Arthur Rackham's Book of Pictures (Signed limited edition)
- SIGNED
- London: William Heinemann, 1913
London: William Heinemann, 1913. First edition. Very Good +. Edition deluxe, number 165 of 1,130 numbered copies, signed by the artist. A Very Good + copy. Large quarto (11 1/2 x 9 inches; 292 x 232 mm). 43, [1] pp. Forty-four color plates (including frontispiece) mounted on tan paper, with descriptive tissue guards, and ten drawings in black and white. Publisher's pictorial white buckram. Front cover pictorially stamped and lettered in gilt, spine lettered in gilt, decorative end-papers, top edge gilt, others uncut. Spine darkened and gilt somewhat dull, a few small marks on upper cover, some very slight wear at top of spine.
Rackham’s Book of Pictures is a collection of illustrations that fully encapsulates the artist’s classic style: From goblins and fairies to mystical atmospheric landscapes, there's an image to suit everyone's tastes in this survey. The introduction by Arthur Quiller-Couch sets out the book's contents—not a biography but a celebration of Rackham's artistry. Rackham initially approached J. M. Barrie to write the introduction, but due to scheduling conflicts Barrie turned down the offer and Arthur Quiller-Couch was found as a replacement. Not only did he admire “Rackham's work; he also thoroughly understood a child's instinctive longing for the imaginative and fanciful. 'To this instant, constant, intellectual need of childhood no one in our day,' he wrote, 'has ministered so bountifully or so whole-heartedly as Mr. Rackham.' And Quiller-Couch was happy, too, in associating the random, impressionistic nature of much of the Book of Pictures with 'the wayward visions that tease every true artist's mind, while he bends over the day's work'" (Hudson).
Arthur Rackham (1867-1939) is perhaps the most acclaimed and influential illustrator of the Golden Age of Illustration. A prolific artist even from his youth, Rackham got his start as an illustrator working for the Westminster Budget Newspaper (1892). Over the next few years, he took on more and more commissions for children’s books, hitting his career high in the first three decades of the twentieth century. Rackham turned his imaginative pen to every classic—from Shakespeare to Dickens to Poe.
Latimore and Haskell, pp. 41-42. Riall, p. 118. Very Good +.
Rackham’s Book of Pictures is a collection of illustrations that fully encapsulates the artist’s classic style: From goblins and fairies to mystical atmospheric landscapes, there's an image to suit everyone's tastes in this survey. The introduction by Arthur Quiller-Couch sets out the book's contents—not a biography but a celebration of Rackham's artistry. Rackham initially approached J. M. Barrie to write the introduction, but due to scheduling conflicts Barrie turned down the offer and Arthur Quiller-Couch was found as a replacement. Not only did he admire “Rackham's work; he also thoroughly understood a child's instinctive longing for the imaginative and fanciful. 'To this instant, constant, intellectual need of childhood no one in our day,' he wrote, 'has ministered so bountifully or so whole-heartedly as Mr. Rackham.' And Quiller-Couch was happy, too, in associating the random, impressionistic nature of much of the Book of Pictures with 'the wayward visions that tease every true artist's mind, while he bends over the day's work'" (Hudson).
Arthur Rackham (1867-1939) is perhaps the most acclaimed and influential illustrator of the Golden Age of Illustration. A prolific artist even from his youth, Rackham got his start as an illustrator working for the Westminster Budget Newspaper (1892). Over the next few years, he took on more and more commissions for children’s books, hitting his career high in the first three decades of the twentieth century. Rackham turned his imaginative pen to every classic—from Shakespeare to Dickens to Poe.
Latimore and Haskell, pp. 41-42. Riall, p. 118. Very Good +.