The Late Scholar The Late Scholar The Late Scholar is the fourth Lord Peter Wimsey-Harriet Vane detective novel written by Jill Paton Walsh. Featuring characters created by Dorothy L. Sayers, it was written with the co-operation and approval of Sayers' estate. It was published by Hodder & Stoughton (whose "yellow jackets" are alluded to in the book) on December 5, 2013 in the UK, and on January 14, 2014 in North America. "The Late Scholar" features the former Lord Peter Wimsey—now the Duke of Denver—and his wife, the former Harriet Vane, and is set in a fictional Oxford college called St. Severin's, mostly
Lord Peter Wimsey Marx, and well able to debate with Marxists on their home ground. The only occasion when Sayers returned to Wimsey was the 1942 short story "Talboys". The war at that time devastating Europe received only a single oblique reference. Though Sayers lived until 1957, she never again took up the Wimsey books after this final effort. In effect, rather than killing off her detective, as Conan Doyle unsuccessfully tried with his, Sayers pensioned Wimsey off to a happy, satisfying old age. Thus, Peter Wimsey remained forever fixed on the background of inter-war England, and the books are nowadays often read