Category: {magazines}

Magazines

Mervyn Peake in Lilliput

This month I’ve been redesigning the Savoy Books edition of The Exploits of Engelbrecht by Maurice Richardson, in preparation for a reprint. This has involved scanning the covers of the issues of Lilliput, the magazine where Richardson’s tales of the dwarf surrealist sportsman first appeared, and one number of these, from May 1950, also includes a feature about nursery rhymes illustrated by Mervyn Peake. The paintings were reprinted in Mervyn Peake: The Man and his Art in 2006 but shrunk onto a single page so this is a chance to see them at a larger size. Also reproduced below is the accompanying article by Leslie Daiken and the Arcimboldo-style cover by Ronald Ferris. Some of the earlier covers by Walter Trier—all of which featured a man, a woman and a dog in a variety of guises—can be seen at VTS.

Update: For more about Mervyn Peake, see also Peake Studies.

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“How many miles to Babylon?”
“Three score miles and ten.”
“Can I get there by candle-light?”
“Yes, and back again.
If your heels are nimble and light
You may get there by candle-light.”

Continue reading “Mervyn Peake in Lilliput”

George Du Maurier’s Christmas Dream

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A Little Christmas Dream (Punch Magazine, December 26th, 1868).

Mr. L. Figuier, in the Thesis which precedes his interesting work on the world before the Flood condemns the practice of awakening the youthful mind to admiration by means of fables and Fairy Tales, and recommends in lieu thereof, the study of the Natural History of the World in which we live.

Christmas would be a bit more worthwhile with a few of these things patrolling the streets. George Du Maurier (1834–1896) gave the world the character of Svengali is his novel Trilby (1894) and that character’s name lives on even if the novel goes largely unread today. He turned to writing late when his eyesight failed and he was no longer able to maintain his career as an illustrator. Post-Beardsley, those illustrations and satires of Victorian life can seem rather stilted but VTS has examples of his more imaginative work, including this piece.

{ feuilleton } will be quiet for a couple of days while I visit family but, as is the custom here, the archive feature will be enabled to throw up random samples from the past.

Elsewhere on { feuilleton }
• The illustrators archive