In the following essay, Mulford traces Warner's literary development throughout the 1930s.

In the following essay, Castle discusses Warner's Summer Will Show as a lesbian novel.

In the following essay, Knoll perceives Lolly Willowes as a novel that explores the dualism between male aggression and female passivity.

In the following essay, Steinman considers The Elements of Lavishness a testament to the true friendship between Warner and editor William Maxwell.

In the following review, Perényi asserts that Warner's work is difficult to categorize and has resulted in a lack of sufficient critical attention to her oeuvre.

In the excerpt below, Crossley compares the elfin worlds of Warner and J. R. R. Tolkien.

In the following review, Kermode notes the insights that Warner's diaries provide into her life.

In the following review, Panter-Downes offers a laudatory review of Warner's collected letters as well as an overview of the author's life and work.

In the following review, which was originally published in The New Republic in 1966, Updike comments on the "genius" of Warner's writing.

In the following review, Feaver considers Warner's poetic output, contending that “more real cause of regret, however, considering the strangely compelling quality of her best work, is that poetry was for most of her life a peripheral and not a major concern.”

In the following review, Davis notes an uneven quality in the sketches in Scenes of Childhood and reflects on her meeting with the author.

In the following interview, which was conducted in 1975, Warner discusses her writing career and political views.

In the following excerpt, Brothers examines Warner's contributions to the body of literature inspired by the Spanish Civil War.

In the following review, Howard provides a positive review of Warner's collected letters and poetry and addresses the lack of critical attention to her oeuvre.

In the following favorable review of Selected Stories, Yardley maintains that however diverse Warner's stories “may be in tone and settings, her stories are all noteworthy for their graceful, witty prose and their tough, uncompromising intelligence.”

In the following excerpted review, Howard contends that “though the individual pieces in Scenes of Childhood are charming, bright, and well-turned, I think that book as a whole does Miss Warner's memory a disservice.”

In the following essay, Cavaliero lauds Warner's literary skill and "ability to celebrate the singular without declining into singularity. "

In the following review, Chisholm offers a favorable review of The Diaries of Sylvia Townsend Warner.

In the following review, Duchêne describes Warner's prose as "witty, warmhearted, [and well-mannered," but questions the selection and editing of the stories in One Thing Leading to Another.]

The critic offers a mixed assessment of the stories in A Garland of Straw.

In the following excerpt, Trilling claims Warner is "an accomplished practitioner of her craft," but finds fault with artistic practices of the generation of writers to which Warner belongs.

In the following excerpt, Vannatta deems Warner's short fiction pure and economical.

In the following review, Smith says that while Warner is dextrous and sharp in her presentation of the elfin world to the reader, behind it all "the reader senses the author's fundamental skepticism. "

In the following review, Hay praises Winter in the Air, and Other Stories, calling it "rewarding and stimulating."

In the following review, Southron claims that in The Cat's Cradle Warner is "at her most beguiling best. "

In the following excerpt, Vannatta provides a positive assessment of The Museum of Cheats.

In this review, Annan describes Warner's prose as "poetic and . . . mystical. "

In the following review, Hilton praises The Museum of Cheats, adding that, to fully enjoy the stories, "one must listen as well as read. "

In the following review, Burnett pronounces Warner's style in the stories of A Spirit Rises lucid and graceful.

In the following review, Rainer acknowledges Warner's technical skills but finds Winter in the Air, and Other Stories lacking in imagination.

[Kingdoms of Elfin] was a return to the earlier fantasy modality of [Sylvia Townsend Warner's] first masterpiece, Lolly Willowes, published half a century previously. Re-reading it, I thought how well T. S. Eliot's 'The end is where we start from … where every word is at home' … applied both to her books and her informal letter-writing which captured the essence of her personality. At first sight it seems strange that Lolly Willowes with its amiable witch-heroine, f...

In the following review, Toulson calls One Thing Leading to Another, and Other Stories "a good collection" that includes some characters who showcase Warner "at her sharpest and funniest. "

This collection of tales by Sylvia Townsend Warner is, to say the least, cause for celebration…. ["Kingdoms of Elfin"] has all the freshness, wit, originality of perception and clarity of insight that have won for her rhythmical prose so many admirers over so long a time. It offers us an unforgettable journey through time and space, a cast of truly fantastic characters and an impressive and seemingly unending display of verbal fireworks. Sylvia Townsend Warner's fairyland kingdom...

In the following review of A Spirit Rises, Faverty appreciates Warner's ability to create an atmosphere in which the elements of her story seem believable.

In the review below, Holsaert gives a favorable assessment of the stories in The Museum of Cheats, saying that Warner's "skilled guidance" allows ordinary characters to be "unexpectedly entertaining. "

Written, Peter Pears explains in his preface, during the last years of her life, most of the poems [in Sylvia Townsend Warner's Twelve Poems] are concerned with old age and death. They range from a defiant monologue delivered from the floor by Queen Elizabeth as she lies dying ("like a race of trees" her people "sway, sigh, nod heads, rustle" above her) to four lines of dry epigrammatic comment on the difference between first and second childhood. Several of the poems retu...

In the following excerpt from a review of Winter in the Air, Arrowsmith describes Warner as being "an almost flawless writer" within a narrow range of fiction.

In the following excerpt, Long comments on the "sophistication" and "imagination" of Warner's stories in The Innocent and the Guilty.

[The stories in Kingdoms of Elfin] are fairy stories…. The elfin kingdoms over or underlie (mostly under, because they tend to be subterranean) Europe, and their inhabitants share the traditionally accepted characteristics of their human counterparts. Thus the elfins of the Kingdom of Wirre Gedanken … are given to metaphysical speculation; on the English side of the Scottish border the fairies are comparatively uncouth and deplorably indifferent to physical comfort; in Elfhame on the Scottish ...

In the following excerpt from a review of The Kingdoms of Elfin, Williams praises Warner's prose as "a delight. "

In Kingdoms of Elfin,… Sylvia Townsend Warner … never condescends to an ethereal race that views mortals as "unfailingly serious and unfailingly absurd." Instead, she talks about fairies without being fey and creates a texture for the intangible. Each of the book's 16 stories … can fly on its own. Taken together, they form both a whimsical saga of invisible dynasties and an extended commentary on Homo sapiens. Warner's elves are in many ways mirror images of ...

In the following excerpt, Jennings finds that the stories in Winter in the Air reflect Warner's perceptivity about people and her strong sense of place.

The late Miss Warner, whose more than half century of brilliantly varied and superbly self-possessed literary production never won her the flaming place in the heavens of reputation that she deserved, began as a poet … [and retained] magic and music in her prose. Her last book … was a series of vivacious matter-of-fact short stories about elves, collected a year before her death as "Kingdoms of Elfin."… Her first novel ["Lolly Willowes"] finds her already mov...

[Twelve Poems] is more in the nature of a pendant to [Sylvia Townsend Warner's] work and a memorial to her talent than of very great importance in a literary sense. The twelve short poems show an honest and admirable character, bearing the heavy weight of history and rural tradition, old age and the approach of death. Assonance and rhyme are used…. Some poems are epigrammatic, some are like Hardy ('Dorset Endearments'). The best is 'Graveyard in Norfolk', which is e...