A Holiday In The Happy Valley With Pen And Pencil (dodo Press)

"I observe that it is customary to begin a book by an Introduction, Preface, or Foreword. In the good old days of the eighteenth century this generally took the form of a burst of grovelling adoration aimed at some most noble or otherwise highly important person. This fulsome fawning on the great was later changed into propitiation of the British public, and unknown authors revelled in excuses for publishing their earlier efforts."