Max Beerbohm. It was published in 1896 at The Bodley Head, his publisher John Lane contributing a detailed bibliography of the works of the author, then aged 24. Before their publication as a book, the essays had appeared in prominent literary periodicals such as
The Yellow Book and
The Savoy. Most of the essays were written while he was a student at Oxford, although he had left Merton College in 1894. By then he was already known as a caricaturist, parodist and essayist and well acquainted with the writers and artists connected with The Bodley Head, notably Aubrey Beardsley and