who finds himself dead and conscious on the 'other side'. Other notable stories are the eerie "[[The Room in the Tower]]" and "Pirates".

Benson is known for a series of biographies/autobiographies and memoirs, including one of [[Charlotte Brontë]]. His last book, delivered to his publisher ten days before his death, was an autobiography titled ''Final Edition.''