35. To V.F. from C.R.

Earlier this month, Paul Rassam sent us a pre-publication copy of his new catalogue 25: Late 19th & 20th century literature. Number 127 in this catalogue describes a copy of Lord de Tabley's Poems, dramatic & lyrical (1893) with a late dedication 'To V.F. from C.R., 1919'. The recipient's bookplate helps to identify 'V.F.' as Vivian Forbes (1891-1937).

Cover for Lord de Tabley, Poems, dramatic & lyrical (1893), designed by Charles Ricketts

Forbes was a young painter who, in 1915, had met his future lover, the painter Glyn Philpot (1884-1937), with whom he had a troublesome relation that ended when Philpot died in 1937 and Forbes, who depended on him for moral and financial support, killed himself. 

Plaque at Lansdowne House, erected by Greater London Council, 1979

Philpot's work was influenced by that of Ricketts and Shannon, and when the two older artists left Lansdowne House for Townshend House, Forbes and Philpot moved into their former flats and studios. Although Ricketts & Shannon and Forbes & Philpot knew each other, they never became close friends. They probably met in about 1918, and Ricketts took a liking for the lesser talented Forbes, about whom he wrote to Gordon Bottomley, 29 May 1919: 'The war caught him when hardly a man, and he is seeing Russian ballets, National Gallery pictures, and hearing Wagner or Chopin as novelties'. To Thomas Lowinsky, he had written, December 1918: 'We have taken a great liking to Forbes, the sensual beast who ate my strawberries at Chilham'. Ricketts and Shannon had a country retreat, the Keep of Chilham Castle in Kent, which had been purchased by their friend Edmund Davis. (*) The dedication by Ricketts in a copy of Lord de Tabley's book dates from these years of admiration for the young painter. It was offered by Paul Rassam in the Summer of 2011 at the Olympia Fair in London, the price has now been reduced to £650.


Dedication from Charles Ricketts to Marcus Behmer in Lord de Tabley's Poems, dramatic & lyrical (private collection)

Another dedication copy of the same book has no date in it, but mentions the full name of the recipient, another young artist: 'To Marcus Behmer, from his friend, Charles Ricketts'. Marcus Behmer was an admirer from Germany, who had lived in Paris and may have met Ricketts before the First World War. He wrote about Ricketts's designs for the Vale Press on several occasions.

Ricketts's dedications are usually as short as these two, omitting dates, or reducing names to initials. Longer and intimate dedications are rare.

(*) Paul Delaney, Charles Ricketts. A biography. Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1990, p. 314. Self-portrait taken from the letters & journals of Charles Ricketts, RA. London, Peter Davies, 1939, p. 308. See also: J.G.P. Delaney, Glyn Philpot. His life and art. Aldershot, Ashgate, 1999, plate 8, for a portrait of Vivian Forbes painted by Glyn Philpot.

34. An original print

On 18 March, 1937 - 75 years ago - Charles Shannon died. Next week, an exhibition on printmaking 1893-1895 will include a lithograph by Shannon at the Minneapolis Institute of Art exhibition about L'estampe originale. Shannon's contribution to this important series of original prints was a lithograph of a woman and cats, 'La femme aux chats', also called 'La Biondina'. This lithograph was described in Ricketts's Vale Press Catalogue of Mr. Shannon's lithographs (1902) as number 24: 'Biondina. A replica of No. 3 in reverse, more forcible, however in effect and execution. About fifty proofs exists'.


Charles Shannon, 'Biondina', lithograph (1894)

Lithograph number 3 was printed in 1890 in an edition of 12 copies. It was called 'The fantastic dress': 'a woman in a wide skirt moves to the left towards a mirror. In the foreground is the indication of a sofa on which are two cats'. The lithograph was later, in 1893, published in a small series, called Early lithographs, of which only 8 copies were for sale.

Ricketts's contribution to the same issue of L'estampe originale (album VII) was a woodcut, which was not well received: the wood engraving (89 x 94 mm) was printed in black on Japan paper (197 x 240 mm) and mounted on a larger sheet (433 x 596 mm). It was signed in pencil, lower right: C Ricketts. A blindstamp designed by Alexandra Charpentier for L’Estampe originale was embossed on the bottom left of the mounting sheet. Ricketts depicted a loggia to the left with a group of people, and to the right is a dragon on the roof. This engraving is known in France as 'Inondation', and in Great Britain as 'Deluge'.

Charles Ricketts, 'Inondation', or, 'Deluge', wood-engraving (1893)

The exhibition in Minneapolis will be on show from Saturday, March 24, 2012 to Sunday, December 9, 2012.

33. Patterned papers (d: Bird, arrow, and rose)

Ricketts published four plays by 'Michael Field' (his friends Edith Cooper and Katharine Bradley), the first of which was Fair Rosamund. This was not a new text, it had originally been issued (twice) in 1884, but for the Vale Press edition the authors revised the text before and during printing, demanding more proofs than Ricketts cared to give them. As they had published a dozen books and he was only a 'young' publisher, they insisted on deciding how many proofs were necessary, and wanted to have a say in the design of the book. Ricketts's revenge was to be secretive about the cover, and when they asked if they would like it, he responded: 'I shall be immensely wounded & unforgiving, if you do not'. (*)

'Bird, arrow, and rose', patterned paper for Michael Field, Fair Rosamund (1897)

The authors received a copy on 14 April 1897, and a month later their diary carried this note: 'It is partly green as the summer peascod with creamy rose-trellis, the roses crowned with briar-thorns & under them fat doves transfixed with arrows as thoroughly as St. Sebastian'. This was another instance of Ricketts's revenge; he had consciously fattened the doves, while he usually did the opposite: he was famous for his elongated art nouveau figures. 'The half-binding is of mist-like blue, flecked with leaves & shapes in brownish purple - the most restless effect ever produced by a volume. The green is sharp, the design complex. The whole binding seems the result of the first spasm of the Spring that is to release Oscar on the imagination of Ricketts'. [Oscar Wilde was released from prison on 19 May 1897.] The diary entry continued: 'But the doves! - sentimental, revolting... We suffer inexpressibly. The relation of cover & book does not exist; there is nothing of our beloved Rosamund in this Valentine symbol, so obvious, so unlovely'. (**)

Patterned paper for the spine of Michael Field, Fair Rosamund (1897)

While the authors denied a link between the text and the patterned paper for the binding, several scholars have pointed out that Ricketts carefully took elements from the story for his imagery. Susan Ashbrook, for example, contended: 'The decorations of the binding include a diagonally repeating motif of a dove with a Plantaganet crown over its head, pierced through the breast by an arrow, against a trellis of roses. The symbolism is clearly that of innocence destroyed through love, with the arrow doing double-duty as a symbol of love and death. The rose is an obvious allusion to Rosamund. At the close of the play the king says to the dead body of his mistress: "A Rosa Mundi, thou | That were to the king a tender sweet brier-rose, | They've shed thy petals".'

Patterned paper for the boards of Michael Field, Fair Rosamund (1897)

Legend has it that Rosamund Clifford, a mistress of King Henry II (1133-1189), had to hide in a hunting lodge at Woodstock, which was surrounded by a maze, or with roses, as she was threatened by the Queen, Eleanor of Aquitaine. There are many stories surrounding Rosamund's hiding place and her death, but no indisputable facts are available. Rosamund was known as The Fair Rosamund or The Rose of the World, and became the subject of many poems and stories.

Dove, signed 'CR', patterned paper for Michael Field, Fair Rosamund (1897) [detail]

Ricketts signed the paper with his monogram CR on the rump of one of the doves (it was repeated on the back cover), clearly establishing the design as his own, regardless of the author's opinion. It should be noted that there are two patterned papers, one for the spine, and one for the boards. The first design of petals and dots alternated with roses and leaves is printed in red on blue paper. The second paper is printed in green on buff coloured paper; this is a complicated design, with several diagonals: the arrows pointing to the left cross the trellis going from left to right. The doves are fixed to the lines of the trellis - forming an angle of 60 degrees. However, the doves form a pattern of their own on a line that forms an angle of 30 degrees. The roses, also, have been clustered along these lines in different angles.

A combination of two patterned papers, printed in red and green, was also applied for a later Vale Press edition: The Rowley poems of Thomas Chatterton (1898).

(*) Diary of Michael Field, 18 February 1897.
(**) Ivor C. Treby, The Michael Field catalogue. A book of lists. London, De Blackland Press,  1998, p. 34; Diary of Michael Field, 23 March 1897, quoted after Paul Delaney, 'Book Design. A nineteenth-century revival', in: The connoisseur, August 1978, p. 282-289.

(***) Susan Ashbrook: The private press movement in Britain 1890-1914. Boston, Boston University Graduate School, 1991, p. 154.

32. Frequent cycle-rides

Thomas Sturge Moore wrote about his friend Charles Shannon in a catalogue for P. & D. Colnaghi & Co., who in their Bond Street premises held a commemorative 'Exhibition of the lithographs of the late Charles Shannon, R.A.', from 20 January to 3 February 1938. Moore's foreword described Shannon as 'very handsome', with 'an energetic sturdiness' and an eye 'full of mockery'. Shannon could work very fast, a lithograph, such as 'The modeller', a portrait of Thomas Sturge Moore, would take ('final touches, and all') little over an hour.

Charles Shannon, 'The modeller', lithograph, 1891: a portrait of Thomas Sturge Moore 

Shannon had his own lithographic press and Moore would help him with the printing, however, they shared other interests:

When I came to help him with the press, he would sometimes propose a cycle-ride, and we would set out from 8 Spring Terrace, Richmond, through Leatherhead, always alighting to admire the old bridge, on through Dorking and Guildford, where the second hand shops would be visited to discover satin-wood, not yet "the rage," so that fine pieces could be picked up cheaply. Or we went to Hampton Court, and he would examine the Titian intently, as though he had never seen anyting like it before. "The fresh eye is the seeing eye; the eye that thinks it knows all about it only recognizes, never discovers."

Titian, 'Portrait of a man (known as Alessandro de Medici)' in Hampton Court (from: Charles Ricketts, Titian, 1910, plate xxxvi)

Apparently, Moore had learned to cycle early in 1896 on the bicycle of his friend the sculptor Henry Poole, and Poole and Moore went on a cycling tour in France later that year. 'His mother begged him not to venture into the heavy traffic of London and enclosed newspaper cuttings of cycling accidents, Uncle Appia sent messages warning of the dangers of the roads in France, even Uncle George in Jersey, a cyclist himself, wrote urging extreme caution'. His father 'offered a loan for the purchase of a thoroughly reliable machine'. Moore was prone to accidents, he pulled off the handlebars on one occasion and injured his knee on another, but eventually he became 'a hardy long-distance cyclist'. From Shannon's London address to Guildford, for example, was about 20 miles. In 1898, on a stay in Broadstairs, he taught Shannon how to master the bicycle.(*)

Moore and Shannon made frequent long cycling trips, such as those to Wells and Marlborough (April 1901) and to Salisbury, Glastonbury and Winchester (August 1901). Paul Delaney wrote:

Not long after this Shannon began to teach Ricketts to ride a bicycle. The old machine that had served to teach Sturge Moore and Shannon was passed on to him. With his haste and impatience he had no more aptitude for the bicycle than the piano, but perhaps he minded not being included when his two friends went off their frequent cycling trips. He certainly missed Shannon. When Ricketts was "wicked", Shannon used to threaten to go off cycling with Sturge Moore. On his first lesson, in July 1901, Ricketts did "unexpectedly well", and in August he was still "improving wonderfully". Shannon even bought  him a new bicycle. But by October the next year the bicycle was for sale and Ricketts's cycling was over: "I collapsed with nervous exhaustion at Cambridge", he told the Fields, "& I fear shed tears upon the Trumpington Road & for the first time the bike has passed into history." From then on, when Shannon "biked", Ricketts "trained". Shannon cycled and played ping-pong or tennis but the only exercise Ricketts took was walking.'(**)



Advertisment for cycles (1901)



Illustration from Isabel Marks, Fancy cycling (1901)

(*) Sylvia Legge, Affectionate cousins. T. Sturge Moore and Marie Appia. Oxford, Oxford University Press, 1980, p. 94, 134.
(**) J.G.P. Delaney, Charles Ricketts. A biography. Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1990, p. 156-157.

31. The tale of the rabbit

A wide range of animals was depicted in drawings, lithographs, woodcuts and paintings by Charles Ricketts and Charles Shannon, including geese, a stag, a bear, fishes, doves, seagulls, dogs and cats, pigs, mice, bulls, peacocks, dolphins, hares, mammoths, and rabbits. Some of these could be observed in woods or parks.

Two hares, drawn by Charles Ricketts (from Atalanta, June 1890, p. [545])

In his diary Ricketts wrote, 13 May 1901 (Self-Portrait 1939, p. 56):

In the Park an exquisite thing occurred: a young rabbit plunged, not into a hole, at the sight of me, but into the bole of a may-tree. There I tickled him, meaning to take him out, till I feared, from the palpitating of his flanks, that he might faint or die; so I stood off, to see him escape. This, however, he would not do, so I plucked up courage and lifted him out by the scruff of his neck from the dark inner hole where he had been hiding his face. I remember the fantastic sensation of his loose soft skin and huge startled eyes before he escaped into the bracken shoots, to look back at the enemy.

'Spring', a tailpiece (detail) (from The magazine of art, April 1891, p. 204)

A tailpiece, 'Spring', drawn in 1891 for The magazine of art illustrates a child with his playmate, a rabbit.

30. A copy for reference

Most private press publications go without a personal inscription by the author and buyers have not written their opinions between the lines or in the margins of these expensive books. However, there are exceptions. A copy of a Dutch private press book by Geerten Gossaert, Experimenten, was heavily annotated by his mistress, the poet Annie Salomons, in preparation for a lecture about his work. This copy is now in the National library of the Netherlands.

Note, in pencil, in a copy of The Kingis Quair (1903)

Only a small number of Vale Press books have inscriptions by the authors or editors. Copies with inscriptions by former owners turn up now and then, but copies with annotations by readers are more rare. A short inscription is found in a privately owned copy of The Kingis Quair by James I of Scotland. Underneath the colophon a German reader has pencilled a note on the type:

'King's Fount
by Charles Ricketts
Vale Press 1903
laut Encycl. S. 149'

This reference ('according to the encyclopaedia, page 149') perhaps indicates that the owner collected books for their typography and design, and not so much for the text, and there is no note on the author, although the book seems to have been read all through (all quires have been cut open). Of course, the note may have been written by a dealer. Whatever the case, the writer left no trace - there is no name, bookplate, note on provenance, or inserted letter.

Anyway, the most important 'handwriting' in private press books can be ascribed to Time. The title label on the front cover for example has brown stains for which the glue may be blamed.

Title label for The Kingis Quair (1903)

29. The beautiful forehead

In the December 1896 issue of Bookselling, Temple Scott published an interview with Charles Ricketts, from which this quote is taken:

No. 52, Warwick Street, Regent Street, W. (from: Bookselling, December 1896, p. 506)

One Saturday afternoon, in the late spring of the present year [1896], we entered a little green-painted shop in a side street leading from under one of the archways of Regent Street into the regions of bric-à-brac and Wardour Street. The shop had not then, as it has now, its swinging white and gold painted "Sign of the Dial." Within, and behind a tiny counter, was seated on a high chair a pale and slight man. This was our first introduction to Mr. Charles Ricketts. We have often been to the little shop since; but we shall never forget that Saturday afternoon. We had a cup of tea, seated in a tiny back room; and soon friends came to drink tea with us. The talk turned on many things, but chiefly on matters related to art - and the pale man with the beautiful forehead talked liked one inspired. Saturday afternoon, we found out later, was receiving day at 52, Warwick Street. The other days of the week Mr Ricketts spends working at home, somewhere in Chelsea.

Signboard 'At the sign of the Dial' (855x488 mm)

See: Temple Scott, 'Mr. Charles Ricketts and the Vale Press', in: Bookselling, II (1896), December, p. [501]-512 (quote on p. 502).
For the signboard see Aberdeen Art Gallery & Museums (the signboard was purchased from Amarylis Robichaud, widow of Llewellyn Hacon, 1949).

28. Two limited editions

Limited editions of books from the nineties only had a statement of limitation in the edition in question: for example, the ordinary edition of Lord de Tabley's Poems, dramatic and lyrical (1893) stated on the page preceding the frontispiece: 'This Edition is limited to Six Hundred Copies'. Another hundred copies were bound in vellum and they had a different limitation statement: 'This Edition is limited to One Hundred Copies' - neither Edition mentioned the other one. The advertisements in Elkin Mathews & John Lane's List of new and forthcoming books (1893) did not reveal all that much: 'A limited number on Japanese paper'. This practice underlines the exclusivity of the more limited edition - if you did not have access to it, you would be unaware of its existence. 

This kind of editorial secrecy has also been applied to books about Charles Ricketts and Charles Shannon, of which I will give two examples. In 1972, L'Art ancien of Zurich published bulletin 25: A collection of books designed by Charles Ricketts. Shortly after the bibliography went to press, the collection was sold to John Paul Getty II (1932-2003). The colophon (facing the title page) mentioned: '500 copies of this catalogue have been printed : this is no :' Many copies were not numbered, and ordinary copies do not mention that, besides an edition in blue paper wrappers, there was an edition in half cloth. A true Ricketts collector, of course, has copies of both editions.


From top to bottom: Catalpa Press catalogue (limited edition and ordinary edition) and L'art ancien catalogue (bound copy and copy in wrappers)

Another semi-secret de-luxe edition was published by the Catalpa Press in 1985. The ordinary plain paper edition of the Catalogue of the works of Charles Ricketts RA from the collection of Gordon Bottomley, written by Michael Richard Barclay, has no statement of limitation. However, fifty copies were printed on Conqueror paper - making the book twice as thick - and these have a handwritten limitation statement on the first fly-leaf: 'No. [..] of 50 Copies', bearing the author's signature underneath. Recently, Ian Hodgkins & Co. Ltd. described a copy of this edition on their website.

27. Patterned papers (c: The ship)

For the cover of Fifty songs by Thomas Campion, published February 1897, Charles Ricketts designed a decorated paper that, in his bibliography of 1904, was labelled: 'the ship'. It was inspired by the last poem in the selection, 'A hymn in praise of Neptune', although it only made reference to 'the waves' (line 2). Ships are not mentioned in the poem, while 'Neptune's diadem' (line 10), 'Tritons' (line 11), 'Sea-nimphs' (line 15) and 'Syrens' (line 16) were ignored by Ricketts in his repetitive design of a sailing ship, wave-lines and wave-crests: 'a soft grey-blue ground which is decorated with rows of small sailboats riding gently swelling waves, indicated by a single undulated line'.(*)

'The ship', patterned paper for Thomas Campion, Fifty songs (1897)

This decorated paper stands out among the others, as it is one of only two that were signed by Ricketts; his initials 'CR' appear in a sail - once on the front cover and once on the back cover.

'The ship', patterned paper for Thomas Campion, Fifty songs (1897): detail with initials CR.

The designs were engraved on wood, 'from which they were printed in repeating patterns and then cast as electrotypes'.(**) Some proofs for the cover paper exist, and were described in a catalogue of Clare Warrack and Geoffrey Perkins in 1977: Short List Fifteen. The Vale Press. Trial settings, cover papers, labels, notices, prospectuses, book lists, occasional publications set in Vale type and Vale Press editions. One of the proofs showed two versions, with manuscript notes beneath each proof: 'old one' and 'new one', referring to the blocks. The block sizes were 249x160 mm and 244x159 mm. The dimensions of the paper on the front cover of the finished book are 234x120 mm.

Lucien Pissarro finished printing the paper in December 1896, and when stock of bound copies of the book (issued in 210 copies) had run out in 1899, he printed an additional hundred on a slightly different paper.(**) Perhaps these two binding editions can be distinguished from each other by the placement of the spine label, which for the first batch of copies was closer to the top (c. 9 mm) than for the later batch (24 mm).

This book and other Vale Press books were on show in 1899 at an international exhibition of book design in the Kaiser-Wilhelm-Museum in Krefeld, and Rudolf Kautzsch wrote about the decorated papers of the Vale Press in the Zeitschrift für Bücherfreunde (1899), that some of them had 'recht hübschen Papierbände', and: 'Die in der Farbe sehr anspruchlosen Papiere zeigen reizvolle Musters diagonal zum Format verläuft'. The design for the Campion was not  placed diagonally as most of the others were.

The paper was reprinted in grey for Gordon Bottomley's A stage for poetry (1948), but this paper does not show Ricketts's initials on the sail.

Back cover of Gordon Bottomley, A stage for poetry (1948)

(*) Susan Ashbrook, The private press movement in Britain 1890-1914. Boston, Boston University Graduate School, 1991, p. 150-151.
(**) Maureen Watry, The Vale Press. Charles Ricketts, a publisher in earnest. New Castle, DE, Oak Knoll Press; London, The British Library, 2004, p. 58, 125.

26. Universal Disdain

Julian Corbett's story 'Jezebel' in The Universal Review of 15 August 1889 was illustrated by Ricketts and Shannon, who divided the four illustrations between them, and added an initial, signed by both. The pen drawings, reproduced as process illustrations, were received in the press with disdain.

Initial T, signed by Charles Ricketts and Charles Shannon for The Universal Review, August 1889

The Spectator (24 August 1889) noted about The Universal Review that 'it is necessary to speak first of the pictures, for they are always its chief feature'. The illustrations in the August issue were 'most remarkable', however: 'Clever, affected, and ugly are perhaps the words that express them best. There is a certain parade of Phoenician archaeology in some of the drawings; but it can hardly be said that the artists have very successfully managed their Sidonian local colour.'

Charles Ricketts, 'Astarté', in The Universal Review, August 1889

Two years later, Typo, a Monthly Record and Review (April 1891) lamented: 'The Universal Review is no more. It had much in its favor'. Typo was published at the other side of the planet, in Wellington, New Zealand, where The Universal Review was appreciated: 'Original in style, superbly printed, edited by an able art critic' - Harry Quilter was The Universal Review's editor - 'it ought certainly to have succeeded', however, the illustrations of Ricketts and Shannon were singled out for scorn: Typo ascertained that 'the "crank" element was too strong. It was too French for the English taste'. A story 'like Corbett's  "Jezebel", illustrated with art (?) works by Ricketts and Shannon, were enough to kill the strongest periodical ever offered to British readers'.

Note the question mark after 'art'. New Zealanders, posing as 'British readers', posing as art connoisseurs...

25. Contact addresses

Ricketts lived and worked in London on several addresses:

1882-1887:
164 Kennington Park Road, Kennington, S.E
[Shannon joined Ricketts in 1886]


164, Kennington Park Road

1887-1888:
12a Edith Terrace, Edith Grove, Brompton
 

12A, Edith Terrace

1888-1894:
No. 2, the Vale, King's Road, Chelsea
[from September? 1888]

1894-1898:
31 Beaufort Street, Chelsea 
[from October 1894]

1898-1902:
8 Spring Terrace, Richmond
[from March 1898]

1902-1923:
Lansdowne House, Lansdowne Road, Holland Park  
[from 8 May 1902]

Lansdowne House (1905)

1923-1931:
Townshend House, Albert Road, Regents Park
[from 23 May 1923]

After Ricketts had died on 7 October 1931, Shannon lived in Townshend House until 24 June 1933. He then moved to 21 Kew Gardens Road.



24. Why Shannon?

The title of this blog has been changed from 'Charles Ricketts' to 'Charles Ricketts & Charles Shannon' - it goes without saying that the name of Charles Shannon keeps popping up in stories about Ricketts. I could have added 'and their circle', as the names of their close friends, such as Michael Field, Lucien Pissarro, Richard Roland Holst, and Oscar Wilde, also frequently appear in these texts, and future entries will as a matter of course mention other friends as well: John Gray, Thomas Sturge Moore, Laurence Binyon, W. Llewellyn Hacon, Charles Holmes, Gordon Bottomley, J.W. Gleeson White, George Bernard Shaw, W.B. Yeats, Selwyn Image - and there are many others.

It is appropriate to dedicate this first instalment of the year 2012, and the first blog under the new title to Ricketts's partner Charles Shannon. The question is: Why Shannon?

Although Charles Shannon was primarily known for his lithographs and paintings, in the eighteen-nineties he showed a versatility that was comparable to that of Ricketts. He was a teacher at the Croydon Art School, he published magazine illustrations in the eighteen-eighties and supplied four illustrations for Oscar Wilde's A House of Pomegranates; together with Ricketts he designed and cut the wood-engravings for Daphnis and Chloe and Hero and Leander, he was an art editor for The Pageant (1896-1897), and he did the ruling for Ricketts's book work (as Ricketts was 'a fool with a ruler').

Cover for the first issue of The Dial (1889)

They started a magazine of their own, The Dial, the first issue of which appeared in August 1889, and announced: 'This number is published by C.H. Shannon, The Vale, King's Road, Chelsea, S.W., from whom copies can be obtained; price seven shillings and sixpence'. Shannon was the publisher, not Ricketts, who was deemed too unpractical for the job. The Dial famously brought them the friendship of Oscar Wilde, who saw to it that Ricketts was to design most of his books, including The Picture of Dorian Gray, Intentions, and The Sphinx, and these designs encouraged his publishers to give more assignments to Ricketts.

Ricketts's versatility is shown in Charles Ricketts, R.A. (1933), which contains illustrations of costume and stage designs (8), woodcuts (10), oil paintings (15), sculptures (7), pen drawings for book illustrations (11), lithographs (2), a bookbinding design, and a locket. A similar book on Shannon in a series of monographs on 'Contemporary British Artists' (1924) had only illustrations of oil paintings (29) and drawings (6). His lithographs, magazine illustrations and woodcuts were not represented, nor were the four binding designs he did for the plays of Oscar Wilde.

Charles Shannon, cover for Oscar Wilde's TheIimportance of Being Earnest (1899)

In 1893 Wilde suggested that Shannon should design the binding for his society comedies, starting with Lady Windermere's Fan. In advertisements these were described as having 'a specially designed Title-page and binding to each volume by Charles Shannon'. Although Shannon had been involved in five book design projects (all in collaboration with Ricketts), Ricketts on the other hand had designed illustrations or covers for sixteen books. The contract that agreed to have the designs done by Shannon, stipulated that two other books should be designed by Charles Ricketts and Aubrey Beardsley who had attracted far more attention as book designers than Shannon. So, why Shannon?

The question has not been raised before, not even in Josephine M. Guy and Ian Small's fascinating Oscar Wilde's Profession (2000), which assembled all details about production, contracts and payments. I think that Wilde made the choice for Shannon, because he did not want the other designers to influence the sales of the plays. Wilde and his publishers intended the books with designs by Ricketts and Beardsley to be exclusive, and the print-runs were accordingly small, while the prices were high. The comedies, however, were intended for a wider audience: the prices were more moderate and the print-runs were doubled. Shannon was, possibly, hired to deliver less eccentric designs.

Charles Shannon, floral design for the cover of Oscar Wilde's Lady Windermere's Fan (1893)

Charles Shannon, mirrored version of the floral design for the cover of Oscar Wilde's The Importance of Being Earnest (1899)

Wilde went to the house in The Vale to discuss the book design and his thoughts will have been of importance to Shannon, who afterwards wrote to John Lane (probably in July 1893) that 'Oscar called tonight' and agreed to the prices of the ordinary and special editions. For the advertisements Lane could use Shannon's description ('In a binding & title page specially designed by Charles Shannon'), but it was obvious that Wilde influenced the design of the series of comedies, as 'Oscar is averse to the idea of their being all bound in the same cover', and on the other hand, that Shannon would not only become involved in the design of the binding and the title page; he would also supervise the printing. Lane was told, that as soon as the copy was ready, Shannon would take it to 'the Ballantyne' (the printers of Lady Windermere's Fan).(*) In fact, Shannon designed the volume, the dimensions, the page setting and the floral ornaments for the cover, although the contract only mentioned a cover design. Wilde asked John Lane (May 1893) to 'have some pages set up for Shannon to see - or ask him to choose type'. In June he wrote to Charles Ricketts: 'Tell Shannon I am quite charmed with the setting of Lady Windermere - it looks delightful and is exquisitely placed'.(**) We may suppose that the next play, A Woman of No Importance, was also to his liking.

Charles Shannon, floral design for the cover of Oscar Wilde's A Woman of No Importance (1894)

Charles Shannon, floral design for the cover of Oscar Wilde's An Ideal Husband (1899)

Ricketts must have liked them too, but it is unclear to what extent he was involved in the designs, as up to that point, Shannon's book designs had all been done in collaboration with Ricketts. When Ricketts designed the cover for The Pageant - the first issue appeared in December 1895; Wilde had been convicted and sent to prison during the summer - he used the same material, the same colour and the same pattern of small floral designs. This could be interpreted as a statement, either of his authorship of the binding designs for Wilde's plays, or, and this is more likely, as a joint statement by Ricketts and Shannon, which was meant to publicly show their sympathy for Wilde by publishing a magazine that had the same kind of binding design, and the same colour, as the books of Oscar Wilde.

Obviously, Wilde was pleased with the Shannon designs for his plays, which cannot be said of Ricketts's design for The Sphinx or Beardsley's design for Salomé, which he disliked. After his release from prison, he asked Ricketts to design one book cover (again, an exclusive edition, for The Ballad of Reading Goal), which he detested, and he was anxious to have Shannon design the book covers for his last two society comedies, The Importance of Being Earnest and An Ideal Husband, even though Shannon had designed no other books in the years between 1894 and 1899, as he devoted himself to lithography and painting, and had just embarked on a career as a portrait painter.

(*) James G. Nelson, The Early Nineties. A View from the Bodley Head. Cambridge, MA, Harvard University Press, 1971, p. 244.
(**) The Complete Letters of Oscar Wilde. Edited by Merlin Holland and Rupert Hart-Davis. London, Fourth Estate, 2000, p. 565-566.
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23. At the sign of the red lion

On 4 April 1887, the Prince of Wales and his wife attended the private view of the sixty-fourth annual exhibition of the Society of British Artists. James McNeill Whistler had persuaded the Prince to come, as he proudly wrote to Théodore Duret: 'J'ai fait venir Le Prince & La Princesse de Galles'. Whistler had been elected President of the society in Suffolk Street, Pall Mall, on 1 June 1886 and took office in December. His efforts to revitalize the organization were met with hostility and complaints, and he was forced to resign on 4 June 1888, staying in office until November.

The paintings and prints were arranged on eye-level in two rows, and this was a revolutionary change from the crowded exhibition rooms of the past. Whistler designed a new symbol for the society, a small red lion, which appeared on stationary and catalogues, as well as on the signboard.

James McNeill Whistler, red lion symbol for The Society of British Artists

A tent-like velarium, walls painted in light colours, gas-light, a limitation on the number of pictures on show, special invitations for art critics (such as Oscar Wilde), were all part of his scheme to make the society 'a powerfull rival of the Royal Academy' (*), and when he obtained a Royal Charter for the society, his work was done. The Society was to be called the Royal Society of British Artists. When Whistler resigned as President, he said that the 'Artists' had gone out, and that the 'British' remained...

Front cover for the catalogue of the sixty-fourth annual exhibition of The Society of British Artists (1887), designed by James McNeill Whistler

Whistler had invited foreign artists and followers to join the society, and during the Whistler years the young artists Charles Ricketts (he would turn 21 in 1887) and Charles Shannon (24) exhibited in the Suffolk Street rooms. In 1887, at the annual exhibition, a work by Ricketts was on show in the Large Room: 'The death of Abel', probably a water-colour or a pastel (present whereabouts unknown).

Page 10 of the catalogue of the 64th annual exhibition of The Society of British Artists (1887)

The catalogue's cover was designed by Whistler, and at the back was a list of prices, ranging between £5 and £1050 - the Ricketts work was priced at £30. The list of members and exhibitors mentions Ricketts's address as '164, Kennington-park-road, S.E.' - Ricketts was not a member and he never showed any other works at the Society. Shannon exhibited three works in 1887 and 1888, just before the two artists decided to cease exhibiting (according to C.J. Holmes) until Shannon was to appear as 'the complete and undeniable master, upon whose princely income Ricketts then proposed to live in ease for the rest of his life'. (**)

Page 40 of the catalogue of the 64th annual exhibition of The Society of British Artists (1887)

(*) See 'Whistler as Exhibitioner', in: Deanna Marohn Bendix, Diabolical Designs. Paintings, Interiors, and Exhibitions of James McNeill Whistler. Washington, London, Smithsonian Institution Press, 1995, p. 239-245.
(**) Self & Partners (mostly Self), being the Reminiscences of C.J. Holmes. London, Constable, 1936, p. 164.

22. Ч. Рикетс in Russian

Т.Ф. Верижникова, 'Из истории английской книжной графики рубежа 19-20 веков: иллюстрации Ч. Рикетса и Ч. Шенона к "Дафнису и Хлое" Лонга', in: Проблема интерпретации литературных образов в изобразительном искусстве. Ленинград: Институт живописи/скульптуры и архитетктуры АХ СССР, 1989, с. 62-68.

First paragraphs of T.F. Verizhikova's essay on Ricketts and Shannon (1989)

This essay on Ricketts and Shannon appeared in a Russian book on imagary and interpretation in 1989. It was written by T.F. Verizhikova and came to my attention as I was an editor of Book History Online in 1990 or 1991, however, it proved impossible to obtain a copy. When a colleague of the National library of the Netherlands went to Moscow in 2000, I asked him for a photocopy, which he got hold of, thanks to the cooperation of a Russian incunabulist.

The essay about the Daphnis and Chloe edition of the Vale Press does not contain anything new, and extensively quotes Stephen Calloway's Charles Ricketts (1979) and Joseph Darracott's The World of Charles Ricketts (1980). There are no illustrations.

This is how Ricketts and Shannon were introduced to a Russian audience in 1989, and isn't it nice to know that their names in Cyrillic characters are given as Ч. Рикетс and Ч. Шенон?

Daphnis and Chloe (1893) [Photograph: © Koninklijke Bibliotheek, National Library of the Netherlands/Jos Uljee, 2010]



21. Patterned papers (b: The Suckling rose)

The first book bound in a patterned paper designed by Ricketts was published by the Vale Press in the Spring of 1896. The Saturday Review (4 July 1896) welcomed The Poems of Sir John Suckling as 'the best edition so far of this better known than edited English gentleman and poet', and considered it to be 'perhaps the most attractive of the first three of Messrs. Ricketts & Hacon's Vale books'.

Front cover of The poems of Sir John Suckling (1896)

The two earlier books (April 1896) were not issued in patterned papers. Early Poems of Milton was bound in white buckram and the next one, Landor's Epicurus, Leontion and Ternissa was issued in plain blue paper boards. At first, the books did not sell well, only an odd twenty copies were ordered, as Lucien Pissarro wrote to his father Camille in 28 April 1896.(*) He also reported that 'la Maison H & R m'achetera une presse de grande dimension pour l'imprimerie des choses en couleurs - Je suis en train d'imprimer pour eux un papier pour la couverture d'un de leurs volumes'. Although Hacon & Ricketts may have had the intention to pay for a large press, intended for colour printing, the plan fell through, and Pissarro printed his first books on a press he hired in the Epping based printing shop of Alfred B. Davis. We may assume that the patterned paper for the Suckling edition was printed in Epping as well.

One of Suckling's poems, 'Lutea Allison', addresses a girl of fifteen, who is 'still chast', but, as the writer argues, destined by nature to lose her virginity:

The roses on your cheeks were never made
To bless the eye alone, and so to fade;
Nor had the cherries on your lips their being
To please no other sense than that of seeing

These conventional symbols (roses, cherries) represent the only floral motives in this selection of Suckling's poems.

Colin Franklin described the patterned paper as 'a dianthus which seems to sprout rose leaves and oak leaves slants' (**). In his own bibliography of 1904 Ricketts described the bindings as: 'Bound in a patterned paper designed by C. Ricketts'; the design lacks a name. I am not sure about the dianthus, although a complex design incorporating more than one plant (dianthus, oak and rose) is not unlike Ricketts at all. Most commentators settle for a rose.

Patterned paper for The poems of Sir John Suckling (1896)

There are other floral patterns in the book. Illustrating the first text page is, what Ricketts called, a 'Border of Honeysuckle', and there are illustrated initials incorporating flowers and leaves. Roses (love), oak (immortality), and honeysuckle (devotion) - it is hard to see a connection between the poems and the pattern of the cover paper, and it is equally difficult to see a 'floral' relation between the paper cover and the opening border. For this publication, the private press law about the unity of the book seems not to have been obeyed by Ricketts in terms of symbolism, but then, this law was formulated only to advance the material unity of the book. Probably, Ricketts's intentions with the Suckling design were not to evoke Suckling's inner thoughts, but his own.

Ricketts's wish was 'to give a permanent and beautiful form to that portion of our literature which is secure of permanence', and his decorations were inspired by 'the desirability of a beautiful and permanent form for it', as he argued in his Bibliography of the Vale Press (p. v, xvi). He also insisted, 'that the decoration is in itself personal' (p. xv). All this may have been represented by the rose (Suckling's poems on love) and the oak leave symbol of immortality (the permanence of literature), but here we have entered the field of conjecture.

(*) The Letters of Lucien to Camille Pissarro, 1883-1903. Edited by Anne Thorold. Cambridge, 2003, p. 475, 477.
(**) Colin Franklin, The Private Presses. London, 1969, p. 88.
The first part in this series on patterned papers was published on 23 November 2011.