Illustrating Fairies

Two words: Arthur Rackham. He was probably the pre-eminent illustrator of children's books in Edwardian and Georgian England, during the golden age of British book illustration. His instantly recognisable pen-and-ink with watercolour fantasy artwork was reproduced in glossy plates in a host of the most popular titles of the era. 

The quintet of 'Rip van Winkle ' (1905), 'Peter Pan in Kensington Gardens ' (1906), 'Alice's Adventures in Wonderland ' (1907), 'A Midsummer Night's Dream ' (1908) and 'Gulliver's Travels ' (1909) got Rackham's illustrious career off to a flying start, no puns intended, a fabulous streak which continued right through to 'The Wind in the Willows ', which set of illustrations he actually completed in 1939 just before his death, though the book didn't get published until 1950, because of wartime paper rationing. 

detail from 'The Serpentine' in Peter Pan In Kensington Gardens, Arthur Rackham, 1906

Rackham's illustrations for Kenneth Graham's 'Wind in the Willows ' was my introduction to his work, when I was given a copy for my seventh birthday. The 'Peter Pan...' and 'A Midsummer Night's Dream ' volumes followed.

Rackham was born in Vauxhall, London in 1867, one of twelve children. (Just imagine that!) Aged seventeen, he got a job as an insurance clerk while also studying part time at Lambeth School of Art. Within a few years he had c hanged jobs and was working for a Westminster newspaper as a reporter and illustrator. As his skill as an artist developed, so did demands for his somewhat gothic fantasy artwork. By the turn of the century, when his illustrations graced an edition of 'Fairy Tales of the Brothers Grimm ', his reputation was firmly established. He was able to buy his own studio property in a gated artists' community in Belsize Park (one such recently sold for £7 million) and he married his neighbour, the Irish-born portrait painter Edyth Starkie.

His fanciful depictions of fairy folk in particular seem to have seized the public imagination, both children and adults alike, and in addition to those titles already mentioned (and as illustrated above and below) Rackham also accepted commissions to produce colour plates and black and white drawings for 'The Allies' Fairy Book ' (1916), 'English Fairy Tales ' (1918), 'Irish Fairy Tales ' (1920), 'The Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Anderson ' (1932), Christina Rossetti's 'Goblin Market  ' (1933) and his own 'The Arthur Rackham Fairy Book ' (1933). He must have drawn and painted hundreds of fairy scenes.

detail from 'Titania' in A Midsummer Night's Dream, Arthur Rackham, 1908

Many children wrote to him via the publishers after reading books with his illustrations in. They were delighted by his work and wanted to express their appreciation or ask him questions and he always responded courteously to their letters and queries.

Recently, some Freudian analyses have remarked that his male fairy folk (including pixies, goblins and their like) are often swarthy, even ugly, quite often small of stature and usually dressed in quasi-medieval attire, whereas his female fairies are slender and graceful nymphs wearing diaphanous robes or sometimes nothing at all. They seek to destroy the magic of innocence by suggesting something improper in Rackham's depictions of female fairy folk, almost as if they were a form of child pornography. But his own daughter Barbara was his model for many of them, and by all accounts she was his best friend and keenest critic, so I think we should just accept that he genuinely liked children, and liked illustrating the classics for them. He is after all on record as saying "I firmly believe in the greatest stimulating and educative power of imaginative, fantastic, and playful pictures and writings for children in their most impressionable years".

It worked for me. By the by, my very first acting part (aged eleven) was as Mustardseed, one of the fairies in 'A Midsummer Night's Dream '.

There's no poem this week. I've just got back from a long day-trip to Cardiff to see Blackpool play (up at 4.30am, home by 9.30pm). It was no fairy tale, but at least we secured a point in a very watchable 0-0 draw in our attempt to avoid relegation. Keep believing, Seasiders.

Thanks for reading, S ;-)