The Classic Text: Traditions & Interpretations
Our Coe College summer intern Sharon Levy is establishing a summer Tumblr series based on the concepts of our long-standing digital exhibition The Classic Text: Traditions & Interpretations, which among other things examines “how printers, publishers, editors, illustrators, and translators have used the icon of the classic text as a venue for their own agendas.” This week, Sharon looks at the classic works of Jane Austen.
Although Jane Austen only lived for a relatively short time (1775-1817), what are considered her six canon novels have stood the test of time and remain classics to this day. While her stories are grounded in the English Regency era, her social commentary and lively characters keep the books alive. There is often very little physical character descriptions in her works, making it easy for artists to re-imagine the cast in unique ways.
UWM Special Collections is home to many different volumes and printings of Jane Austen’s novels, each with a unique style of illustration, although many of them come from the same source, the Limited Editions Club.
The featured volume of Mansfield Park was published in 1856 by R. Bentley as one book in a set of five, each containing an Austen novel (minus Persuasion). The two illustrations are engravings on the frontispiece and title page by the engraver William Greatbach after original illustrations by George Pickering. Both are reprinted from an earlier 1833 edition.
The copy of Pride and Prejudice shown here was printed in 1940 by D. B. Updike at his Merrymount Press for the Limited Editions Club in an edition of 1500 signed by the artist Helen Sewell, who was primarily a children’s book illustrator.This edition also includes a foreword by the prolific English writer and editor Frank Swinnerton.
Our copy of Sense and Sensibility is also a publication of the Limited Editions Club with illustrations by Sewell, printed for the Club at the Spiral Press in 1957. Sewell’s illustrations here have very different and stylized form than those for Pride and Prejudice. The introduction here is by the English writer and journalist Stella Gibbons, author of the Cold Comfort Farm stories.
The 1964 edition of Emma, printed by the Thistle Press for the Limited Editions Club, was again introduced by Stella Gibbons. It features the artwork of Fritz Kredel, a German-born illustrator whose work we have featured several times in our Tumblr posts. This limited edition of 1500 copies is signed by the artist.
The Limited Editions Club edition of Northanger Abbey in Baltimore by the Garamond Press in 1971. The introduction was written by Sylvia Townsend Warner, an English novelist and poet. The art appears in two styles for this edition, some smaller ink sketches in black and white and others as full-page illustrations in pastel. The illustrations were created by the English artist and illustrator Clarke Hutton, who signed this edition of 1500 copies.
The most recent of our illustrated Austens, Persuasion, was printed by The Stinehour Press for the Limited Editions Club in 1977 in an edition of 1600 copies. The forward was written by the American writer and lawyer Louis Auchincloss. The illustrations are reproductions full-page, monochromatic drawings by Tony Buonpastore, who signs this edition.
-- Sharon Levy, Coe College Intern
