Gems of Art on Paper: Illustrated American Fiction and Poetry, 1785–1885 by Georgia Brady Barnhill (review)

IF 0.3 3区 文学 0 LITERATURE, AMERICAN
Amy L. Sopcak-Joseph
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Sopcak-Joseph (bio) </li> </ul> <em>Gems of Art on Paper: Illustrated American Fiction and Poetry, 1785–1885</em><br/> <small>georgia brady barnhill</small><br/> University of Massachusetts Press, 2021<br/> 332 pp. <p>In his memoir <em>Recollections of a Lifetime</em> (1856), author and editor Samuel Griswold Goodrich reflected on how nineteenth-century literary annuals brought more than reading material into American homes: \"These charming works scattered the very gems of art far and wide, making the reading mass familiar with the finest specimens of engravings, and not only cultivating an appetite for this species of luxury, but in fact exulting the general standard of taste all over the civilized world\" (75). Georgia Brady Barnhill's <em>Gems of Art on Paper</em> sketches the longer history of how illustration techniques developed and merged with literary publishing <strong>[End Page 215]</strong> from the late eighteenth century through the late nineteenth. As Goodrich indicated, this is not just a story of adding pictures for the sake of breaking up long blocks of type; rather, these \"gems\" made the careers of artists and increasingly brought art into middle-class American parlors.</p> <p>Barnhill's study covers a veritable \"age of revolutions\" in publishing and artistic production made possible by tools like lithographic stones, grease pencils, woodblocks, and chemical washes. Her project begins in the late eighteenth century when readers' access to images was limited. The chapbooks, almanacs, and newspapers that made up the reading material of many Americans contained small images made from woodcuts. Barnhill's focus is on literary publications, but even those contained few images by the 1780s. Americans with greater means purchased illustrated books from England or sometimes domestically published books with carefully engraved reproductions of art. Throughout the nineteenth century, a number of conditions changed: innovators developed new techniques to reproduce images, publishers looked to provide a growing audience of middle-class consumers with illustrated literature, and an increasing number of skilled American artists took up the work. By the time Goodrich penned his reflections, consumers found images to be cheaper and more plentiful. This scholarship is \"long overdue,\" writes Barnhill, because until recently \"scholarly interest in historical literary illustration was minimal\" (2). Both historians of the book and of literature have largely bypassed the subject; even Gerard Genette set aside illustrations in <em>Paratexts: Thresholds of Interpretation</em> (Cambridge UP, 1997) because the subject is so vast.</p> <p>The thing is, nineteenth-century American reviewers and readers thought about books as material objects. As Barnhill shows throughout, reviewers of American literature often evaluated a book's physical attributes (clearly printed engravings, high-quality paper, good type, etc.) in addition to the perceived quality of the ideas and prose. There are few people better positioned to intervene in the conversation than Barnhill. Many scholars have encountered her behind the circulation desk at the American Antiquarian Society or at the various programs and conference panels produced during her tenure as the director of the Center for Historic American Visual Culture (CHAViC). She has long been generous with her time and knowledge of illustration processes, and <em>Gems of Art</em> captures so much of that knowledge in one volume for future reference. This book lies at the intersection of scholarship on literature, art and artists, and history <strong>[End Page 216]</strong> (or really, various histories: the history of the book but also that of labor and technology).</p> <p><em>Gems of Art</em> consists of four lengthy chapters that follow the introduction. They are generally organized chronologically, but there is some overlap as the chapters shift focus from poetry to fiction. The first chapter addresses the development of illustrated poetry from the 1780s through the 1810s to \"serve as a baseline against which later [examples] can be compared. … for the most part these books and their illustrations were first steps\" (74). Barnhill catalogs a number of volumes of illustrated poetry, providing key information about particularly well-known authors and notable artists. Through these examples, the chapter provides foundational book history knowledge for readers to understand the business environment in which early American printers, authors, and illustrators functioned. A section on engravers reminds us of the multiple layers of skilled labor involved...</p> </p>","PeriodicalId":44043,"journal":{"name":"EARLY AMERICAN LITERATURE","volume":"14 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.3000,"publicationDate":"2024-02-12","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"EARLY AMERICAN LITERATURE","FirstCategoryId":"1085","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.1353/eal.2024.a918926","RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"0","JCRName":"LITERATURE, AMERICAN","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 0

Abstract

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:

Reviewed by:

  • Gems of Art on Paper: Illustrated American Fiction and Poetry, 1785–1885 by Georgia Brady Barnhill
  • Amy L. Sopcak-Joseph (bio)
Gems of Art on Paper: Illustrated American Fiction and Poetry, 1785–1885
georgia brady barnhill
University of Massachusetts Press, 2021
332 pp.

In his memoir Recollections of a Lifetime (1856), author and editor Samuel Griswold Goodrich reflected on how nineteenth-century literary annuals brought more than reading material into American homes: "These charming works scattered the very gems of art far and wide, making the reading mass familiar with the finest specimens of engravings, and not only cultivating an appetite for this species of luxury, but in fact exulting the general standard of taste all over the civilized world" (75). Georgia Brady Barnhill's Gems of Art on Paper sketches the longer history of how illustration techniques developed and merged with literary publishing [End Page 215] from the late eighteenth century through the late nineteenth. As Goodrich indicated, this is not just a story of adding pictures for the sake of breaking up long blocks of type; rather, these "gems" made the careers of artists and increasingly brought art into middle-class American parlors.

Barnhill's study covers a veritable "age of revolutions" in publishing and artistic production made possible by tools like lithographic stones, grease pencils, woodblocks, and chemical washes. Her project begins in the late eighteenth century when readers' access to images was limited. The chapbooks, almanacs, and newspapers that made up the reading material of many Americans contained small images made from woodcuts. Barnhill's focus is on literary publications, but even those contained few images by the 1780s. Americans with greater means purchased illustrated books from England or sometimes domestically published books with carefully engraved reproductions of art. Throughout the nineteenth century, a number of conditions changed: innovators developed new techniques to reproduce images, publishers looked to provide a growing audience of middle-class consumers with illustrated literature, and an increasing number of skilled American artists took up the work. By the time Goodrich penned his reflections, consumers found images to be cheaper and more plentiful. This scholarship is "long overdue," writes Barnhill, because until recently "scholarly interest in historical literary illustration was minimal" (2). Both historians of the book and of literature have largely bypassed the subject; even Gerard Genette set aside illustrations in Paratexts: Thresholds of Interpretation (Cambridge UP, 1997) because the subject is so vast.

The thing is, nineteenth-century American reviewers and readers thought about books as material objects. As Barnhill shows throughout, reviewers of American literature often evaluated a book's physical attributes (clearly printed engravings, high-quality paper, good type, etc.) in addition to the perceived quality of the ideas and prose. There are few people better positioned to intervene in the conversation than Barnhill. Many scholars have encountered her behind the circulation desk at the American Antiquarian Society or at the various programs and conference panels produced during her tenure as the director of the Center for Historic American Visual Culture (CHAViC). She has long been generous with her time and knowledge of illustration processes, and Gems of Art captures so much of that knowledge in one volume for future reference. This book lies at the intersection of scholarship on literature, art and artists, and history [End Page 216] (or really, various histories: the history of the book but also that of labor and technology).

Gems of Art consists of four lengthy chapters that follow the introduction. They are generally organized chronologically, but there is some overlap as the chapters shift focus from poetry to fiction. The first chapter addresses the development of illustrated poetry from the 1780s through the 1810s to "serve as a baseline against which later [examples] can be compared. … for the most part these books and their illustrations were first steps" (74). Barnhill catalogs a number of volumes of illustrated poetry, providing key information about particularly well-known authors and notable artists. Through these examples, the chapter provides foundational book history knowledge for readers to understand the business environment in which early American printers, authors, and illustrators functioned. A section on engravers reminds us of the multiple layers of skilled labor involved...

纸上艺术瑰宝:美国小说和诗歌插图,1785-1885 年》,作者 Georgia Brady Barnhill(评论)
以下是内容的简要摘录,以代替摘要:评论者: Gems of Art on Paper:Gems of Art on Paper: Illustrated American Fiction and Poetry, 1785-1885 by Georgia Brady Barnhill Amy L. Sopcak-Joseph (bio) Gems of Art on Paper:Gems Art on Paper: Illustrated American Fiction and Poetry, 1785-1885 georgia brady barnhill University of Massachusetts Press, 2021 332 pp.作家兼编辑塞缪尔-格里斯沃尔德-古德里奇(Samuel Griswold Goodrich)在他的回忆录《一生的回忆》(1856 年)中回顾了 19 世纪的文学年刊如何为美国家庭带来更多的读物:"这些迷人的作品将艺术瑰宝散播到四面八方,使广大读者熟悉了最精美的版画,不仅培养了人们对这种奢侈品的兴趣,而且实际上提高了整个文明世界的普遍品味标准"(75)。乔治亚-布拉迪-巴恩希尔(Georgia Brady Barnhill)的《纸上艺术瑰宝》(Gems of Art on Paper)一书勾勒了从 18 世纪晚期到 19 世纪晚期插图技术如何发展并与文学出版 [尾页 215]融合的漫长历史。正如古德里奇所指出的,这不仅仅是一个为了打破冗长的字体而添加图片的故事;相反,这些 "宝石 "成就了艺术家的职业生涯,并越来越多地将艺术带入美国中产阶级的客厅。巴恩希尔的研究涵盖了出版和艺术生产领域名副其实的 "革命时代",石版印刷、油性铅笔、木版印刷和化学水洗等工具使这一时代成为可能。她的项目始于 18 世纪晚期,当时读者获取图像的途径非常有限。构成许多美国人读物的小册子、年鉴和报纸上都有木刻的小图像。巴恩希尔关注的是文学出版物,但到了 1780 年代,即使是文学出版物也很少包含图像。财力雄厚的美国人从英国购买插图书籍,有时也在国内出版精心雕刻的艺术复制品。在整个 19 世纪,一些情况发生了变化:创新者开发出复制图像的新技术,出版商希望为越来越多的中产阶级消费者提供图文并茂的文学作品,越来越多技艺精湛的美国艺术家开始从事这项工作。到古德里奇撰写他的反思时,消费者发现图像更便宜、更丰富了。巴恩希尔写道,这项学术研究 "早该开始了",因为直到最近,"学术界对历史文学插图的兴趣还微乎其微"(2)。书籍历史学家和文学历史学家在很大程度上都绕开了这一主题;就连杰拉德-热奈特(Gerard Genette)也在《副译本》(Paratexts)一书中搁置了插图:Thresholds of Interpretation》(剑桥大学出版社,1997 年)一书中也将插图搁置一旁,因为这个主题实在是太庞大了。问题是,19 世纪的美国评论家和读者都将书籍视为物质对象。正如巴恩希尔自始至终所展示的那样,美国文学评论家除了评价书籍的思想和散文的质量外,还经常评价书籍的物理属性(清晰的印刷雕版、高质量的纸张、良好的字体等)。很少有人能比巴恩希尔更适合介入这场对话。许多学者都曾在美国古籍学会的发行台后,或者在她担任美国历史视觉文化中心(CHAViC)主任期间举办的各种项目和会议小组讨论中见过她。长期以来,她一直慷慨地奉献自己的时间和关于插图制作过程的知识,而《艺术宝石》一书则将她的这些知识汇集成册,以供今后参考。本书是文学、艺术和艺术家学术与历史 [第 216 页末](或者说是各种历史:书籍史、劳动史和技术史)学术的交汇点。艺术瑰宝》由导言之后的四个长篇章节组成。这些章节一般按时间顺序编排,但也有一些重叠之处,因为这些章节的重点从诗歌转向了小说。第一章论述了 17 世纪 80 年代到 18 世纪 10 年代插图诗歌的发展,以 "作为后来的(例子)可以比较的基线。......在大多数情况下,这些书籍及其插图是第一步"(74)。巴恩希尔对一些诗歌插图进行了编目,提供了关于特别知名的作者和著名艺术家的关键信息。通过这些例子,本章为读者了解美国早期印刷商、作家和插图画家所处的商业环境提供了基本的图书史知识。有关雕刻师的章节提醒我们,雕刻工作涉及多层次的熟练劳动力...
本文章由计算机程序翻译,如有差异,请以英文原文为准。
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来源期刊
EARLY AMERICAN LITERATURE
EARLY AMERICAN LITERATURE LITERATURE, AMERICAN-
CiteScore
0.30
自引率
33.30%
发文量
62
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