Edward Thomas’ In Pursuit of Spring: the lost photographs

The story started here: while undertaking the cataloguing of the Edward Thomas archive – the slow and careful process of examining, describing and categorising one man’s belongings – I came across a small, slightly battered envelope marked ’53 prints, Edward Thomas’.

The photos were of locations Thomas had visited over 100 years ago, taken during a cycle ride from London to Somerset, via the cathedral towns of Winchester, Salisbury and Wells over Easter weekend, 1913. The journey was to provide inspiration for his prose work, In Pursuit of Spring – a celebration of nature, Spring and the English landscape in the months prior to the devastation of the First World War.

It is not yet spring. Spring is being dreamed and the dream is more wonderful and more blessed than ever was spring. What the hour of waking will bring forth is not known, catch at the dreams as they hover.

Mapped: locations photographed along the route

Landscape photographer Rob Hudson visited Special Collections and Archives this time last year, with a general interest in finding out more about the contents of Edward Thomas archive. I showed him notebooks, poems drafts, and letters from the poet, which are the usual objects of interest, and as an afterthought, considering his interest in photography, brought out the little packet of photos. Some had locations pencilled on the reverse, and as we peered and puzzled over the names, I could tell Rob had been struck by inspiration. He placed an order for the photos to be digitised, and produced this fantastic blog post. The post was shared widely across his network on Twitter, and the photos were introduced to the world.

Turner’s Tower, Hemington, Radstock, Avon.

Later that year, Little Toller, described by The Independent as ‘a small but discerning press’, were trying to make a decision. Edward Thomas’ centenary was approaching: should they publish The Icknield Way or In Pursuit of Spring? Stumbling across Rob’s blog post while researching online, an idea grew. What if In Pursuit of Spring could be reprinted, fully illustrated with the snapshots which had inspired its author? Images of a lost, almost car-less England, full of empty roads and paths, speaking of travel, motion and hope.

Castle Street, Bridgwater

Following discussions with the Edward Thomas Estate, permission was granted to publish the photos in print for the first time, in a brand new edition of the work. Little Toller’s handsome edition of In Pursuit of Spring went on sale on 3 March, Edward Thomas’ birthday, and sold out in just four weeks. Another print run has just taken place, and it is just as well, given that the work has caught the attention of the national media. The Guardian has run an excellent feature which compares the historic images with photos taken in the same locations in the modern day – readers can use the blue sliders on each image to compare then and now.

In Pursuit of Spring was to be one of Thomas’ last prose works. He is now better remembered for his poetry, such as In Memoriam, written only two years later, at yet another Easter, in 1915:

The flowers left thick at nightfall in the wood
This Eastertide call into mind the men,
Now far from home, who, with their sweethearts, should
Have gathered them and will do never again.

In his post, Rob Hudson writes:

That is the final connection with Easter for this story; the Easter 1913 when he set out, in pursuit of Spring; the Easter Monday 1915 of In Memoriam; and Easter Monday 1917, at Arras where he died. Easter, of course, is when we traditionally celebrate the Resurrection, and it is perhaps fitting that Edward Thomas’ words and now his photographs outlive him.

Special Collections and Archives would like to thank Rob Hudson and Little Toller for their role in enabling these images, and Thomas’ work, to reach and be enjoyed by a new generation of readers. All photographs can be viewed on our Pinterest board.

Exhibition: Illustrating Shakespeare

Guest-curated by final year PhD student Michael John Goodman, Illustrating Shakespeare focuses on the visual representation of six of Shakespeare’s most engaging heroes and villains. Read more about the background to the exhibition, and Michael’s wider research on Shakespeare illustration, in our interview. The exhibition will be on display in Special Collections and Archives until 6 May 2016.

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Richard III

Richard the Duke of Gloucester: hunchbacked, ‘deformed, unfinished,’ beguiles and appals the audience with his desire to ‘prove a villain’. One of the most psychologically complex characters to be realised on the stage, Richard is a performer, an actor, confiding in the audience his darkest intentions: manipulating them into sympathising with him, as he manipulates the characters on the stage into carrying out his instructions, including murder.

The illustrations presented here of Richard range from the familiar depiction of him as hunchbacked King (the Dalziel frontispiece, illustrated by John Gilbert), an attempt at historical accuracy (the aquatint portrait) through to three images that illustrate events taken from Richard’s nightmare before the Battle of Bosworth’s field. In one powerful depiction, a terrified Richard is confronted by the Ghost of Lady Anne. By way of contrast, the illustration of Richard by Johann Joseph Zoffany, whilst technically more accomplished, loses much of the visceral horror that is apparent in the image with Lady Anne: Richard here is securely lying in bed and this is very clearly a dream, with the threat of physical or psychological violence neutered.

The final image of this sequence is taken from the famous Hogarth painting, which sees Richard awakening from the nightmare, holding his hand aloft as if to defend himself from the viewer/audience who he has worked so hard to charm for the duration of the play. But, like the ghosts, the audience has begun to turn on him. Zoffany presents Richard in the last moments upon the battlefield before he is slain, crying, notoriously, ‘A horse! A horse! My Kingdom for a horse!’

Frontispiece, Richard III. Engraved by the Dalziel Brothers after John Gilbert.

Richard III. In Charles Knight (ed.), Pictorial edition of the works of Shakespeare: histories, vol. IV, pt. 2. London: Charles Knight and Co. 1867. Extra-illustrated edition, frontispiece.

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Aquatint portrait of Richard III. Artist unknown.

Richard III. In Charles Knight (ed.), Pictorial edition of the works of Shakespeare: histories, vol. IV, pt. 2. London: Charles Knight and Co. 1867. Extra-illustrated edition, facing p. 238.

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Richard III’s nightmare. Artist unknown.

Ghost of Lady Anne: Richard, thy wife, that wretched Anne thy wife,
That never slept a quiet hour with thee,
Now fills thy sleep with perturbations
To-morrow in the battle think on me,
And fall thy edgeless sword: despair, and die!

Richard III. In Charles Knight (ed.), Pictorial edition of the works of Shakespeare: histories, vol. IV, pt. 2. London: Charles Knight and Co. 1867. Extra-illustrated edition, facing p. 251.

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‘Garrick in the character of Richard III’. Engraved by E. J. Portbury, after William Hogarth.

Richard III. In Charles Knight (ed.), Pictorial edition of the works of Shakespeare: histories, vol. IV, pt. 2. London: Charles Knight and Co. 1867. Extra-illustrated edition, facing p. 309.

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‘König Richard III ~ King Richard III’. Engraved by Johann Tobias Bauer after August Friedrich Pecht.

Richard III. In Edward Dowden, Shakespeare scenes and characters: a series of illustrations. London: Macmillan and Co., 1876, facing p. 49.

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‘Garrick as Richard the Third’. Engraved by Henry Edward Dawe after Johann Joseph Zoffany.

King Richard: I think, there be six Richmonds in the field;
Five have I slain today, instead of him: —
A Horse! a horse! my Kingdom for a horse!

Richard III. In Charles Knight (ed.), Pictorial edition of the works of Shakespeare: histories, vol. IV, pt. 2. London: Charles Knight and Co. 1867. Extra-illustrated edition, facing p. 311

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Lady Macbeth

Here, we can examine variations on the same scene presented by different artists. The images of Lady Macbeth by John Gilbert, George Henry Harlowe and Alfred Edward Chalon are all taken from the first time Lady Macbeth appears on stage in Act I Scene V, after she has read Macbeth’s letter that informs her of the witches’ prophecy that Macbeth will become King. In all three images she is presented as being rather masculine, a direct visual correspondence to her line ‘Come, you spirits / That tend on mortal thoughts, unsex me here’. In the image by Harlowe, of the actress Sarah Siddons playing the role, the pattern on her dress even looks like a sword. This is Lady Macbeth as a warrior.

The final two images are taken from Act V Scene I or, as it has become popularly know: the sleepwalking scene. Consumed by guilt, a somnambulant Lady Macbeth confesses to the crimes she has committed throughout the play and attempts to wash the imaginary blood from her hands: ‘Here’s the smell of the blood still: all the perfumes of Arabia will not sweeten this little hand. Oh, oh, oh!’ Harlowe’s image, here, contrasts remarkably with his first. Lady Macbeth is no longer warrior-like, she is dressed in white and is greatly reduced in stature, looking vulnerable and, even, holy. It is the last we shall see of Lady Macbeth in the play, she will die off-stage by ‘self and violent hands’. Or, rather, suicide.

Lady Macbeth holding Macbeth’s letter. Engraved by the Brothers Dalziel after John Gilbert.

Lady Macbeth: Glamis thou art, and Cawdor; and shalt be
What thou art promis’d: — yet do I fear thy nature;
It is too full of the milk of human kindness

Macbeth. In Howard Staunton (ed.), Works of Shakespeare, vol. 3. London: George Routledge & Sons, 1866, p. 478.

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‘Mrs. Siddons in the character of Lady Macbeth, Act I, Scene V’. Engraved by Charles Rolls after George Henry Harlowe (1830)

Macbeth. In Charles Knight (ed.), Pictorial edition of the works of Shakespeare: tragedies, vol. VI, pt. 1. London: Charles Knight and Co. 1867. Extra-illustrated edition, facing p. viii.

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Lady Macbeth in Act 1, Scene 5. Engraved by Henry Cook after Alfred Edward Chalon.

Macbeth. In Charles Knight (ed.), Pictorial edition of the works of Shakespeare: tragedies, vol. VI, pt. 1. London: Charles Knight and Co. 1867. Extra-illustrated edition, facing p. 26.

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‘Mrs. Siddons’ [as Lady Macbeth]. Engraved by Robert Cooper after George Henry Harlowe (1822).

Macbeth. In Charles Knight (ed.), Pictorial edition of the works of Shakespeare: tragedies, vol. VI, pt. 1. London: Charles Knight and Co. 1867. Extra-illustrated edition, facing p. 52.

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‘Lady Macbeth, walking in her sleep’ [Act 5, Scene 1]. Engraved by Charles Taylor after Robert Smirke.

Lady Macbeth:  Out! Damned spot; out, I say!

Macbeth. Charles Knight (ed.), Pictorial edition of the works of Shakespeare: tragedies, vol. VI, pt. 1. London: Charles Knight and Co. 1867. Extra-illustrated edition, facing p. 52.

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Falstaff

Sir John Falstaff is one of Shakespeare’s most popular and enduring comic characters. Described by Samuel Taylor Coleridge as a man of ‘complete moral depravity,’ but also possessing a ‘first-rate wit’ and ‘talent’, Falstaff appears in both parts of Henry IV and also, in what could be described as the Renaissance Stage equivalent of a sitcom spinoff, The Merry Wives of Windsor, where Falstaff decides to woo two married women in a fool-hardy attempt to make money.

It is the two parts of Henry IV and the powerful narrative arc that Falstaff participates in with the future King Henry V, Prince Hal, that mark Falstaff out as a character who possesses a depth more associated with Shakespeare’s tragic heroes rather than his other comic characters. When Hal succeeds to the throne at the end of Henry IV Part II, he rejects his old friend Falstaff, telling him in an electrifying piece of theatre that, ‘I know thee not old man: fall to thy prayers’.

Falstaff is not just a simple comic foil, then, and in his ‘What is honour?’ speech that he delivers at the end of Henry V Part I, he poses a question that in the context of the History Plays is analogous to Hamlet’s ‘To be or not to be?’ In the epilogue of Henry IV Part II, Shakespeare reassures us that he will ‘continue the story, with Sir John in it’. But it was not to be. For whatever reason, Sir John did not appear in Henry V:  his death occurs off-stage and is only reported to us by Mistress Quickly. Had Shakespeare killed off his fat Knight because his popular comic character was becoming bigger than the story he was trying to tell?

‘Falstaff and his friends’. Painted by Charles Leslie.

Merry wives of Windsor. In Henry Irving and Frank A. Marshall (eds.), Works of William Shakespeare, vol. VI. London: Gresham Publishing Company, 1888, frontispiece.

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Falstaff. Engraved by George Noble after Robert Smirke.

King Henry IV, Part 1. In Charles Knight (ed.), Pictorial edition of the works of Shakespeare: histories, vol. III, pt. 2. London: Charles Knight and Co. 1867. Extra-illustrated edition, facing p. 188.

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Falstaff in Act 2 Scene 4. Engraved by Charles Heath after Robert Smirke (1825).

King Henry IV, Part 1. In Charles Knight (ed.), Pictorial edition of the works of Shakespeare: histories, vol. III, pt. 2. London: Charles Knight and Co. 1867. Extra-illustrated edition, facing p. 190.

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Portrait of Falstaff. Artist and engraver unknown.

King Henry IV, Part 1. In Charles Knight (ed.), Pictorial edition of the works of Shakespeare: histories, vol. III, pt. 2. London: Charles Knight and Co. 1867. Extra-illustrated edition, facing p. 206.

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Falstaff in Act 4, Scene 2. Engraved by Richard Rhodes after John Thurston (1813).

Falstaff: No eye hath seen such scarecrows. I’ll not march through Coventry with them, that’s flat.

King Henry IV, Part 1. In Charles Knight (ed.), Pictorial edition of the works of Shakespeare: histories, vol. III, pt. 2. London: Charles Knight and Co. 1867. Extra-illustrated edition, facing p. 214.

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Falstaff. Illustrated by Kenny Meadows.

Falstaff: Methinks you prescribe to yourself very preposterously.

Merry wives of Windsor. In Barry Cornwall (ed.), Complete works of Shakespeare, vol. I. London: London Printing and Publishing Company Limited, c. 1858, p. 89.

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Rosalind

‘From the east to western Inde, / No jewel is like Rosalind’. Whilst Orlando’s verse praising his love is comically turgid, it is, nevertheless a neat summation of Rosalind’s position in English Literature. There is, simply, no other character like her. Or him. For Rosalind spends most of the play dressed as a shepherd named Ganymede, and has consequently given gender theorists much material to work with.

Why, for example, when Rosalind safely escapes her uncle’s court for the Forest of Arden, does she remain as Ganymede? And what about the problem of the epilogue? Is the actor playing Rosalind meant to remain ‘in character’ or is that mask meant to drop? Confusing matters even further is when we remember that only boys and men were allowed to perform on the Elizabethan stage. In this context, then, the boy actor playing Rosalind is effectively a boy acting as a girl who is acting as a boy in order to make a young man fall in love with her (or him)?

The fluidity of gender is one of the major characteristics of Shakespeare’s comedy and it reaches its most satisfying realisation in As You Like It through the character of Rosalind, whom Harold Bloom has described as being the first modern lover.

‘Wie es euch gefällt ~ As you like it’. Engraved by Johann Bankel after Friedrich Schwoerer.

As you like it. In Edward Dowden, Shakespeare scenes and characters: a series of illustrations. London: Macmillan and Co., 1876, facing p. 138.

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Frontispiece, As you like it. Engraved by the Dalziel Brothers after John Gilbert.

As you like it. In Charles Knight (ed.), Pictorial edition of the works of Shakespeare: comedies, vol. II, pt. 1. London: Charles Knight and Co. 1867. Extra-illustrated edition, facing p. 192.

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Rosalind gives Orlando her necklace, Act 1 Scene 2. Engraved by William Leney after John Downman.

As you like it. In Charles Knight (ed.), Pictorial edition of the works of Shakespeare: comedies, vol. II, pt. 1. London: Charles Knight and Co. 1867. Extra-illustrated edition, facing p. 216.

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Rosalind in Act 4, Scene 3. Illustrated by Kenny Meadows.

Celia: Why, how now, Ganymede! Sweet Ganymede! [Rosalind faints.
Oliver: Many will swoon when they do look on blood.
Celia: There is more in it. — Cousin! Ganymede!

As you like it. In Barry Cornwall (ed.), Complete works of Shakespeare, vol. II. London: London Printing and Publishing Company Limited, c. 1858, p. 469.

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‘The bloody napkin shewn to Rosalind’ [Act 4, Scene 3]. Engraved by Charles Taylor after Thomas Stothard.

As you like it. In Charles Knight (ed.), Pictorial edition of the works of Shakespeare: comedies, vol. II, pt. 1. London: Charles Knight and Co. 1867. Extra-illustrated edition, facing p. 249.

 

Hamlet

The scene by Kenny Meadows demonstrates traditional, wood engraved illustration. The technique allowed both word and image to be printed on a single page easily and relatively cheaply. It revolutionised printing in the Victorian period and turned illustrated media into a mass commercialised medium. The Dalziel Brothers, engravers of the Hamlet frontispiece, were one of the largest and most successful firms of Victorian engravers.

Moving on from the Victorian period, we have two compelling images taken from the early part of the twentieth-century. The first two of these are from a wonderful edition, illustrated, or, rather, ‘decorated’ (as the frontispiece says) by John Austen from 1922. The images are fascinating in their own right as visual interpretations of the play, but they also show how the art of Shakespeare illustration was influenced by technology. New photomechanical means of reproduction led to the obsolescence of manual wood engraving, and  aided the smooth, curvilinear designs of art nouveau.

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Hamlet in Act 1, Scene 4. Illustrated by Kenny Meadows.

Enter Ghost.
Horatio: Look, my lord, it comes!
Hamlet: Angels and ministers of grace defend us

Hamlet. In Barry Cornwall (ed.), Complete works of Shakespeare, vol. III. London: London Printing and Publishing Company Limited, c. 1858, p. 149.

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Frontispiece, Hamlet. Engraved by the Dalziel Brothers, after John Gilbert.

Hamlet. In Charles Knight (ed.), Pictorial edition of the works of Shakespeare: tragedies, vol. V, pt. 1. London: Charles Knight and Co. 1867. Extra-illustrated edition, facing p. 84.

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‘Hamlet apostrophising the skull’ [Act 5, Scene 1]. Engraved by John Rogers after Sir Thomas Lawrence.

Hamlet. In Charles Knight (ed.), Pictorial edition of the works of Shakespeare: tragedies, vol. V, pt. 1. London: Charles Knight and Co. 1867. Extra-illustrated edition, facing p. 157.

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Frontispiece, Hamlet. Illustrated by John Austen.

William Shakespeare, Hamlet, Prince of Denmark. London: Selwyn & Blount, 1922, facing p. 9

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Hamlet in Act 1, Scene 5. Illustrated by John Austen.

Hamlet: […] Let us go in together;
And still your fingers on your lips, I pray.
The time is out of joint: O cursed spite,
That ever I was born to set it right!

William Shakespeare, Hamlet, Prince of Denmark. London: Selwyn & Blount, 1922, facing p. 42

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Beatrice

Like Benedick, during the course of the Much Ado About Nothing, we also fall in love with Beatrice. She is the most witty and vivacious of all of Shakespeare’s heroines, telling Benedick that ‘I had rather hear my dog bark at a crow than a man swear he loves me.’  It is this repartee that she has with Benedick that led the critic Marjorie Garber to describe the play as a forerunner to the screwball Hollywood comedies of the 1930s and 1940s such as The Philadelphia Story and His Girl Friday. Beatrice and Benedick are, in many ways, the Katherine Hepburn and Cary Grant of the 1590s.

‘Viel lärmen un nichts ~ Much ado about nothing’. Engraved by Johann Tobias Bauer after M. Adamo.

Much ado about nothing. In Edward Dowden, Shakespeare scenes and characters: a series of illustrations. London: Macmillan and Co., 1876, facing p. 131.

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Beatrice eavesdropping on Hero and Ursula. Engraved by John Rogers after Rev. Matthew William Peters.

Much ado about nothing. In Charles Knight (ed.), Pictorial edition of the works of Shakespeare: comedies, vol. II, pt. 1. London: Charles Knight and Co. 1867. Extra-illustrated edition, facing p. 94.

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Beatrice in Act 5, Scene 4. Illustrated by Kenny Meadows.

Benedick: Soft and fair, friar. — Which is Beatrice?
Beatrice: I answer to that name [Unmasking.
What is your will?

Much ado about nothing. In Barry Cornwall (ed.) Complete works of Shakespeare, vol. I. London: London Printing and Publishing Company Limited, c. 1858, p. 239.

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Beatrice in Act 3, Scene 1, engraved by Charles Taylor after Robert Smirke.

Beatrice: What fire is in mine ears? Can this be true?
Stand I condemn’d for pride and scorn so much?
Contempt, farewell! And maiden pride, adieu!
No glory lives behind the back of such.
And, Benedick, love on, I will requite thee;
Taming my wild heart to thy loving hand.

Much ado about nothing. In Charles Knight (ed.), Pictorial edition of the works of Shakespeare: comedies, vol. II, pt. 1. London: Charles Knight and Co. 1867. Extra-illustrated edition, facing p. 96.

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Illustrating Shakespeare: Interview with the curator

Our latest exhibition, Illustrating Shakespeare, has been guest-curated by final year PhD student Michael John Goodman. The exhibition focuses on the visual representation of six of Shakespeare’s most engaging heroes and villains. Our archivist Alison Harvey interviewed Michael to find out more about the exhibition, and his wider research on illustrated Shakespeare.

A: So what was the thinking behind the exhibition?

M: Well, my PhD research is focused on Victorian Shakespeare illustration and it just seemed like the right time to do the exhibition. I’m coming to the end of my doctoral work now and this year is also the 400th anniversary of Shakespeare’s death so I’m delighted that we can mark the anniversary in this way.

A: Ok, let’s take a step back, then. Why did you want to look at Shakespeare illustration for your PhD?

M: Shakespeare illustration is, basically, an untapped resource of vast research potential. It’s a treasure trove. When I was exploring my potential PhD ideas I couldn’t believe that hardly any work had been done in this field at all. This is amazing for two reasons: the first being that almost everything to do with Shakespeare has been covered many many times previously and, secondly, because the illustrations are hugely important culturally.

A: Why is that, do you think?

M: The images are important culturally, certainly by the time we get to the Victorian period, because these illustrated editions would have been the first encounter with Shakespeare that many readers would have had. They were sold relatively cheaply and were affordable to members of the working classes – a group of people who may not have been able to experience Shakespeare in the London theatre. Their experience of Shakespeare was based on these illustrated pages as opposed to the stage. As such these editions are significant as they played a very significant part in how the Victorians, for example, thought about and constructed Shakespeare.

A: If they are so important, then what can account for the lack of scholarly research in this area?

M: In academia there is a real fear of images. People don’t know how to read them, let alone what to do with them. So when you get a form like illustration that combines both word and image in often highly complex ways, it is easier just not to bother trying to analyse it or think about it. Historically, illustration has been considered as mere decoration, subservient to the words that it is simply embellishing. Illustration does not have the capacity to create meaning in and of itself, we seem to be told through the brevity of work that has been done. Obviously, I am coming at this from an English Literature perspective, but even in disciplines like Art History, the focus is on painting and ‘high art’; illustration isn’t considered ‘serious’ enough. These problems are magnified further when we start working with Shakespeare, because for many people, Shakespeare’s words are considered almost sacred. So we have two situations combining to create a situation where these illustrations have been ignored: the academy’s fetishisation of the word as the sole source of knowledge, and the Shakespeare scholar’s obsession with the written word itself.

A: But surely without the written word, there would be no Shakespeare to study?

M: That’s not quite what I’m saying. What I mean is that Shakespeare’s plays create meanings that aren’t confined to verbal discourse alone. They are plays: by their nature, they rely on an interplay between visual and verbal modes of communication. A vast industry has grown up around Shakespeare scholarship that looks at the most tiniest details of the text to explain what Shakespeare meant. As if having textual validation about Shakespeare’s intentions is a desirable thing to have. It is not. I really do not care what Shakespeare meant, but what I do care about is how, to quote the late Terence Hawkes, we mean by Shakespeare. In short, if a comma in a speech creates meaning, and is worth so much time agonising over, then surely so does placing an illustration next to that speech? And if that is indeed the case (as I suggest it is) then we need to begin to rethink how we consider the Victorians’ relationship with Shakespeare.

A: This would be a good time, then, to talk about your big project that you have coming out in the next few months, the Victorian Illustrated Shakespeare Archive?

M: The Victorian Illustrated Shakespeare Archive is an open access database that contains over 3,000 Victorian illustrations of Shakespeare’s plays. As it has a Creative Commons license by attribution, any user will be able to take any of the images and do whatever they like with them. The archive is the practical part of my PhD. The other part is the more traditional thesis aspect that explores how I have gone about setting up this resource in the first place. The archive came about when I was discussing this work with my supervisor, Professor Julia Thomas, and, as I have said, because the illustrations that I found were so rich, compelling and interesting, we decided I should build an archive and share them with the world!

A: And when will you be launching?

M: Early summer. Stay tuned.

Michael John Goodman is in his final year of his PhD at Cardiff University’s School of English, Communication and Philosophy. His research focuses on Victorian illustrated editions of Shakespeare and how digital technology is changing our relationship to research and Shakespeare himself. He is the RA on Cardiff University’s brand new Digital Cultures Network and can be contacted at GoodmanMJ@cardiff.ac.uk.

Cardiff Women’s Suffrage Society banner comes home

Copyright: Local Studies, Cardiff Public Library

On Saturday 13 June 1908, the newly-formed Cardiff and District Women’s Suffrage Society were returning from a mass demonstration in London to demand equal voting rights. On the journey back to Cardiff, their coach was intercepted by police. The vehicle was searched, and all propaganda material was confiscated and set alight in a nearby field.

One item escaped the fire – a large canvas banner, featuring a hand-stitched red dragon motif and the Society’s name. One of the suffragists, Irene Protheroe, concealed the item from police in her clothing, and brought it back to Cardiff in one piece.

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Special Collections and Archives was recently contacted by Irene’s granddaughter, now living in London. She told us that a women’s suffrage banner had been passed down through her family. She knew that it had been taken to London and back for a march, and saved from destruction, but had no more specific details. Seeking a safe home for its long-term preservation, Irene made a final London-to-Cardiff trip with the banner, and kindly agreed to donate this very special piece of Cardiff’s history to the archives.

Seeking further information on the march mentioned by the donor, we enlisted the help of Beth Jenkins, PhD candidate in the School of History, Archaeology and Religion. Her research examines women’s professional employment in 19th and 20th century Wales. She immediately recognised the banner from photographs of the 1908 march, which have been reproduced here with the kind permission of Local Studies, Cardiff Public Library. Below, Beth summarises her research on the details of the march and its wider context.

In June 1908, over 10,000 women marched from Embankment to the Royal Albert Hall, where a large meeting took place. The procession was organised by the ‘constitutional’ wing of the women’s suffrage movement and led by Millicent Fawcett, leader of the National Union of Women’s Suffrage Societies. It included women from all classes, parties, and areas of Britain. Provincial detachments marched behind the leaders in alphabetical order. Each contingent carried a banner made for the march by local branch members, or designed by the Artists’ League for Women’s Suffrage. These banners used regional or national emblems: a leek for Llandudno and a dragon for Cardiff.

Copyright: Local Studies, Cardiff Public Library

The years preceding the First World War were the pinnacle of activity in the struggle for women’s parliamentary franchise, and campaigners used both constitutional and militant means to promote their cause. Banners were an important element of the spectacle in the suffrage marches and helped to distinguish groups – even though contemporaries did not always do so. The participants of this march displayed their non-militancy in the colours they wore: the red, white and green of the National Union of Women’s Suffrage Societies, rather than the purple, white and green which would be used by the Women’s Social and Political Union in their Hyde Park rally the following week. Participants with degrees also wore their academic robes to demonstrate the respectability of their supporters and women’s suitability for citizenship.

Formed in June 1908, this march would have been one of the Cardiff and District Women’s Suffrage Society’s inaugural activities. The society began with a membership of 70, and rapidly grew until it became the largest branch outside of London in 1912-13. Its membership peaked at 1,200 on the outbreak of the First World War.

The branch’s co-founder was Millicent Mackenzie, Professor of Education at the University (formerly the University College of South Wales and Monmouthshire). Mackenzie became the first female professor in Wales and the first female professor in the United Kingdom appointed to a fully chartered university in 1910. She also stood as the only female parliamentary candidate in Wales in 1918 – the first election in which women could vote, and be voted for.

Following the Representation of the People Act in 1918, the Cardiff and District Women’s Suffrage Society reconstituted itself as a Women Citizens’ Association, and continued to campaign for women’s franchise on the same terms as men. This was eventually achieved in 1928.

Back in the School of History, Archaeology and Religion, Professor Bill Jones brought his Culture, Society and Identity in Wales 1847-1914 undergraduates into Special Collections to see the banner. The impact was palpable: following a stunned silence, the group broke out into discussion: how was it made, who would have carried it, what did they talk about while it was being sewn, how far through the sewing were they before they realised that the dragon was facing the wrong way…? Some questions will never be answered, but thanks to the University’s research community, we now know much more about the history of this important item.

Devolution resource guide launched

Dydd Gŵyl Dewi Hapus / Happy St David’s Day!

Vote Yes on March 1st. Cardiff : Wales for the Assembly Campaign, [1979].

Special Collections and Archives have launched a new library resource guide on devolution to celebrate St David’s Day.

By listing works chronologically by publication date, it gives a historical perspective on the developing debate over the last 100 years. It also allows for a comparative study of devolution resources for Wales, Scotland, Northern Ireland, England and the European Union.

Pob hwyl / farewell Peter !

Last month, Special Collections and Archives bid farewell to its retiring founder Peter Keelan, as he hung up his white gloves for the final time.

Peter has been a member of the Cardiff University library service in its various incarnations for over 35 years. As former Salisbury Librarian, Peter petitioned for improved storage and security for this important collection, which resulted in the establishment of Special Collections and Archives in 2005.

In 2010, the collections doubled in size with the acquisition of the Cardiff Rare Books collection from the City Council, taking the University into a new league in terms of the breadth, depth and calibre of its research collections. Over the last ten years, visitor numbers, collection items, and profile have all risen steadily, as evidenced in the Special Collections and Archives Review 2005-2015. Peter’s career reached a landmark milestone in 2014 when he was awarded Welsh Librarian of the Year.

Pob lwc a pob hwyl Peter!

Exhibition: Livres d’Artistes

Our latest exhibition was launched at the opening of the Livres d’Artistes: The Artist’s Book in Theory and Practice conference. It showcases the generous donation of artists’ books from Ron King and the Circle Press, gifted to Special Collections and Archives in 2014. Sample images from the exhibition are featured below, with captions taken from an interview with Ron conducted by Cathy Courtney (1999), which looks back on his career in book arts.

Contracted at this time to create print editions for Editions Alecto, London, I persuaded them to take on this first book [The Prologue (1967)]. On completion of the work with their imprint on the title page and stamped logo on the reverse of the images, they suffered a financial set-back and I was forced to take on publication myself as Circle Press.

I had been working on a series of mask prints, and I knew this was a solution I wanted to explore for the Chaucer rather than attempting to ‘illustrate’ it… The abstract mask provided the opportunity to express the pilgrims through the merging of symbols – symbols taken from heraldry or the Church, for example – rather than caricature. The Parson, for instance, is not just himself but also a symbol of the Church, just as the Knight is the symbol of ruthlessness and (at the same time) vulnerability but also, in heraldic terms, of the Crusade… I used colour to put certain moods across; for instance, the Knight is grey, black, and silver and rather rusty, whereas the Squire is bright and gaudy.

Ronald King, Geoffrey Chaucer
The Prologue (1967)
Originally produced for Editions Alecto, London; published by Circle Press with frontispiece and fourteen mask images titled and initialled in pencil – printed silk screen and letterpress in 24 pt Plantin. 125 signed copies, 15 proofs – 50 x 37cm – 15 unbound 4pp sections in J. Green rag-made paper wraparound in blue cloth folder and canvas slipcase. Separate editions of 50 plus 5 proofs were made of all the images except ‘Friar’ and ‘Franklin’ onto J. Green paper 56 x 38cm titled, numbered, and fully signed. Guildford, 1967 (second edition, 1978).

There was a room in the Victoria and Albert Museum that was devoted to artists’ books in [the 1960s], and some of them had a deep influence on me. Matisse’s Jazz (1947) moved me tremendously, a revelation in the strength of its colour, the economy of its drawing, the exciting presentation of something that had been worked out in cut paper and reproduced by a hand-cut stencil technique in a way that vitalized rather than diminished it… Miró’s A Toute Epreuve (1958)… had a strong influence on the second book I did, The Song of Solomon (1969)

Ronald King, King James Bible
The Song of Solomon (1968)
Over 30 screen printed images, including 8 double spreads – text printed letterpress in 30 pt Fry’s Baskerville, interwoven with the designs. 150 signed copies, 15 proofs – 72pp unbound on J. Green mould-made paper – 40 x 30cm – in gold-blocked red cloth cover and slipcase. 50 copies reserved for London Graphic Arts Inc. and 10 for Imre Maltzahn Gallery. Separate editions of 30 signed prints on Hosho paper of all double spreads and 2 single pages were issued without text. Guildford, 1968 (second edition, 1990).

Bluebeard’s Castle (1972-73) marked the beginning of [my] collaboration with the poet Roy Fisher [and] my first step away from the traditional book format… The extraordinary thing was that within three weeks of my having sent Roy a mock-up of the book, he had written a text in which we only changed one word. I’d never met him… I designed the whole thing, and making it was incredibly masochistic. Absolute hell. The difficult thing about a work like Bluebeard’s Castle is to translate the dummy into something that can be manufactured or constructed in an edition. I remember sitting at a desk and just cutting and chopping and gluing and looking at all kinds of different pop-up material until I turned out the first room, the Torture Chamber. Once I got the idea that to make something pop-up you have to have symmetrical folding structure, I began experimenting in various ways.

Ronald King, Roy Fisher
Bluebeard’s Castle (1972)
Based on the opera by Bartok, the visual theme of the book is represented by nine pop-up constructions; the portcullis, the castle and seven secret chambers with the verse incorporated into the design printed in Optima. 125 signed copies – 30 x 20cm made up of 10 loose 4pp sections silk screened throughout onto Hollingsworth paper placed into a cardboard folder and held in a black Perspex tray with a clear lid. Guildford, 1972.

I was born in Brazil in 1932. The Carnival was a three-day event just before Lent and was visually very powerful. I loved the spectacle of the fancy dress, the masks and hobby horses. I spent a lot of times making paper toys and kites. Kites have a tremendous masklike presence, and they have appeared in my adult work; for instance, I used them in my Antony and Cleopatra (1979).

Ronald King, William Shakespeare
Antony and Cleopatra (1979)
Over 30 screen printed designs for the full text of the play; printed letterpress in 11 pt Baskerville with screen printed handwriting for annotations by Keith Please. 300 signed copies, 40 proofs – eleven 8pp unbound sections – 38 x 29cm on Cuve Rives Blanc paper in a quarter-bound leatherette and canvas portfolio. Guildford, 1979.

The Left-Handed Punch (1986) and Anansi Company (1992) are the two most elaborate books Roy and I worked on. The Punch is my favourite of all the books I’ve done; it holds together better than Anansi and has more dimensions. Punch’s moveable puppets, on-stage descriptions, the large chunks of the original Cruikshank version of the text, and the drawn Victorian tableaux scenes (spoofs of famous drawings and paintings) all fit together easily, and the photo montages and collages are relieved by the inclusion of the poet’s (Roy’s) handwriting to strong effect.

Ronald King, Roy Fisher
The Left-Handed Punch (1986)
The fifth collaboration of artist and poet in a modern version of the Punch and Judy drama. Entirely screen-printed with the exception of the introduction, titles and colophon, which were printed letterpress in 14 pt Baskerville. 80 signed copies made up often 4pp French-folded sections – 38 x 28cm on Somerset mould-made paper. The six scenes and epilogue (which include 1 articulated puppet designs) are held in cartridge paper folders within a red cloth-covered folder inserted into a hand-printed striped cloth slipcase. Guildford, 1986.

The Anansi book is more spectacular with its removable puppets made of wire and card – the whole book is like the Brazilian Carnival scene as I knew it, lots of noisy music and revelry coming from all directions.

Ronald King
The Anansi Company (1992)
The seventh collaboration of artist and poet with thirteen screen-printed removable wire and card puppets. Introduction and accompanying verse printed letterpress in 14 & 18 pt Walbaum. 120 copies, 10 proofs – one 8pp section, thirteen 4pp French-fold sections, and one 4pp section (40 x 29cm), all loosely inserted into card wraparound and held in large colour-blocked solander box. London, 1992.

If I am to criticise other works, I would say that, too often, one look through is enough! That does not mean that I can’t enjoy that ‘one-look’ type of book; not only do I have a large collection of them, but my own wire-printed productions, Turn Over Darling (1990) and Echo Book (1994), are books of that nature… I try to make even those ‘one-look’ books tactile and pleasing to handle and the printing relevant to the content. As in good speech, the message is not enough, the quality of delivery is vital.

Ronald King
Turn Over Darling (1990)
A series of six double-sided blind-embossed images printed in wire, which, when folded and juxtaposed in sequence, make eleven reclining nudes which change position from front to back view. 75 signed copies – six 4pp sections – 20 x 15cm on RWS hand-made paper and an unsigned, unlimited edition on Khadi Indian hand-made paper, both bound into tan hand-made paper covers and inserted into grey card slipcase. London, 1990.

Ronald King
Echo Book (1994)
A small booklet with the words ‘ECHO BOOK’ printed in wire and blind-embossed to read ‘BOOK ECHO’ on the reverse of the page. The impression fades as the pages are turned in sequence. 75 signed copies with three 4pp sections – 20 x 8cm of Khadi hand-made paper and an unsigned and unlimited edition with two 4pp sections, both sewn into a blind embossed black paper cover. London, 1994.

Although I was never a wholly traditional printer, I was closer to that stand-point when I began than now, when much of what I do might be described as the work of an experimental book artist. For many years now I have been using materials such as wire, wood, mirror and stone and exploring the elasticity of the book form itself. In selecting slides for lectures, I’m often aware of how my approach to the book form has developed. From the conventional solution of image and text in the format of the Chaucer Prologue in 1967 – through pop-up books, mirror books, wire-embossed books with double images, stone books, sawn and laser-cut ones – to the hollow log which I cut earlier this year into forty sections and bound in the inner ring to make four quarter-circle books that fit together into the original log form, is a long way.

Ronald King
Log Books: Hollow Log (1995)
An on-going project, begun in 1995, for a series of book-works which explore the possibilities of sawing a log of wood into book sections, or pages, which can be reassembled into their original log form. In the case of Hollow Log, pages are cut from the circumference of a hollow log, divided into four codex-bound books of equal size.

Ronald King
Hick Hack Hock (1996-7)
A series of book-works varying in size (7 x 5cm – 13-18cm) based on the ‘paper, scissor, stone’ game. The scissors are blind-embossed onto a concertina of hand-made black paper with split stones (which act as covers) adhered to both ends of the folded pages. Text printed letterpress in 8 pt Helvetica. Each book contained in a hinged custom-made box. London, 1996-7.

Artist’s Book conference: discount booking ends Friday

 

Many thanks to those who have already registered for the conference Livres d’Artistes: the Artist’s Book in Theory and Practice. For those who have yet to do so, the last day for booking at the discounted rate is FRIDAY 13 NOVEMBER. Conference registration will cost £60 (£25 student/unwaged) until Friday, and £75 (£40 student/unwaged) after that date. A booking form can be downloaded from the website.

Full details of the conference programme and our plenary speakers can also be found on the conference website. Hurry – places are filling up fast!

Exhibition: Scandal and Sociability: New perspectives on the Burney family

Frances Burney (1752-1840) was one of the most successful and influential writers of the eighteenth century, publishing four novels (Evelina: or, the History of a Young Lady’s Entrance into the World (1778); Cecilia: or, Memoirs of an Heiress (1782); Camilla: or, A Picture of Youth (1796); and The Wanderer: or, Female Difficulties (1814), which were immensely popular and influenced other writers including Jane Austen (1775-1817). In recent years, scholarly interest in Burney has widened to encompass the influence and activities of the rest of her remarkable family, which included musicians, sailors, classicists, artists and two other successful novelists. Between them, the Burneys knew most British luminaries of the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries working in the fields of literature, art, music, politics, botany, exploration, and court and Church circles.

A symposium held at Cardiff University on 1 September 2015 considered the Burney family as a composite whole, asking how their sociable network and often tumultuous internal dynamics influenced the remarkable spate of cultural and sociable activity carried out by its polymathic members. This exhibition of rare print and visual material relating to the Burney family and circle was designed and curated by Dr. Sophie Coulombeau (School of English, Communication and Philosophy) and Alison Harvey (Special Collections and Archives) to complement the symposium.

 

Portraits, Lives and Letters

Many members of the Burney family and their social circle achieved fame or notoriety in their own day, as writers, artists, or musicians… or socialites with scandalous love lives.  This section explores visual and textual depictions of Frances Burney, her father Dr. Charles Burney (1726-1814), and the family friend – and later enemy – Hester Piozzi (1741-1821). Some were composed by the subjects themselves or with their permission; others devised by those closest to them after their deaths; and still others produced by perfect strangers exploiting their celebrity for commercial gain.

 

Portrait [of Frances Burney?]

Dr. John Butterworth, an independent scholar, has kindly lent us an anonymous, undated portrait of a young woman identified on the frame as Frances Burney. An art historian and conservator have suggested that the portrait dates from the last quarter of the eighteenth century, and the hairstyle of the sitter (the so-called ‘pouf’, which was fashionable only in the second half of the 1770s) suggests a date from 1775-1780. If the sitter was Burney, it would therefore have been painted just before, or just after, she wrote and published Evelina.

Some attendees at the symposium felt that Dr. Butterworth made a persuasive case for the identity of the sitter as Burney. Others were more sceptical, and pointed out that there is no reference to the portrait in her journals and letters: conversely, when she had her portrait taken later in life, she complained about the process bitterly. It was also pointed out that the inscription on the portrait almost certainly dates fro the twentieth century. However, it should be noted that Burney’s journals and letters were twice heavily censored; and also that a modern inscription may well have replaced an earlier one.

 

Frances Burney, Diary and Letters of Madame D’Arblay, as edited by her niece Charlotte Barrett, 7 vols. (London: Henry Colburn, first edition, 1842-47).

This was the first published edition of Frances Burney’s Diary and Letters, which today stretches to over twenty volumes. This edition (severely edited by both Frances Burney and by her niece Charlotte Barrett to exclude any verdict on acquaintances that might be seen as offensive, and to excise any mention of incidents that might reflect badly on the Burney family) was a more modest seven volumes. Even after this censorship, the diaries provide a fascinating insight into life in Georgian England and France. The edition was influential in setting the direction of Burney’s critical reputation: for most of the nineteenth and early twentieth century, she was seen as a talented diarist rather than an important novelist.

These volumes belonged to Arthur Henriques: an inscription suggests they were a gift from his mother in 1878. The edition is notable for an interesting selection of frontispiece portraits used to illustrate the seven volumes: sitters include Burney herself, Hester Thrale, Queen Charlotte, Mary Delaney, General D’Arblay, Dr. Charles Burney and Germaine de Stael. From this selection of Burney’s acquaintance, we can glean an idea of the figures that Barrett’s publisher thought most likely to interest the readership.

 

Hester Lynch Piozzi, Love Letters of Mrs. Piozzi, written when she was eighty, to William Augustus Conway (London: John Russell Smith, first edition, 1843.)

Hester Lynch Thrale was Frances Burney’s dearest friend in the early 1780s. The two fell out in 1785 over Burney’s disapproval of Thrale’s second marriage (soon after the death of her husband) to the Italian Catholic music master Gabriel Piozzi. The marriage scandalised polite society, and Hester Lynch Piozzi achieved a reputation as a woman unable to control her passions, or to put her duties as a widow and mother above her ‘unfeminine’ lust. She steadily built up an impressive career as a poet, biographer and travel writer. But the whiff of scandal never deserted her; during old age, she conducted a close and ambiguous friendship with the young actor William Augustus Conway, who was fifty years her junior. This edition of some of her letters to him – styled ‘Love Letters’ – was published after her death by an anonymous editor. Like Barrett’s Diary and Letters of Burney, this edition is illustrated with thirteen portraits, with the following subjects: ‘Mrs. Thrale’, ‘A. Murphy’, ‘Dr. Johnson’, ‘Madame d’Arblay’, ‘Urn to Dr. Johnson’, ‘Mrs. Thrale’, ‘Mrs. Kemble’, ‘Cowper’, ‘Bath (view of)’, ‘Rousseau’, ‘Duke of Kent’, ‘Duchess of Kent’, ‘Mrs. Piozzi’.

 

Frances Burney, Memoirs of Dr. Burney (London: Edward Moxon, first edition, 1832).

Frances Burney’s father, the historian of music Dr. Charles Burney, died in 1814. She would live on for another twenty-nine years, most of which time she spent writing her beloved father’s Memoirs. The result, published in 1832, was the most critically reviled of all Burney’s works. John Wilson Croker (1780-1857), writing in the Quarterly Review, accused her of distorting her father’s memory in order to draw attention to her own achievements. Some modern scholars feel that he had a point: Dr. Cassie Ulph (York), speaking about the Memoirs at our symposium, said: ‘The real narrative of Memoirs of Doctor Burney is that of [Frances] Burney’s own literary career, and genius.’ In writing her father’s life, Burney was really writing her own.

 

Streatham and Cantab Literature

The Burney family were extraordinarily talented networkers. Throughout their lives, their literary, musical and artistic gifts helped them to assimilate into the social circles of people more wealthy and powerful than themselves, and to meet fellow men and women of letters. The most important of these groups, in the 1770s and the 1780s, was the Streatham Circle of the rich brewer Henry Thrale and his wife Hester, where Dr. Samuel Johnson (1709-1784) was the star attraction. A more minor connection – but an important one for Frances Burney – was the ‘Cantab’ circle of the Cambridge family at Twickenham. This section of the exhibition showcases some early editions of writings by members of these two groups, showing how deeply the Burney family embedded themselves, throughout the 1770s and 1780s, within the metropolitan literary elite.

 

Hester Lynch Piozzi, Anecdotes of the late Samuel Johnson LL.D during the last twenty years of his life (London: T. Cadell, second edition, 1786).

In the wake of her scandalous second marriage, Hester Piozzi embarked on a project: to publish a book of Anecdotes of the recently deceased literary lion Dr. Samuel Johnson, who had been her close friend before they fell out over her marriage to Piozzi. The Anecdotes were published by the reputable publisher Thomas Cadell, and sold like wildfire. They were strongly criticised by friends of Johnson (such as James Boswell (1740-1795)) who thought that Piozzi had painted Johnson in an unflattering light.

The inscription suggests that this copy was owned by William Ingham. A handwritten note at the back of the volume marks passages of particular interest to the owner.

 

Hester Lynch Piozzi, British Synonymy; or, an attempt at regulating the choice of words in familiar conversation, 2 vols (London: G.G. and J. Robinson, first edition, 1794). 

In 1794, Hester Lynch Piozzi published a two-volume work of synonymy, a relatively new field; her innovative publication was preceded only by the Rev. John Trusler’s The Difference Between Words Esteemed Synonymous (1766). The book was popular and immediately ran into a further two editions. The editors of Merriam-Webster’s Dictionary of Synonymys (1984) note that Piozzi ‘frequently takes issue with Dr. Johnson or, in a sprightly manner, casts doubt on his judgments’: perhaps we might see this work of lexicography as Piozzi’s attempt to throw off the shadow of Johnson’s influence. If so, then she was unsuccessful, at least for the owner of this copy: the title-page of vol. 1 is annotated in a pencil hand: ‘Hester Lynch Piozzi’ is changed to ‘Mrs. Thrale – vide Johnson’. (Mrs. Thrale – see Johnson’).

 

Richard Owen Cambridge, An Account of the War in India (London: T. Jefferys, second edition, 1762) 

During the 1780s, Frances Burney became friendly with the Cambridge family of Twickenham. Richard Cambridge (1717-1802), a man of letters who published this volume in 1762, was the first to welcome her into their home. Eventually, however, his son George (1756-1841) became far more important to Burney: her manuscript letters reveal that she had strong romantic feelings for him, and believed them to be returned. But George Cambridge never proposed marriage. One of our speakers at the symposium, Professor Stewart Cooke (Dawson College), gave a fascinating insight into Burney’s misery and suspense over the mid-1780s as she realised that George Cambridge was a lost cause and tried to extract herself from a hopeless situation.

 

Edmund Burke, Reflections on the Revolution in France, and on the proceedings in certain societies in London, (London: J. Dodsley, fourth edition, 1790).

The philosopher and politician Edmund Burke (1729-1797) was one of the most regular visitors at Streatham, and a close friend of Charles Burney. Moreover, he provided literary mentorship to Frances Burney after the publication of Cecilia in 1782, sending her a warm letter full of compliments and thanking her ‘for providing instruction’.

Perhaps Burke’s most important work was his Reflections on the Revolution in France, a pamphlet published in 1790 reviling the action of French revolutionaries and British sympathisers, and arguing for the preservation of ancient traditions. He sent Charles Burney a copy of the first edition: Burney wrote of his ‘infinit eagerness and delight’ upon reading it, and promised: ‘this copy I shall deposit among my most precious literary possessions’. This volume of the fourth edition appears to have belonged to Isabella Metford, and is inscribed ‘May 1866’.

 

Charles Burney, A General History of Music, from the earliest of ages to the present period, 4 vols. (Vol. 1 London: Printed for the author, second edition, 1789; vols 2-4 London: J. Robson and G.G. Robinson, first edition, 1782-1789).

In the 1770s Charles Burney was a music teacher and talented musician, but he harboured ambitions of being recognised as a bona fide man of letters like his heroes Dr. Johnson and Edmund Burke. The symposium’s keynote speaker, Professor Peter Sabor (McGill University) remarked: ‘With the publication of his General History of Music, Burney could transition from Johnson’s fan to his peer.’ Peter also gave us an overview of the creative exchanges between the two men: While Johnson was reading proofs of Burney’s General History of Music, Burney was reading the manuscript and proofs of Johnson’s last work: Lives of the Poets. By the time of Johnson’s death, Charles Burney was high in his estimation, a testament to the inimitable Burney networking skills.

An anonymous reader has annotated the volumes with the dates of his/her reading, and with notes drawing attention to passages of particular interest.

 

Exploration and Botany

Frances Burney’s elder brother James (1750-1821) had a colourful naval career: he travelled with Captain James Cook (1728-1779) on his last two voyages, and acted as interpreter for the famous Tahitian Mai (c. 1751-1780) when he conducted a tour of England in the 1770s. Several of our papers drew attention to the Burney family’s links, through James and his shipmate Molesworth Phillips (1755-1832), with South Sea culture and with the taxonomic work of the botanical explorers Joseph Banks (1743-1820) and Daniel Solander (1733-1782) (who accompanied Cook on his earlier voyages).

 

Joseph Banks and Daniel Solander, Illustrations of Australian Plants collected in 1770 during Captain Cook’s Voyage round the World in H.M.S Endeavour, by the Right Hon. Sir Joseph Banks, Bart. K.B., P.R.S, and Dr. Daniel Solander, F.R.S., 3 vols (London: Longman & Co. and the British Museum, 1900-1905).

Joseph Banks and Daniel Solander were botanists who sailed to Brazil, Tahiti and Australia with Captain Cook on the HMS Endeavour in 1768-1761. They brought back hundreds of specimens of plants then unknown in Britain, which they catalogued and had illustrated for publication. Probably due to Solander’s sudden death in 1782 and Banks’s subsequent loss of interest in the project, their findings were not published for over a hundred years. These folio volumes, published by the British Museum in 1900, contain Solander’s descriptions and beautiful illustrations of the plants, many carried out by artists on board the Endeavour.

 

James Lee, Introduction to Botany, (London: S. Crowder et al, fifth edition, 1794).

Botanical study was a fashionable hobby in Georgian London, where new discoveries such as those of Banks and Solander attracted intense public interest. The Swedish botanist Carl Linnaeus (1707-1778) had recently developed a new method for classifying and identifying species that was simple to use, and was explained in many popular adaptations such as James Lee’s Introduction to Botany. At the symposium, Sophie Coulombeau (Cardiff University) argued that that botanical handbooks like James Lee’s, and the personal tutelage of Daniel Solander before his death, heavily influence Frances Burney’s theory of ‘character’ in her second novel, Cecilia.

 

John Hawkesworth, Account of the Voyages (London: W. Strahan and T. Cadell, first edition, 1773).

In 1773 the writer John Hawkesworth (1715-1773) was commissioned by the Admiralty to publish an authorised account of Captain James Cook’s voyages in the Southern Hemisphere. These beautifully illustrated volumes, which were hugely influential in crafting the public impression in Britain of little-known territories such as Tahiti, were the result. The inscription reads: ‘From the Library of T. Booker Esq, Velindra, near Cardiff, Purchased 1901’.

 

James Cook, A Voyage Towards the South Pole, and round the world 2 vols. (London: W. Strahan and T. Cadell, third edition, 1779).

A sort of sequel to Hawkesworth’s work, though this time written by Cook himself, this publication gave an account of Cook’s second major voyage (1772-1775), the first known expedition to cross the Antarctic circle. By the time these volumes appeared, Cook had embarked on his second voyage in the HMS Resolution, which was eventually to end in his gruesome death in Hawaii in 1779.

Guest post: CUROP Research Project – Pattern and the Romantic Imagination, 1780-1840

This guest post comes from Felicity Holmes-Mackie. A graduate of Cardiff University, Felicity has been working as a research assistant for Dr Jane Moore School of English, Communication and Philosophy on a CUROP (Cardiff Undergraduate Research Opportunities Programme) project using ladies’ periodicals held in Special Collections and Archives.

Posters from all the Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences CUROP projects undertaken this year will be exhibited later this week on Friday 16^th October in the Viriamu Jones Gallery in Main Building between 12.00-13.30.

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‘The fashionable colours for this month are…’

During my undergraduate degree at Cardiff I have been fortunate enough to enrol on several modules taught in conjunction with Special Collections and Archives. Having been exposed to the wonderland of exciting resources nestled underneath the Arts and Social Studies Library, I naturally leapt at the chance to embark upon a research project based there during summer 2015. Now, thanks to a project led by Dr Jane Moore and supported by the Cardiff Undergraduate Research Opportunities Programme (CUROP), I have spent a summer picking my way through the moveable shelving and examining the treasures I discovered.

The project, entitled Pattern and the Romantic Imagination: the creative interchange between poetry and needlework 1780-1840, explores the links between material crafts and imaginative poetry and prose fiction of the Romantic period. I have been, slowly but surely, rifling through the hard copy collections and online digital databases of late eighteenth- and early nineteenth-century
periodicals. The main publications I have focussed on are The Lady’s Magazine, La Belle Assemblée, and The Ladies’ Monthly Museum, which feature a wide range of articles. These include serialised prose fiction, illustrated biographies, recipes for medicines, word puzzles, and needlework patterns. They were generally aimed at upper class ladies and contain work written by both male and female contributors, who were often unpaid.

The most interesting discoveries of the project were undoubtedly those found in the fashion descriptions which feature in all three publications. Each magazine had a slightly different approach to reporting on the latest fashions; while some articles aim to inspire with vivid descriptions, others dictate what the reader should or should not be wearing according to the tastes that month. La Belle Assemblée outlines upcoming fashions, whereas The Ladies’ Monthly Museum describes fashions of the past month in its regular feature ‘The Mirror for Fashion’. The Lady’s Magazine includes similar monthly features, but twice a year it also provides vivid and detailed descriptions of the court dresses worn on royal birthdays. In these pieces, each lady’s outfit is described and judged in terms of taste; sometimes the line between gossip and fashion description becomes somewhat blurred!

These fashion articles can seem repetitive and uninteresting, perhaps something to skim quickly before finding the next instalment of a gripping serialised novel or the next letter in a stream of huffy correspondence. However, delving into these articles reveals an arsenal of technical language and a veritable rainbow of descriptive vocabulary. One of the highlights of the project has undoubtedly been the rich, varied, and occasionally eccentric colour vocabulary which features in all the publications to some degree. From pigeon’s breast to faded dove, marshmallow-blossom to date-leaf, ponceau to ethereal blue, the ‘fashionable colours for the month’ are rich, varied, and occasionally eccentric.

The coloured fashion plates too, are a real treat. The majority of plates show ladies sitting or standing in ways which will show off their outfits, but some also show ladies dancing, at the beach, playing musical instruments, or picking flowers. In some months hat fashions go into overdrive and resemble crowns, large turban-style wraps, or even Roman helmets.

These fashion articles and plates are certainly more stimulating and imaginative than they might first appear. Not only did the colour vocabularies surprise me but the technical descriptions of the dresses offered an insight into thinking about outfits and dress which was peculiar to the period and is far-removed from the way we think about style today. The periodicals generally offered a range of unexpected and fascinating articles and illustrations and I certainly feel lucky to have familiarised myself with them.