Point Lace and Diamonds

Ballrooms, fashionable dresses and romantic daydreams give George Augustus Baker plenty to tease in this collection of verse. A weary writer abandons his walking holiday for fashionable company, then looks back with amusement at his own youthful poetry. Other speakers turn alphabet reform into a courtship joke or let memories of a dance interrupt a classroom problem. Rhyming stanzas and conversational voices make the social comedy feel close to overheard talk.

The mood changes in "Eight Hours," where a young working woman describes long days, a persistent cough and the embarrassment of being unable to write her name. Her employer's daughter can travel abroad while she struggles to find time for flowers or schooling. Alongside these sharply observed contrasts, a retelling of Sleeping Beauty gives the familiar fairy tale a moral reading. Readers can follow the collection for its quick jokes, shifting voices and attention to the distance between comfort and hardship.