Public-domain ebook
by Walter Crane
Language: en1,087 downloads on Project Gutenberg
Subjects
In: History - Other·Art
Public-domain ebook sourced from Project Gutenberg #40250.
Walter Crane’s Of the Decorative Illustration of Books Old and New is a scholarly survey of book ornamentation that begins with a lengthy dedication and a series of acknowledgments, situating the work within a network of contemporary illustrators, printers, and collectors. The opening pages list the many artists and firms whose plates and blocks Crane has borrowed, then move to a “Note to Third Edition” that updates earlier material and records recent developments in lettering and illumination taught at the Central School of Arts and Crafts and the Royal College of Art. From this point the book proceeds through a detailed contents outline, followed by an extensive catalogue of illustrations ranging from fifteenth‑century German incunabula to modern works by William Blake, Dante Gabriel Rossetti, and the author himself. The first chapter frames the study as a visual history of design, arguing that the evolution of decorative impulse can be traced through the pages of illuminated manuscripts and printed books alike.
Crane writes in a measured, erudite Victorian voice, blending personal experience as a decorator with a broad art‑historical perspective. His prose is rich with metaphor, comparing books to mirrors that reflect the “ebb and flow of human progress”, yet remains anchored in concrete examples and meticulous bibliographic detail. Readers with an interest in the history of illustration, typographic design, or the Arts and Crafts movement will find the text rewarding, as will collectors, librarians, and scholars who appreciate a thorough, image‑driven exploration of how pictures and ornament have shaped the book page from medieval manuscripts to the modern revival of decorative printing.
The opening · free to read
I must offer my best thanks to Mr. Gleeson White, without whose most valuable help the book might never have been finished. He has allowed me to draw upon his remarkable collection of modern illustrated books for examples, and I am indebted to many artists for permission to use their illustrations, as well as to Messrs. George Allen, Bradbury, Agnew and Co., J. M. Dent and Co., Edmund Evans, Geddes and Co., Hacon and Ricketts (the Vale Press), John Lane, Lawrence and Bullen, Sampson Low and Co., Macmillan and Co., Elkin Mathews, Kegan Paul and Co., Walter Scott, Charles Scribner's Sons, and Virtue and Co., for their courtesy in giving me, in many cases, the use of the actual blocks.
To Mr. William Morris, who placed his beautiful collection of early printed books at my disposal, from which to choose illustrations; to Mr. Emery Walker for help in many ways; to Mr. John Calvert for permission to use some of his father's illustrations; and to Mr. A. W. Pollard who has lent me some of his early Italian examples, and has also supervised my bibliographical particulars, I desire to make my cordial acknowledgments.
WALTER CRANE.
KENSINGTON: July 18th, 1896.
NOTE TO THIRD EDITION.
A reprint of this book being called for, I take the opportunity of adding a few notes, chiefly to Chapter IV., which will be found further on with the numbers of the pages to which they refer.
As touching the general subject of the book one may, perhaps, be allowed to record with some satisfaction that the study of lettering, text-writing, and illumination is now seriously taken up in our craft-schools. The admirable teaching of Mr. Johnston of the Central School of Arts and Crafts and the Royal College of Art in this connection cannot be too highly spoken of. We have had, too, admirable work, in each kind, from Mr. Reuter, Mr. Mortimer, Mr. Treglown, Mr. Alan Vigers, Mr. Graily Hewitt, and Mr. A. E. R. Gill; and Mrs. Traguair and Miss Kingsford are remarkable for the beauty, delicacy, and invention of their work as illuminators among the artists who are now pursuing this beautiful branch of art.
So that the ancient crafts of the scribe and illuminator may be said to have again come to life, and this, taken in connection with the revival of printing as an art, is an interesting and significant fact.
As recent contributions to the study of lettering we have Mr. Lewis F. Day's recent book of Alphabets, and Mr. G. Woolliscroft Rhead's sheets for school use.
I have to deplore the loss of my former helper in this book, Mr. Gleeson White, since the work first appeared. His extensive knowledge of, and sympathy with the modern book illustrators of the younger generation was remarkable, and as a designer himself he showed considerable skill and taste in book-decoration, chiefly in the way of covers. As a most estimable and amiable character he will always be remembered by his friends.
WALTER CRANE.
KENSINGTON: June, 1904.
CONTENTS.
CHAPTER I.--OF THE EVOLUTION OF THE ILLUSTRATIVE AND DECORATIVE IMPULSE FROM THE EARLIEST TIMES; AND OF THE FIRST PERIOD OF DECORATIVELY ILLUSTRATED BOOKS IN THE ILLUMINATED MSS. OF THE MIDDLE AGES. 1.
CHAPTER II.--OF THE TRANSITION, AND OF THE SECOND PERIOD OF DECORATIVELY ILLUSTRATED BOOKS, FROM THE INVENTION OF PRINTING IN THE FIFTEENTH CENTURY ONWARDS. 45.
CHAPTER III.--OF THE PERIOD OF THE DECLINE OF DECORATIVE FEELING IN BOOK DESIGN AFTER THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY, AND OF THE MODERN REVIVAL. 125.
CHAPTER IV.--OF RECENT DEVELOPMENT OF DECORATIVE BOOK ILLUSTRATION, AND THE MODERN REVIVAL OF PRINTING AS AN ART. 185.
CHAPTER V.--OF GENERAL PRINCIPLES IN DESIGNING BOOK ORNAMENTS AND ILLUSTRATIONS: CONSIDERATION OF ARRANGEMENT, SPACING AND TREATMENT. 279.
INDEX. 329.
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.
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