In chapter three of his autobiographical sketch, Something of Myself, Rudyard Kipling (1865 - 1936) says of Sir Walter Besant’s romantic novel All in a Garden Fair:

…But the work was heavy. I represented fifty per cent of the ‘editorial staff’ of the one daily paper of the Punjab — a small sister of the great Pioneer at Allahabad under the same proprietorship. And a daily paper comes out every day even though fifty per cent of the staff have fever….



…This is fit place for a ‘pivot’ experience to be set side by side with the affair of the Adjutant of Volunteers at the Club. It happened one hotweather evening, in 1886 or thereabouts, when I felt that I had come to the edge of all endurance. As I entered my empty house in the dusk there was no more in me except the horror of a great darkness, that I must have been fighting for some days. I came through that darkness alive, but how I do not know. Late at night I picked up a book by Walter Besant which was called All in a Garden Fair. It dealt with a young man who desired to write; who came to realise the possibilities of common things seen, and who eventually succeeded in his desire. What its merits may be from today’s ‘literary’ standpoint I do not know. But I do know that that book was my salvation in sore personal need, and with the reading and re-reading it became to me a revelation, a hope and strength. I was certainly, I argued, as well equipped as the hero and — and — after all, there was no need for me to stay here for ever. I could go away and measure myself against the doorsills of London as soon as I had money. Therefore I would begin to save money, for I perceived there was absolutely no reason outside myself why I should not do exactly what to me seemed good. For proof of my revelation I did, sporadically but sincerely, try to save money, and I built up in my head — always with the book to fall back upon — a dream of the future that sustained me. To Walter Besant singly and solely do I owe this — as I told him when we met, and he laughed, rolled in his chair, and seemed pleased….

Sir Walter Besant lived from 1836 until 1901. He was an English novelist and humanitarian. He graduated from Christ’s College, Cambridge in 1859. Besant was one of the most widely read novelists of the late 19th century. Much of his later work dealt with social problems. He received a knighthood in 1895.

All in a Garden Fair has the structure of a three-volume novel common in the early part of the 19th century. In 1884, Chatto & Windus of London published a new edition in a single volume. It is this edition that Kipling is likely to have picked up to read after a long, hard day working on the Civil & Military Gazette. As the sub-title says: it is ‘the simple story of three boys and a girl.’

Besant sets his story in and around Hainault Forest, to the east of London near Abridge and Chigwell. It has been years since I was in the neighbourhood, but I don't remember any forest; no doubt it is now suburban development.

The story is highly descriptive, readable, well-structured, and entertaining. Interest in the story is heightened because of the large effect it had on Kipling, by his own admission. It is clear that the character Allen Engledew has remarkable similarities to Kipling, and may even be responsible for Kipling's keen interest in common people.

Besant provides some interesting observations on the workings of the financial markets in the City of London similar to the corporate chicanery recently revealed by Enron and others in the United States of America. Also, Besant has cogent remarks to make about education in general.

All in a Garden Fair is a romantic book and a good entertainment with several philosophical points worth the reader’s consideration. It has been out of print for a long time. It is also long out of copyright, so there is now no problem with reproducing it for the pleasure of readers today.