“‘Literary Frivolities’ is an absolutely delightful companion for an unoccupied half-hour. It is a book which may with equal pleasure be read all through or dipped into at any point, and the collection of literary triflings it supplies is admirably ample.”—Gentleman’s Magazine.
“This is a pleasant and amusing little volume. It contains a great deal of curious information, and shows a very creditable amount of research.... We may end as we began, by commending ‘Literary Frivolities’ as a capital book of its sort.”—Athenæum.
“This latest volume of the bright little ‘Mayfair Library’ is an entertaining contribution to the literature of ‘inert hours,’ and will sufficiently initiate its readers into all the mysteries of bouts-rimés, palindromes, lipograms, centones and figurate poems.”—Notes and Queries.
“A more delightful little work it has seldom been our lot to take in hand. Mr. Dobson has made a study of all the eccentricities and frivolities which have from time to time been perpetrated by writers in prose and verse.... Mr. Dobson had gone into his work in a catholic spirit, and has done it with great neatness and ability. It would be difficult to commend the book too highly. It is a volume alike for holiday purposes, and for other purposes more serious in connection with literature.”—Scotsman.
“Mr. Dobson has done his work well.... The book is very interesting and entertaining, and has a still higher claim to our regard as a curious chapter in the history of literature.”—Examiner.
“Not a few of the pages will raise a hearty laugh, and this fact alone disposes us to regard the book with marked favour. A good index has not been forgotten, and the volume in all ways reflects high credit on its author.”—Brief.
“This is a queer collection of interesting nothings, a record of some of the literary playthings wherewith men have sought at one time and another to beguile the road towards the darkness. Here are quips and cranks, strange forms of prose and verse; monstrosities of rhythms. It is all very interesting, and shows a heavy amount of research on the part of the compiler.”—Vanity Fair.
“Great fun is shown in almost every page of ‘Literary Frivolities.’... The ‘Mayfair Library’ will do well if it gives us many books like Mr. Dobson’s.”—Graphic.
“It is quite certain that there have been thousands of not only intelligent, but grave and learned persons who have taken pride as well as pleasure in the accomplishment of such exploits, and that there are tens of thousands who will be greatly entertained, if not roused to emulation, by the pretty little volume consecrated to the commemoration and to illustrative samples of those exploits.... It is provided with an index, a very useful addition, and it is undoubtedly a bright, amusing, and not altogether uninstructive publication.”—Illustrated London News.
“Mr. Dobson deserves credit for the pains he has taken.”—Spectator.