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Books in Review / Comptes rendus
et Jean Lescure (sans lien de parent6 avec la fondateur) est d6taill6 ainsi que
l'apparitiond'une nouvelle génération de collaborateurs sans lien avec la guerre.
Ainsi, c'est en mars 1947 qu'apparait le personnage qui monopolisers le reste de
l'ouvrage: Jrérme Lindon. C'est en fait l'histoire de Lindon (nouveau pdg), sinsi
que celle de Georges Lambrich et de leurs auteurs qui peuplent cette seconde
partie. L'historique de la maison devient dès lors 6troitement li6e Ala publication
des ouvrages de Georges Bataille, de Samuel Beckett -- qui avec sa compagne
Suzanne Demesnil rappelle un peu les excentricit6s de R6jean Ducharme de Michel Butor et d'Alain Robbe-Grillet. Sous Lindon, les Éditions de Minuit
deviennent une vraie maison d'6dition sans aucun lien avec la guerre et dirig6e
par un 6diteur commercial. La rivalit6 avec Gallimard et le rôle de Jean Paulhan
sont 6voqu6s avec brio.
Bien que l'6diteur reste muet sur sa biographie, Anne Simonin est historienne.
Son but, on l's vu, n'est ni bibliographique ni litt6raire, mais historique. Son
6criture est claire, pr6cise, simple et enthousiaste. Même si l'ouvrage r6sulte d'un
m6moire de thèse - avec plus de I 300 notes en bas de page - la lecture en
demeure agr6able et accessible au grand public. Le volume assez imposant contient en annexes des lettres et autres textes souvent in6dits. Il compte aussi une
bibliographie, des index des noms, des ouvrages et des collections, ainsi que des
revues et des journaux et se termine par le catalogue des Éditions de Minuit de
1956. En somme, un ouvrage bien document6 et int6ressant à lire.
MICHEL BRISEBOIS
Bibliothèque nationale du Canada
Alan Horne. The Dictionary of 20th Cenitury British Book 111ustrators. Woodbridge, Suffolk: The Antique Collectors' Club, 1994.
456 pp.; $60.50 U.s. (cloth). IsBw I-85149-Io8-2.
With Alan Horne's The Dictionary of 20th Centulry BritishBook 111ustrators, the
Antique Collectors' Club has published another of its sumptuous and beautifully
designed 'books on books.' Horne's Dictionary,with at least a thousand entries
for book illustrators working in Britain between 1915 and 1985, black-and-white
illustrations on every page, about 150o beautifully reproduced coloured plates, and
some sixty pages of introductory essays, all printed on high quality paper and
impeccably bound, is indeed a collector's item. Moreover, this beautiful book is
also a work of utility. Like its predecessor, The Dictionary of British Book Illustratorsand CaricaturistsI800-z9z4 by Simon Houfe (revised and reprinted under
the title The Dictionary of £9th Century British Book Illustrators,Antique Collectors' Club, 1994), which is really a companion volume, The Dictionary of
20th Century~British Book Illustrators will be a major reference source for both
bibliophiles and scholars working in the field of illustrated books.
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Papers of the Bibliographical 'Society of Canada 34/2
Horne's introductory material, which features his essays on 'British Book Illustration 1915-1985,' 'The Revival of Wood Engraving,' 'Commercial Art,' and
'Book Jackets and Covers and Paperback Wrappers,' as well as an article by specialist Brian Alderson, 'Some Notes on Children's Book Illustration I9I5-I985,'
provides an excellent context for the subsequent dictionary entries, particularly
since the themes established here are picked up in individual entries later. The
bibliographies which follow these introductory essays also offer useful direction
for further study.
In the introductory~ essays, Horne offers a balanced argument for the importance
of commercial art 1in the development of illustration. These views are reinforced
in the many listings of poster and advertising work recorded in the subsequent
dictionary entries. For example, in the entry for Edward Ardizzone, one of the
twentieth century's most highly acclaimned book illustrators, and one whose farreaching influence is evident both in the many entries in which his name is
mentioned and in the illustrative plates which visually demonstrate his impact
on the artistic style of British illustrators, Horne includes information about his
periodical illustrations, his cover designs, book jackets, posters, and advertising
work, as well as his fine book illustration for the works of Dickens, Thackeray,
Trollope, and Eleanor Farjeon. Such a comprehensive approach to the art of
illustration does much to validate Horne's contention that 'the subordination
of artistic integrity to the need for financial gain' is not an inevitable· outcome of
commercial art (p.26).
Given the title of the work, however, with its emphasis on book illustrators, so
much attention to other kinds of illustration sometimes seems overdone. This is
especially true for the space Horne gives to artists whose m6tier was the comic
strip or the political cartoon. While such illustrative work is fascinating, in a work
whose provenance is the illustrated book itself, and whose limited space necessarily demands selectivity, one wonders about the rationale which gives textual
space to cartoonists such as Frank Bellamy and George Heath, who are not really
book illustrators, while omitting any data on Alan Odle, who is mentioned in a
number of entries on other artists but receives none for himself apart from the
reference 'See Houfe.' Such cross-references to Houfe's book make the previous
volume truly a necessary companion to Horne's - so much so, indeed, that without both works before her, the researcher would often be frustrated in her search
for data on certain book artists working in the twentieth century.
The entries which comprise most of the Dictionary'spages are clearly laid out
and easily read, with an excellent use of capitals and bold print to highlight important aspects and diacritical marks to direct cross-references. For each artist, Horne
includes biographical information, and often some critical assessment, as well as
(where applicable) lists of books illustrated, books written and illustrated, periodical contributions, exhibits, collections, and bibliographic sources. For easy reference, black-and-white illustrations are almost always proximate to their relevant
entries, either on the same or the facing page. Where a colour plate representing
the artist's work is available, the number of the plate is given at the bottom of
the entry. This facilitates the movement from text to image, especially since the
coloured plates are usually some pages removed from the dictionary entry.
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Books in Review / Comptes rendus
One aspect of the dictionary entries that is especially helpful is the inclusion
of artists'theories on illustration. Another is the fine attention paid to each artist's
method(s) of illustration, and their preferred medium. The connections between
schools and styles of illustration, as well as those between individual artists, the
emphasis on the importance of publishers in the production of illustrated books,
and the balancing of a comprehensive scope with a meticulous attention to detail
make Horne's Dictionary an invaluable reference source that builds on, but
extends, previous work such as Brigid Peppin and Lucy Micklethwait's Dictionary of British Book Illustrators:The 'Ttentieth Century (London: John Murray, 1983). To facilitate such connections, it would have been helpful to have an
index which would enable the reader to search cross-references in such fields
as influence, school, medium, publishers, book titles, and the like.
In such a compendious work, it is inevitable that there will be a few errors, but
The Dictionaryof 20th CenturyBook Illustrators has been meticulously edited,
and is remarkably free of these in its 456 pages. Twto minor errors include an
inaccurate birth date for Noel Rooke (198 I rather than I88I) and an incorrect
title for Annabel Kidston's illustration for MIatthew Arnold's 'The Forsaken MIermaid' [sic] (p.277). As Kidston's full-frontal illustration of the title figure makes
patently clear even without recourse to Arnold's poem, the sea-creature in question is a Merman, not a Mermaid. Errors of a more serious nature include those
few entries where one wishes that Horne's impressive scholarly sleuthing could
have probed a little farther into original sources. For example, the entry on Florence Harrison refers the reader to Houfe for information, despite the fact that the
flourishingdates given (I877-I92 5)are from Peppin rather than Houfe, who gives
Harrison's active dates as 188 7-1914. In fact, Harrison illustrated for Blackies into
the thirties, her last known work being an illustrated version of Jean Ingelow's
Mopsa the Fairy,retold by Dorothy King (Blackie and Son I932).
Despite such occasional lapses, Alan Horne's compendious The Dictionary of
20th CenturIy Br'itish Book 11uzstrators is a splendid reference book whose lavish
production, detailed information, and critical framework provide source material
that scholars and collectors will return to again and again as they work in the
burgeoning field of the illustrated book.
LORRAINE
JANZEN
KOOISTRA
Nipissing University
Kenneth Blackwell and Harry Ruja. A Bibliograpl2y of Bertrand
Russell. London: Routledge, 1994- 3vols.; £250, $385.oo U.s. (cloth).
IsBN o-4 15-I I644-9 ·
Bertrand Russell (1872-1970) is difficult to categorize. Look him up in a dictionary of philosophy and you'll see him described as one of the great, maybe even