Elspet is the older sister of Elizabeth Keith. Elspet ran the New East publishing company in Tokyo for
several years starting in 1915 with her husband, John Robertson Scott. In doing so, she came to understand
the history and culture of Korea and Japan. When James S. Gale, a missionary, translated and published a
Korean classical novel, The Cloud Dream of the Nine, in 1922, Elspet wrote the introduction. It was Elspet
who invited her sister Elizabeth to Japan and visited Korea with her in 1919. The sisters joined hands in
coauthoring Old Korea, which tells the story of Korea’s reality under the colonial rule of Japan. Elizabeth
created the paintings and captions, and Elspet wrote the text.