There are ten versions of this subject. The image was one Gwen John continued to explore over a number of years, and more is known about the sequence of its creation than is usual with Gwen John's 'sets' of pictures. One version had certainly been largely completed in 1919. An undated letter written by Gwen John in the autumn of that year refers to it as a work in progress and one which she was about to complete for her friend Isabel Bowser. "I will finish the little painting," Gwen John wrote. "It is called *The Convalescent*. I was going to say to Isabel, 'It doesn't matter about the title, does it, Isabel? No doubt she was cured by Christian Science.' That was a sort of joke." Other completed versions can be traced to the early twenties: one was owned by John Quinn and was acquired by him in either 1922 or 1925; one was purchased by Charles Rutherston from the Salon des Tuileries exhibition in 1924 where it was shown as *La lettre*; one was brought over from Meudon in 1925 by Ethel Nettleship (Ida John's sister) and sold to Dorothy Samuel (née Salaman) as *Girl Reading*. Gwen John told Mrs. Samuel in a letter dated 31 December 1925: "The 'girl reading' was painted about the Spring two years ago." The version known as *The Precious Book* was done in 1926. The version was purchased in 1936 by Chloë and Grilda Boughton-Leigh. It is mentioned in their correspondence with Gwen John under the title *The Letter*.

The pictures were painted in one of the rooms of Gwen John's little flat on the top floor of the building at 29 rue Terre Neuve, Meudon. In all of them, the girl is shown in the same pose except for the position of the hands, which in some versions are held slightly higher than in others. In all but two versions, the teapot and the pink cup appear. They are replaced by a book and a plate in the versions where the girl is holding a book instead of a letter, and in the 'book' version, the girl wears a little shawl around her shoulders.

A pencil sketch of this subject was given by Gwen John to her friend Véra Oumançoff. It bore the title *La convalescente* in Gwen John's hand. The date it also bore, 4 June 1929, referred to the day when the gift was made and not to the date of execution.

The National Gallery of South Australia owns a picture by Gwen John called *The Convalescent* which does not belong to this series.