It tells how a teenage girl, Tessa Sanger, falls in love with a family friend, who eventually marries her cousin.

[3] The character and appearance of the composer Lewis Dodd was based on the artist Henry Lamb, who was a gifted pianist.

Attributes of Albert Sanger were taken from Augustus John, particular the artists' colony he set up in 1911 at Alderney Manor.

[6] Margaret Kennedy and Basil Dean adapted The Constant Nymph for a three-act play that was published by Doubleday, Page and Company (Garden City, N.Y.) in 1926.

[9] A third film adaptation in 1943 featured Charles Boyer, Joan Fontaine, and Alexis Smith.