This is the third and final piece of original artwork by Jessie Willcox Smith for the book Dickens’s Children. Here we have The Runaway Couple, Master Harry Walmers and Miss Norah, resting at the inn on their way to Gretna Green to be married. Poor little Norah is not used to being away from home and is exhausted from a long coach journey. Not even a Norfolk biffin is going to cheer her up.
‘So Boots goes up-stairs to the Angel, and there he finds Master Harry on a e-normous sofa — immense at any time, but looking like the Great Bed of Ware, compared with him — a drying the eyes of Miss Norah with his pocket-hankecher. Their little legs was entirely off the ground, of course, and it really is not possible for Boots to express to me how small them children looked.’ (Christmas Stories – The Holly Tree by Charles Dickens.)
Sadly, the union is not to be and the two go their separate ways.
‘…...I hold with him in two opinions: firstly, that there are not many couples on their way to be married who are half as innocent of guile as those two children; secondly, that it would be a jolly good thing for a great many couples on their way to be married, if they could only be stopped in time, and brought back separately.’
I can’t tell what Miss Norah is clutching along with her parasol, but for her wedding trip she also carried ‘a smelling-bottle, a round and a half of cold buttered toast, eight peppermint drops, and a (doll’s) hair-brush.’
Below is the reproduction from Dickens’s Children, 1912.
Please click on the postcard below to find the runaways and more – thanks for visiting 🙂
Another piece of original artwork by Jessie Willcox Smith today. This is Little Em’ly, childhood friend and first love of David Copperfield; used and abused by Steerforth but eventually living happily ever after (we assume) in Australia.
‘She started from my side, and ran along a jagged timber which protruded from the place we stood upon, and overhung the deep water at some height, without the least defence. The incident is so impressed on my remembrance, that if I were a draughtsman I could draw its form here, I dare say, accurately as it was that day, and little Em’ly springing forward to her destruction (as it appeared to me), with a look that I have never forgotten, directed far out to sea.
The light, bold, fluttering little figure turned and came back safe to me, and I soon laughed at my fears, and at the cry I had uttered; fruitlessly in any case, for there was no one near.’ (David Copperfield by Charles Dickens.)
Again, this illustration is in ‘mixed media’; watercolour with oil and pastel.
Below, the reproduction from Dickens’s Children, 1912
Please click on the notebook below to find all kinds of Willcox Smith lovelies and again, thanks for visiting 🙂
Dickens’s Children is a collection of 10 illustrations by Jessie Willcox Smith, featuring the younger characters from the novels of Charles Dickens. The work was commissioned by Scribner’s in 1911; eight of the drawings subsequently printed in their magazine, and the book published in 1912.
Below is the study for Tiny Tim and Bob Cratchit on Christmas Day (A Christmas Carol) and the reproduction printed in the book. The original is described as ‘mixed media’ and looks to be watercolour with oil (the snow) and pastel. Mr Cratchit certainly started out with a much gentler face, although the poor boy behind them still looks like his cap is on fire!
Please click on the link below for new Jessie Willcox Smith cards, postcards, notebooks, jigsaw puzzles and of course posters of all shapes and sizes. Thanks for visiting 🙂
Jessie Willcox Smith was an American illustrator whose impressive volume of work includes more than 60 books and almost 200 covers for Good Housekeeping.
Born in Philadelphia in 1863, Jessie didn’t discover her talent until the age of 16. After attending the School of Design for Women and the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts in Philadelphia she worked for the Ladies’ Home Journal for 5 years. Frustrated by her education so far, Jessie left the job to study under Howard Pyle at the Drexel Institute in 1894.
After leaving Drexel, Jessie rented a studio with two fellow students of Pyle, Violet Oakley and Elizabeth Shippen Green. 14 years later she was working steadily and had enough financial security to have her own house and studio built. The property was surrounded by gardens that her young models would play in while she observed, waiting for the perfect subject to draw. Working in natural light and with her models playing freely around her the results are the wonderfully warm and charming illustrations below.
Remaining unmarried, Jessie Willcox Smith seems to have sacrificed motherhood for her career but her life was certainly not childless. Her drawings show the love and passion she had for children. In later years Jessie chose portrait work and kept her subjects’ attention with fairy tales. In her own words…
“It has been one long joyous road along which troop delightful children, happy children, sad children, thoughtful children, and above all wondering, imaginative children, who give to their charmingly original thoughts a delicious quaintness of expression. I love to paint them all.”
She died in 1935 aged 71.
The Seven Ages of Childhood – 1909
First the Infant in It’s Mother’s Arms
Then the Epicure, With Fine and Greedy Taste for Porridge
Then the Scholar, With Eyes Severe and Hair of Formal Cut
At the Back of the North Wind – 1919
“Dear boy!” said his mother; “your father’s the best man in the world.”
“Are you ill, dear North Wind?”
So Diamond sat down again and took the baby in his lap
The Princess and the Goblin – 1920
She ran for some distance, turned several times, and then began to be afraid
There sat his mother by the fire, and in her arms lay the princess fast asleep
“Come,” and she still held out her arms
Please take a look at my Jessie Willcox Smith cards, postcards and posters – just click on the poster below – thanks for visiting 🙂
“Her achievement was beauty, a delicate, fantastic beauty, created with brush and pencil. Almost unschooled in art, her life spent in prosaic places of the West and Middle West, she made pictures of haunting loveliness, suggesting Oriental lands she never saw and magical realms no one ever knew except in the dreams of childhood … Perhaps it was the hardships of her own life that gave the young artist’s work its fanciful quality. In the imaginative scenes she set down on paper she must have escaped from the harsh actualities of existence.”
I am starting off this blog with my favourite Golden Age artist, Virginia Frances Sterrett. The above comment from the St Louis Post-Dispatch of July 1931, perfectly sums up her amazing accomplishments despite her short and difficult life.
Virginia Frances Sterrett was born in Chicago, Illinois in 1900 and moved with her family to Missouri and Kansas following the death of her father.
She started to draw as a small child and, encouraged by the success of her drawings in the Kansas State Fair Exhibition, she went to Chicago at 15 to attend high school and study art. She was given a full scholarship. Unfortunately, her mother became ill and Sterrett was forced to leave her studies to support the family. Virginia worked in various art advertising agencies until her own health began to fail. In 1919 at age 19, Sterrett received her first commission. She was also diagnosed with tuberculosis.
Old French Fairy Tales was published in 1920. Consisting of 5 ageless fairy tales by Sophie, la Comtesse de Ségur, the book included 8 magnificent full page colour illustrations and many equally stunning line drawings.
She threw her arms around the neck of Bonne-Biche
Rosalie never left the park, which was surrounded by high walls
They were three months passing through the forest
The fairy must give herself up to the queen and lose her power for eight days
What are you seeking, little one?
The broom was on fire at once, blazed up and burned her hands
Violette consented willingly to pass the night in the forest
I have enjoyed restoring these wonderful illustrations and have some products to share with you. All images are at least 300 ppi to show the incredible detail. Please take a look.
I’ll be visiting Virginia’s life and work again at a later date so please do come back.
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