Imagined Selves

The collected novels and cultural commentary of one of Scotland’s greatest literary talents and an early twentieth century feminist pioneer.

The author of two classic novels as well as numerous translations of Franz Kafka, Hermann Broch, and others, Willa Muir was one of the finest and fiercest intellectuals of the early twentieth century—even as she was overshadowed by her husband, the poet Edwin Muir. This volume gathers together some of her most important works, representing her many voices and lives, both real and imagined.

Muir’s writing is rich with paradox: though she was obsessively Scottish in subject and style, she openly resented Scotland; though a trenchant champion of feminism, she voluntarily sacrificed her identity to that of the ‘poet’s wife’; and although she was a committed reformer, she never aligned herself with any political or ideological movement. These passionate dichotomies are intertwined in her writing, giving a particular power to her fiction and non-fiction alike.

This collection offers a sense of the diversity of Willa Muir’s oeuvre, including both novels—Imagined Corners and Mrs. Ritche—as well as her provocative essays on gender, history, and culture. It makes possible the re-evaluation of her work and assures her of a deserved place in the Scottish literary canon.