The idea that illustrations limit the reader’s imagination or mental visualization of the text is arguably one of the most prevalent and persistent critiques of illustration. We find the first occurrence of this idea in Charles Lamb’s sonnet “To Samuel Rogers, Esq.” from 1833, as well as in an undated letter sent by Lamb to Samuel Rogers, possibly from the same year (Wood).
The sonnet suggests a contrast between the frivolous and empty appeal of illustrated editions and the rich and noble appeal of editions without pictorial representations. The sonnet presents the former as vacuous presentations, which leave nothing “Of healthful action to the soul-conceiving / Of the true reader.”
More concretely, in the letter explaining to Rogers his position, Lamb connects his criticism of illustrations with his criticism of David Garrick and Boydell’s “Shakespeare Gallery,” paintings of Shakespeare’s plays and, especially, characters. In the letter, he states:
But I am jealous of the combination of the sister arts. Let them sparkle apart. What injury (short of the theatres) did not Boydell’s ‘Shakespeare Gallery’ do me with Shakespeare?—to have Opie’s Shakespeare, Northcote’s Shakespeare, light-headed Fuseli’s Shakespeare, heavy-headed Romney’s Shakespeare, wooden-headed West’s Shakespeare (though he did the best in ‘Lear’), deaf-headed Reynolds’s Shakespeare, instead of my, and ’s Shakespeare. To be tied down to an authentic face of Juliet! To have Imogen’s portrait! To confine the illimitable! I like you and Stothard (you best), but ‘out upon this half-faced fellowship.’
As mentioned, this type of critique was very prominent throughout the nineteenth century. A notable example is Gustave Flaubert’s objections to the illustration of Salammbô (1862). In a famous letter to Ernest Duplan, his notary, from June 12, 1862, Flaubert explains:
Jamais, moi vivant, on ne m’illustrera, parce que: la plus belle description littéraire est dévorée par le plus piètre dessin.
Si précis net que soit un type en littérature,[cut by Flaubert] du momentqu’il[cut by Flaubert] qu’un type est fixé par le crayon, il perd ce caractère de généralité, cette ressemblance avec mille objets connus qui font dire au lecteur : ‘J’ai vu cela’ ou ‘cela doit être.’ Une femme dessinée ressemble à une femme, voilà tout. L’idée est dès lors fermée, complète. Toutes les phrases sont inutiles, tandis qu’une femme écrite fait rêver à mille. – Donc, ceci étantpr moi[cut by Flaubert] une question d’esthétique, je refuse formellement toute espècede dessins[cut by Flaubert] d’illustration.
Works Cited
Flaubert, Gustave. Correspondance. Édition électronique. Edited by Yvan Leclerc and Danielle Girard. Centre Flaubert, 2017. https://flaubert.univ-rouen.fr/correspondance/edition/
Lamb, Charles. “To Samuel Rogers, Esq. (1833).” In Lamb, Charles, and Mary Lamb. The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb.
Wood, Gillen D’Arcy. “Illustration Tourism Photography.” The Shock of the Real: Romanticism and Visual Culture, 1760-1860, pp. 171-218. Palgrave, 2001.
Content is forthcoming. Please check this site again soon.