Children's Books and Their Illustrators

by Gleeson White

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 FROM "MAKE BELIEVE." BY CHARLES ROBINSON (JOHN LANE. 1896)

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?

THE SPOTTED MIMILUS. ILLUSTRATION FROM "KING LONGBEARD." BY CHARLES ROBINSON (JOHN LANE. 1897)

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.