The Mount is sad to hear of the death of Miles Huddleston, book publisher and bibliophile. While working at the U.K. publishing house Constable (now Constable and Robinson) he was responsible for the reissue of Edith Wharton's works. Wharton's literary reputation had suffered in the years after her death, particularly in 1947, when Percy Lubbock (an ostensible friend) published his "Portrait of Edith Wharton" which, to quote Hermione Lee (Wharton's most recent biographer), made Wharton "sound like the character played by Margaret Dumont in the Marx Brothers films."
Constable's decision to reprint her works was in no small measure responsible for the restoration of her reputation, and we thank Miles Huddleston for his championship of her work. Here is his obituary in The Guardian.
