My Japanese Wife

Holland's rare fascination with his Japanese wife is described beautifully in "My Japanese Wife: A Japanese Idyl" and nourishes the turn-of-the-century growing obsession with the exotic. "Mousmé is leaning over me as I write. Mousmé, a butterfly from a far Eastern land, her dress of apricot silk, with a magenta satin obi (sash), a blot of bright colour in the dulness of my English study. My Mousmé! with Dresden-china tinted cheeks, and tiny ways; playing at life, as it always seems to me, with the dainty grace of Japan, that idealised doll's-house land."