Penelope Lively and Kamila Shamsie curate women's vote centenary reissues

Pair have chosen neglected books by female writers for a series launching to coincide with February’s anniversary of the Representation of the People Act

From a neglected novel for adults by the beloved children’s author E Nesbit to a provocative short-story collection from the Urdu writer Ismat Chughtai, a new series of “forgotten” classics by female authors is being launched by Penguin next year to mark the centenary of women getting the vote in the UK.

Penguin asked the authors Penelope Lively and Kamila Shamsie to choose two titles by women writers they “felt deserved to be better known in the UK”. Conscious that “writers can disappear, unread by later generations; certain books can be sidelined, where others by the same writer survive”, Lively plumped for Nesbit’s The Lark, first published in 1922. She called it “a charming and brilliantly entertaining novel … shot through with the lighthearted Nesbit touch”. The book sees two 18-year-old cousins left to earn their own living when their guardian gambles away their money.

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