After writing several novels which were reasonably successful Frances Browne turned her mind to the writing of stories for children. None of these, however, compared with the remarkable story of the present volume, for it has minutely described scenes which were imagined by a writer who could see nothing with any eyes but those of the mind, for she had been blind since birth.

Irish-born and daughter of a village postmaster, Frances Browne—she was living with a sister in Edinburgh when she wrote her books—was fortunate in having the Irish fairy-stories of her childhood to lead her into their gossamer-strewn ways, to touch her fancy with their magic, and to colour the whole of Granny's Wonderful Chair. Here each story in the book makes a complete picture, and the pictures are kept in their places, pinned down to reality by delightful touches of humour. Of the wonderful chair Dame Frostyface says in the beginning of the story: "it was made by a cunning fairy who lived in the forest when I was young, and she gave it to me because she knew nobody would keep what they got hold of better." How did a writer who had never seen a coach or a palace, or the picture of a coach or palace, tell of these things? Whence came her vision of the old woman who weaved her own hair into grey cloth at a crazy loom: of the fortified city in the plain, with cornfields and village; of floors of ebony and ceilings of silver? Had her descriptions been borrowed, the wonder of them would cease. But her words are her won, and they are used sparingly, as by one who sees too vividly what she is describing to add on unnecessary or indistinct touch. From the dust jacket of the Children's Illustrated Classics edition of Granny's Wonderful Chair published by J.M. Dent and Sons