Mendel: A Story of Youth (1916) (Dora Carrington Interest)

First Canadian edition of this scarce and controversial novel about bohemian artistic life in early 20th-century.  Made from sheets of the London: Unwin, 1916 first edition (integral title leaf), the first Canadian issue may predate the UK binding. Based on Cannan’s real-life acquaintances, including the artist Mark Gertler, who served as the inspiration for the novel’s main character, Mendel Kuhler, a talented and emotionally intense Jewish painter. Cannan modelled the character of Greta Morrison, who refuses Kuhler’s romantic advances, on Dora Carrington (to whom he also dedicated the book). The book’s portrayal of these relationships stirred some controversy, with Gertler and Carrington  feeling betrayed by Cannan’s candid fictionalization of their lives. The novel also includes portraits of Edward Marsh, Augustus John, C.R.W. Nevinson, and William Rothenstein. Rothenstein, an early champion of Gertler’s talent, felt especially wounded by his portrayal under the fictional name Edgar Froitzheim. Condition:  blue cloth boards a little rubbed to extremities. Rear endpaper creased. Faint spotting to fore and top page edges as well as to endpapers and prelims, otherwise very good.