[V. S. Pritchett] … has been writing good short stories for many years. He is … no longer at the top of his form, but the leading story in The Camberwell Beauty is quite equal to work he did in his prime. One of Pritchett's great advantages as a writer—and one which is becoming rarer as our cultures become more fragmented—is his ability to create a variety of backgrounds: he is not tied, as so many writers are, to a single and usually restricted world. "The Camberwell Beauty" takes place among antique dealers, the best imaginable milieu for the development of its Jamesian theme. Pritchett convinces us that dealers are collectors before they are businessmen: each has his specialty, porcelain or silver or rare miniatures: buying and selling furniture is simply a means toward an avaricious end. The Camberwell Beauty is a girl, loved by a young man...