(Griffith and Farran, 1882); "Baby Blossoms," "Tangles and Curls," and
many other volumes mainly devoted to pictures of babies and their
doings, pleased a very large audience both here and in the United
States. "Dreams, Dances and Disappointments," and "The Maypole," both by
Konstan and Castella, are gracefully decorated books issued by Messrs.
De La Rue in 1882, who also published "The Fairies," illustrated by [H?]
Allingham in 1881. Major Seccombe in "Comic Sketches from History"
(Allen, 1884), and "Cinderella" (Warne, 1882), touched our theme; a
large number of more or less comic books of military life and social
satire hardly do so. Coloured books of which I have failed to discover
copies for reference, are: A. Blanchard's "My Own Dolly" (Griffith and
Farran, 1882); "Harlequin Eggs," by Civilly (Sonnenschein, 1884); "The
Nodding Mandarin," by L. F. Day (Simpkin, 1883); "Cats-cradle," by C.
Kendrick (Strahan, 1886); "The Kitten Pilgrims," by A. Ballantyne
(Nisbet, 1887); "Ups and Downs" (1880), and "At his Mother's Knee"
(1883), by M. J. Tilsey. "A Winter Nosegay" (Sonnenschein, 1881);
"Pretty Peggy," by Emmet (Low, 1881); "Children's Kettledrum," by M. A.
C. (Dean, 1881); "Three Wise Old Couples," by Hopkins (Cassell, 1881);
"Puss in Boots," by E. K. Johnson (Warne); "Sugar and Spice and all
that's Nice" (Strahan, 1881); "Fly away, Fairies," by Clarkson (Griffith
and Farran, 1882); "The Tiny Lawn Tennis Club" (Dean, 1882); "Little Ben
Bate," by M. Browne (Simpkin, 1882); "Nursery Night," by E. Dewane
(Dean, 1882); "New Pinafore Pictures" (Dean, 1882); "Rumpelstiltskin"
(De la Rue, 1882); "Baby's Debut," by J. Smith (De la Rue, 1883);
"Buckets and Spades" (Dean, 1883); "Childhood" (Warne, 1883); "Dame
Trot" (Chapman and Hall, 1883); "In and Out," by Ismay Thorne
(Sonnenschein, 1884); "Under Mother's Wing," by Mrs. Clifford (Gardner,
Darton, 1883); "Quacks" (Ward and Lock, 1883); "Little Chicks" (Griffith
and Farran, 1883); "Talking Toys," "The Talking Clock," H. M. Bennett;
"Four Feet by Two," by Helena Maguire; "Merry Hearts," "Cosy Corners,"
and "A Christmas Fairy," by Gordon Browne (all published by Nisbet).
Among many books elaborately printed by Messrs. Hildesheimer, are two
illustrated by M. E. Edwards and J. C. Staples, "Told in the Twilight"
(1883); and "Song of the Bells" (1884); and one by M. E. Edwards only,
"Two Children"; others by Jane M. Dealy, "Sixes and Sevens" (1882), and
"Little Miss Marigold" (1884); "Nursery Land," by H. J. Maguire (1888),
and "Sunbeams," by E. K. Johnson and Ewart Wilson (1887).
F. D. Bedford, who illustrated and decorated "The Battle of the Frogs
and Mice" (Methuen), has produced this year one of the most satisfactory
books with coloured illustrations. In "Nursery Rhymes" (Methuen), the
pictures, block-printed in colour by Edmund Evans, are worthy to be
placed beside the best books he has produced.
Of all lady illustrators--the phrase is cumbrous, but we have no
other--Miss A. B. Woodward stands apart, not only by the vigour of her
work, but by its amazing humour, a quality which is certainly infrequent
in the work of her sister-artists. The books she has illustrated are not
very many, but all show this quality. "Banbury Cross," in Messrs. Dent's
Series is among the first. In "To Tell the King the Sky is Falling"
(Blackie, 1896) there is a store of delicious examples, and in "The
Brownies" (Dent, 1896), the vigour of the handling is very noticeable.
In "Eric, Prince of Lorlonia" (Macmillan, 1896), we have further proof
that these characteristics are not mere accidents, but the result of
carefully studied intention, which is also apparent in the clever
designs for the covers of Messrs. Blackie's Catalogue, 1896-97. This
year, in "Red Apple and Silver Bells," Miss Woodward shows marked
advance. The book, with its delicious rhymes by Hamish Hendry, is one to
treasure, as is also her "Adventures in Toy Land," designs marked by the
_diablerie_ of which she, alone of lady artists, seems to have the
secret. In this the wooden, inane expression of the toys contrasts
delightfully with the animate figures.
Mr. Charles Robinson is one of the youngest recruits to the army of
illustrators, and yet his few years' record is both lengthy and kept at
a singularly high level. In the first of his designs which attracted
attention we find the half-grotesque, half-real child that he has made
his own--fat, merry little people, that are bubbling over with the joy
of mere existence. "Macmillan's Literary Primers" is the rather
ponderous title of these booklets which cost but a few pence each, and
are worth many a half-dozen high-priced nursery books. Stevenson's
"Child's Garden of Verse," his first important book, won a new
reputation by reason of its pictures. Then came "AEsop's Fables," in
Dent's "Banbury Cross" Series. The next year saw Mr. Gabriel Setoun's
book of poems, "Child World," Mrs. Meynell's "The Children," Mr. H. D.
Lowry's "Make Believe," and two decorated pages in "The Parade" (Henry
and Co.). The present Christmas will see several books from his hand.
"Old World Japan" (George Allen) has thirty-four, and "Legends from
River and Mountain," forty-two, pictures by T. H. Robinson, which must
not be forgotten. "The Giant Crab" (Nutt), and "Andersen" (Bliss,
Sands), are among the best things W. Robinson has yet done.
[Illustration]
"Nonsense," by A. Nobody, and "Some More Nonsense," by A. Nobody
(Gardner, Darton & Co.), are unique instances of an unfettered humour.
That their apparently naive grotesques are from the hand of a very
practised draughtsman is evident at a first glance; but as their author
prefers to remain anonymous his identity must not be revealed. Specimens
from the published work (which is, however, mostly in colour), and
facsimiles of hitherto unpublished drawings, entitled "The Singing
Lesson," kindly lent by Messrs. Gardner, Darton & Co., are here to prove
how merry our anonym can be. By the way, it may be well to add that the
artist in question is _not_ Sir Edward Burne-Jones, whose caricatures,
that are the delight of children of all ages who know them, have been so
far strictly kept to members of the family circle, for whom they were
produced.
[Illustration: ILLUSTRATION FROM "LITTLE FOLKS." BY MAURICE BOUTET DE
MONVEL. (CASSELL AND CO.)]
The editor of THE STUDIO, to whose selection of pictures for
reproduction these pages owe their chief interest, has spared no effort
to show a good working sample of the best of all classes, and in the
space available has certainly omitted few of any consequence--except
those so very well known, as, for instance, Tenniel's "Alice" series,
and the Caldecott toy-books--which it would have been superfluous to
illustrate again, especially in black and white after coloured
originals.
In Mrs. Field's volume already mentioned, the author says: "It has been
well observed that children do not desire, and ought not to be furnished
with purely realistic portraits of themselves; the boy's heart craves a
hero, and the Johnny or Frank of the realistic story-book, the little
boy like himself, is not in this sense a hero." This passage, referring
to the stories themselves, might be applied to their illustration with
hardly less force. To idealise is the normal impulse of a child. True
that it can "make believe" from the most rudimentary hints, but it is
much easier to do so if something not too actual is the groundwork.
Figures which delight children are never wholly symbolic, mere virtues
and vices materialised as personages of the anecdote. Real nonsense such
as Lear concocted, real wit such as that which sparkles from Lewis
Carroll's pages, find their parallel in the pictures which accompany
each text. It is the feeble effort to be funny, the mildly punning
humour of the imitators, which makes the text tedious, and one fancies
the artist is also infected, for in such books the drawings very rarely
rise to a high level.
The "pretty-pretty" school, which has been too popular, especially in
anthologies of mildly entertaining rhymes, is sickly at its best, and
fails to retain the interest of a child. Possibly, in pleading for
imaginative art, one has forgotten that everywhere is Wonderland to a
child, who would be no more astonished to find a real elephant dropping
in to tea, or a real miniature railway across the lawn, than in finding
a toy elephant or a toy engine awaiting him. Children are so accustomed
to novelty that they do not realise the abnormal; nor do they always
crave for unreality. As coaches and horses were the delight of
youngsters a century ago, so are trains and steamboats to-day. Given a
pile of books and an empty floor space, their imagination needs no
mechanical models of real locomotives; or, to be more correct, they
enjoy the make-believe with quite as great a zest. Hence, perhaps, in
praising conscious art for children's literature, one is unwittingly
pleasing older tastes; indeed, it is not inconceivable that the "prig"
which lurks in most of us may be nurtured by too refined diet. Whether a
child brought up wholly on the aesthetic toy-book would realise the
greatness of Rembrandt's etchings or other masterpieces of realistic art
more easily than one who had only known the current pictures of cheap
magazines, is not a question to be decided off-hand. To foster an
artificial taste is not wholly unattended with danger; but if humour be
present, as it is in the works of the best artists for the nursery, then
all fear vanishes; good wholesome laughter is the deadliest bane to the
prig-microbe, and will leave no infant lisping of the preciousness of
Cimabue, or the wonder of Sandro Botticelli, as certain children were
reported to do in the brief days when the aesthete walked his faded way
among us. That modern children's books will--some of them at least--take
an honourable place in an iconography of nineteenth-century art, many of
the illustrations here reproduced are in themselves sufficient to prove.
[Illustration: ILLUSTRATION FROM "GOULD'S BOOK OF FAIRY TALES." BY
ARTHUR GASKIN. (METHUEN AND CO.)]
[Illustration: ILLUSTRATION FROM "LULLABY LAND" BY CHARLES ROBINSON.
(JOHN LANE. 1897)]
After so many pages devoted to the subject, it might seem as if the mass
of material should have revealed very clearly what is the ideal
illustration for children. But "children" is a collective term, ranging
from the tastes of the baby to the precocious youngsters who dip into
Mudie books on the sly, and hold conversations thereon which astonish
their elders when by chance they get wind of the fact. Perhaps the
belief that children can be educated by the eye is more plausible than
well supported. In any case, it is good that the illustration should be
well drawn, well coloured; given that, whether it be realistically
imitative or wholly fantastic is quite a secondary matter. As we have
had pointed out to us, the child is not best pleased by mere portraits
of himself; he prefers idealised children, whether naughtier and more
adventurous, or absolute heroes of romance. And here a strange fact
appears, that as a rule what pleases the boy pleases the girl also; but
that boys look down with scorn on "girls' books." Any one who has had
to do with children knows how eagerly little sisters pounce upon books
owned by their brothers. Now, as a rule, books for girls are confined to
stories of good girls, pictures of good girls, and mildly exciting
domestic incidents, comic or tragic. The child may be half angel; he is
undoubtedly half savage; a Pagan indifference to other people's pain,
and grim joy in other people's accidents, bear witness to that fact.
Tender-hearted parents fear lest some pictures should terrify the little
ones; the few that do are those which the child himself discovers in
some extraordinary way to be fetishes. He hates them, yet is fascinated
by them. I remember myself being so appalled by a picture that is still
keenly remembered. It fascinated me, and yet was a thing of which the
mere memory made one shudder in the dark--the said picture representing
a benevolent negro with Eva on his lap, from "Uncle Tom's Cabin," a
blameless Sunday-school inspired story. The horrors of an early folio of
Foxe's "Martyrs," of a grisly "Bunyan," with terrific pictures of
Apollyon; even a still more grim series by H. C. Selous, issued by the
Art Union, if memory may be trusted, were merely exciting; it was the
mild and amiable representation of "Uncle Tom" that I felt to be the
very incarnation of all things evil. This personal incident is quoted
only to show how impossible it is for the average adult to foretell what
will frighten or what will delight a child. For children are singularly
reticent concerning the "bogeys" of their own creating, yet, like many
fanatics, it is these which they really most fear.
[Illustration: ILLUSTRATION FROM "MAKE BELIEVE." BY CHARLES ROBINSON
(JOHN LANE. 1896)]
[Illustration: ILLUSTRATION FROM "JUST FORTY WINKS" BY GERTRUDE M.
BRADLEY (BLACKIE AND SON. 1897)]
Certainly it is possible that over-conscious art is too popular to-day.
The illustrator when he is at work often thinks more of the art critic
who may review his book than the readers who are to enjoy it. Purely
conventional groups of figures, whether set in a landscape, or against a
decorative background, as a rule fail to retain a child's interest. He
wants invention and detail, plenty of incident, melodrama rather than
suppressed emotion. Something moving, active, and suggestive pleases him
most, something about which a story can be woven not so complex that his
sense is puzzled to explain why things are as the artist drew them. It
is good to educate children unconsciously, but if we are too careful
that all pictures should be devoted to raising their standard of taste,
it is possible that we may soon come back to the Miss Pinkerton ideal of
amusement blended with instruction. Hence one doubts if the
"ultra-precious" school really pleases the child; and if he refuse the
jam the powder is obviously refused also. One who makes pictures for
children, like one who writes them stories, should have the knack of
entertaining them without any appearance of condescension in so doing.
They will accept any detail that is related to the incident, but are
keenly alive to discrepancies of detail or action that clash with the
narrative. As they do not demand fine drawing, so the artist must be
careful to offer them very much more than academic accomplishment.
Indeed, he (or she) must be in sympathy with childhood, and able to
project his vision back to its point of view. And this is just a mood in
accord with the feeling of our own time, when men distrust each other
and themselves, and keep few ideals free from doubt, except the
reverence for the sanctity of childhood. Those who have forsaken beliefs
hallowed by centuries, and are the most cynical and worldly-minded, yet
often keep faith in one lost Atalantis--the domain of their own
childhood and those who still dwell in the happy isle. To have given a
happy hour to one of the least of these is peculiarly gratifying to many
tired people to-day, those surfeited with success no less than those
weary of failure. And such labour is of love all compact; for children
are grudging in their praise, and seldom trouble to inquire who wrote
their stories or painted their pictures. Consequently those who work for
them win neither much gold nor great fame; but they have a most
enthusiastic audience all the same. Yet when we remember that the
veriest daubs and atrocious drawings are often welcomed as heartily, one
is driven to believe that after all the bored people who turn to amuse
the children, like others who turn to elevate the masses, are really, if
unconsciously, amusing if not elevating themselves. If children's books
please older people--and that they do so is unquestionable--it would be
well to acknowledge it boldly, and to share the pleasure with the
nursery; not to take it surreptitiously under the pretence of raising
the taste of little people. Why should not grown-up people avow their
pleasure in children's books if they feel it?
[Illustration: THE SPOTTED MIMILUS. ILLUSTRATION FROM "KING LONGBEARD."
BY CHARLES ROBINSON (JOHN LANE. 1897)]
[Illustration: ILLUSTRATION FROM "THE MAKING OF MATTHIAS" BY LUCY
KEMP-WELCH. (JOHN LANE. 1897)]
If a collector in search of a new hobby wishes to start on a quest full
of disappointment, yet also full of lucky possibilities, illustrated
books for children would give him an exciting theme. The rare volume he
hunted for in vain at the British Museum and South Kensington, for which
he scanned the shelves of every second-hand bookseller within reach, may
meet his eye in a twopenny box, just as he has despaired of ever seeing,
much less procuring, a copy. At least twice during the preparation of
this number I have enjoyed that particular experience, and have no
reason to suppose it was very abnormal. To make a fine library of these
things may be difficult, but it is not a predestined failure. Caxtons
and Wynkyn de Wordes seem less scarce than some of these early nursery
books. Yet, as we know, the former have been the quest of collectors for
years, and so are probably nearly all sifted out of the great
rubbish-heaps of dealers; the latter have not been in great demand, and
may be unearthed in odd corners of country shops and all sorts of likely
and unlikely places. Therefore, as a hobby, it offers an exciting quest
with almost certain success in the end; in short, it offers the ideal
conditions for collecting as a pastime, provided you can muster
sufficient interest in the subject to become absorbed in its pursuit. So
large is it that, even to limit one's quest to books with coloured
pictures would yet require a good many years' hunting to secure a decent
"bag." Another tempting point is that prices at present are mostly
nominal, not because the quarry is plentiful, but because the demand is
not recognised by the general bookseller. Of course, books in good
condition, with unannotated pages, are rare; and some series--Felix
Summerley's, for example--which owe their chief interest to the "get-up"
of the volume considered as a whole, would be scarce worth possessing if
"rebound" or deprived of their covers. Still, always provided the game
attracts him, the hobby-horseman has fair chances, and is inspired by
motives hardly less noble than those which distinguish the pursuit of
bookplates (_ex libris_), postage-stamps and other objects which have
attracted men to devote not only their leisure and their spare cash, but
often their whole energy and nearly all their resources. Societies, with
all the pomp of officials, and members proudly arranging detached
letters of the alphabet after their names, exist for discussing hobbies
not more important. Speaking as an interested but not infatuated
collector, it seems as if the mere gathering together of rarities of
this sort would soon become as tedious as the amassing of dull armorial
_ex libris_, or sorting infinitely subtle varieties of postage-stamps.
But seeing the intense passion such things arouse in their devotees, the
fact that among children's books there are not a few of real intrinsic
interest, ought not to make the hobby less attractive; except that,
speaking generally, your true collector seems to despise every quality
except rarity (which implies market value ultimately, if for the moment
there are not enough rival collectors to have started a "boom" in
prices). Yet all these "snappers up of unconsidered trifles" help to
gather together material which may prove in time to be not without value
to the social historian or the student interested in the progress of
printing and the art of illustration; but it would be a pity to confuse
ephemeral "curios" with lasting works of fine art, and the ardour of
collecting need not blind one to the fact that the former are greatly in
excess of the latter.
[Illustration: ILLUSTRATION FROM "MISS MOUSE AND HER BOYS." BY L. LESLIE
BROOKE. (MACMILLAN AND CO. 1897)]
The special full-page illustrations which appear in this number must not
be left without a word of comment. In place of re-issuing facsimiles of
actual illustrations from coloured books of the past which would
probably have been familiar to many readers, drawings by artists who are
mentioned elsewhere in this Christmas Number have been specially
designed to carry out the spirit of the theme. For Christmas is
pre-eminently the time for children's books. Mr. Robert Halls' painting
of a baby, here called "The Heir to Fairyland"--the critic for whom all
this vast amount of effort is annually expended--is seen still in the
early or destructive stage, a curious foreshadowing of his attitude in a
later development should he be led from the paths of Philistia to the
bye-ways of art criticism. The portrait miniatures of child-life by Mr.
Robert Halls, if not so well known as they deserve, cannot be unfamiliar
to readers of THE STUDIO, since many of his best works have been
exhibited at the Academy and elsewhere.
The lithograph by Mr. R. Anning Bell, "In Nooks with Books," represents
a second stage of the juvenile critic when appreciation in a very acute
form has set in, and picture-books are no longer regarded as toys to
destroy, but treasures to be enjoyed snugly with a delight in their
possession.
[Illustration: ILLUSTRATION FROM "BABY'S LAYS" BY E. CALVERT (ELKIN
MATHEWS. 1897)]
Mr. Granville Fell, with "King Love, a Christmas Greeting," turns back
to the memory of the birthday whose celebration provokes the gifts which
so often take the form of illustrated books, for Christmas is to Britons
more and more the children's festival. The conviviality of the Dickens'
period may linger here and there; but to adults generally Christmas is
only a vicarious pleasure, for most households devote the day entirely
to pleasing the little ones who have annexed it as their own special
holiday.
The dainty water-colour by Mr. Charles Robinson, and the charming
drawing in line by M. Boutet de Monvel, call for no comment. Collectors
will be glad to possess such excellent facsimiles of work by two
illustrators conspicuous for their work in this field. The figure by Mr.
Robinson, "So Light of Foot, so Light of Spirit," is extremely typical
of the personal style he has adopted from the first. Studies by M. de
Monvel have appeared before in THE STUDIO, so that it would be merely
reiterating the obvious to call attention to the exquisite truth of
character which he obtains with rare artistry.
G. W.
* * * * *
The Editor's best thanks are due to all those publishers who have so
kindly and readily come forward with their assistance in the compilation
of "Children's Books and their Illustrators." Owing to exigences of
space reference to several important new books has necessarily been
postponed.
* * * * *
[Illustration: ILLUSTRATION FROM "NATIONAL RHYMES." BY GORDON BROWNE
(GARDNER, DARTON AND CO. 1897)]
For Younger Readers
BY MARTHA FINLEY
ELSIE DINSMORE. With illustrations by H. C. Christy. Large 8vo, cloth.
$1.50.
ELSIE AT HOME. Similar in general style to the previous "Elsie" books.
16mo, cloth. $1.25.
BY RAFFORD PYKE.
THE ADVENTURES OF MABEL. For children of five and six. With many
illustrations by MELANIE ELIZABETH NORTON. Large 8vo. $1.75.
BY BARBARA YECHTON.
DERICK. Illustrated. Large 12mo, cloth. $1.50.
BY AMANDA M. DOUGLAS.
CHILDREN AT SHERBURNE HOUSE, 12mo, cloth. $1.50.
NAN. A Sequel to "A Little Girl in Old New York." Illustrated. 12mo,
cloth. $1.50.
BY ELIZABETH STUART PHELPS.
GIPSY'S YEAR AT THE GOLDEN CRESCENT. Uniform with the previous volumes
of the same series. Fully illustrated. Large 12mo, cloth. $1.50.
BY ELIZABETH W. CHAMPNEY.
WITCH WINNIE IN VENICE. With many illustrations. Large 12mo, cloth.
$1.50.
PIERRE AND HIS POODLE. With numerous illustrations. 12mo, cloth. $1.00.
BY BEATRICE HARRADEN.
UNTOLD TALES OF THE PAST. By BEATRICE HARRADEN, author of "Ships that
Pass in the Night," "Hilda Strafford," etc. Illustrated. Cloth. Probably
$1.50.
_The above are published by_
Dodd, Mead & Company, FIFTH AVE. & 21ST
STREET, NEW YORK
* * * * *
Four Capital Books
Aaron in the Wildwoods
A delightful new Thimblefinger story of Aaron while a "runaway," by JOEL
CHANDLER HARRIS, author of "_Little Mr. Thimblefinger and his Queer
Country_," "_Mr. Rabbit at Home_," "_The Story of Aaron_," _etc._ With
24 full-page illustrations by OLIVER HERFORD. Square 8vo. $2.00.
Little-Folk Lyrics
By FRANK DEMPSTER SHERMAN. HOLIDAY EDITION. A beautiful book of very
charming poems for children, with 16 exquisite illustrations. 12mo.
$1.50.
Being a Boy
By CHARLES DUDLEY WARNER. With an introduction and 32 capital full-page
illustrations from photographs by CLIFTON JOHNSON. 12mo, gilt top.
$2.00.
An Unwilling Maid
A capital story of the Revolution, for girls, by JEANIE GOULD LINCOLN,
author of "_Marjorie's Quest_," "_A Genuine Girl_," _etc._ With
illustrations. $1.25.