For some years after his death in 1940, E.F. Benson was a forgotten man of English letters, remembered only by a few enthusiasts of his supernatural fiction. But over the last decade this has all changed, as successful TV adaptations of his comic masterpieces, the "Mapp and Lucia" stories, have transformed his reputation and led to the reissue of his best comic novels. Now, Jack Adrian, an authority on twentieth-century popular fiction, has brought...