Where Nothing Sleeps: The The Complete Short Stories and Other Related Works

Edited by James Methuen-Campbell

This definitive collection of seventy-six short stories and related autobiographical writings, presented in the two volumes of Where Nothing Sleeps, is suffused with the paradoxical appeal of Denton Welch: his self-obsession and Gothic morbidity of outlook, ranged against his dogged individualism and ability to charm and fascinate the reader with the 'freshness and pin-point detail of his perceptions'.

Admired by literary luminaries as diverse as William Burroughs and Edith Sitwell, Welch, author of Maiden Voyage, was only thirty-three at his death in 1948. An Old Boy of Repton and Goldsmiths' College, he had a memorably idiosyncratic personality and never lost his feeling of being excluded from society in general, perhaps because of his early childhood in China and, as he became aware later in life, his homosexuality. But the fact that he was able to rise above severe physical infirmities inflicted by a tragic road accident when he was twenty to create some memorable writing and artwork, demonstrates that he also possessed a remarkable strength of character.

James Methuen-Campbell is the author of the biography Denton Welch, Writer and Artist (Tartarus Press, 2002) and has also written on classical music, specialising in the history of piano playing. His book, Chopin Playing (Gollancz, 1981) has appeared in three editions. In recent years he has developed his interest in art, ranging from the Old Masters to Modern British Painters.

Where Nothing Sleeps is a slipcased set of two sewn hardback books of 380 and 390 pages.

Limited to 500 sets