IN the first notice of Mr. Pennell's book we dealt
with the technical question raised; it remains to treat of the merits of the exhibition he gives us as a display of imagination. We use that word because it hits the defect of Mr. Pennell's way of regarding the whole subject. He appears to think there are two terms, and two terms only to be considered, namely, Subject and Technique. But the really essential term is the one omitted, namely, the way in which the subject is imagined. The technique may be halting or tentative, and yet convey a design or a feeling so much grander than the swaggering execution of a poorer spirit, that the result ranks immeasur- ably higher. This comes out in the case of the drawings by Rossetti. Rossetti's painting, like that of Mr. Watts and Sir Edward Burne-Jones, was inadequate in technique to the merit of his designs. In his drawings it is more adequate, but, as Mr. Pennell says, not exemplary. Yet the sheer intensity of conception does express itself despite the halting technique, and the result is, as we turn the pages, that long after we have ceased to wonder at the felicity and sparkle of spirits less weighted with a lesser emotion, long after we have skimmed the tourist notes, the witty gossip written in easy running hand, we are drawn back to Rossetti's designs, in which the deep brooding of a poetic spirit expresses itself. The difference is like that between clever journalism and the literature of a mind obstructed but profound.
We find ourselves, then, at odds with Mr. Pennell very -frequently in our estimate of the relative importance of the drawings he gives. We do not suppose, of course, that he admires them all. He doubtless put his taste aside fre- quently, and acted on some idea of including all sorts. It is difficult to believe that good ever comes of putting one's taste aside, or that anything is to be learnt from trivial stuff. We think Mr. Pennell must agree that much in his book is trivial, or if he does not now, he will perhaps tire of it in time. Some of it, to our stomach, is worse than trivial. And what is more, when Mr. Pennell does express a judgment, we must often disagree. He astounds us with his views of decoration, of fun, of impressiveness. We find the Montalti on an early page, and the Farny on a later, which he praises as decoration, alike trashy ; no better, in fact, than the decora- tion of rooms by sticking fans, pots, and handkerchiefs about, as ladies are apt to do. Meggendorfer leaves us grave, and the artist of Ally Sloper makes us sick. Edelfelt we think wooden. The neatness of Lalanne's drawing, printed beside a robust design by Titian, pleases us less than the pettiness of its arrangement annoys ns. But to come to Mr. Pennell's greater gods. In Adolf Menzel we do recognise the firm drill- sergeant draughtsman to whom we can forgive all the uncouth sporting of the Works of Frederick the Great for his iron grip of a man's head or a soldier's dress. In Charles Keene we admire, like all the world, a draughtsman of character, treating admirably material congruous _with his mind. Mr. Raven- Hill, among the maw men„is..his, mast ,worthy successor. In - Pen Drawing and Pen Draughtsmen. By Joseph Pennell. London and New -Yarle Max:nine& and Co. 1894.
Mr. Abbey we appreciate a silky daintiness, delicacy, fancy, but we miss, under this feeling for the surface, and affection for old modes, the stronger grasp of vital form that marks a great draughtsman. Mr. Howard Pyle and many more deserve their word, but it is only possible to say that in a number of magazine and book illustrators are to be found powers of dexterity, adaptation, economical skill,—everything short of a creative gift.
To speak more generally, there are three species to which the drawings may be most of them referred,—journalist- illustrators, caricaturists, decorative illustrators. Mr. Pennell has great hopes for the future of the first species. We cannot share his sanguine view. The necessities of the case are against it. Journalistic illustration must be of the expository order. Diagrams, photographs, views, drawings of incident, are the type. Let us take examples. The recognisable tourist-view of a town is the thing for a journal, and is as opposed as possible to the production of a man soaked in, and brooding over, a place till he disengages a pictorial idea from it. Here is Mr. Herbert Railton, a clever sketcher of architecture. He gives what answers to the popular idea of the picturesque in architecture,—namely, the speckled and broken surface of stones, bricks, tiles, railings. He never gives, he never has time or attention to apprehend, the real character of a building. He spices, peppers it for the languid passing eye that never sees buildings. It is like the descrip- tive journalism that discovers a new emergency and shock in every trivial incident of the House of Commons, and peppers the description with every overdone device of alliteration and emphasis. The same is true of the clever drawings we see every day illustrating fiction. They reduce themselves to reports of tailoring and fashions,—a frock-coat talking to a pair of sleeves. There was a wonderful moment in the illustration of fiction when the influence of the quiet, brooding artist, Rossetti, spread through a group, and animated the work of Millais, Boyd Houghton, Da Manlier, Fred Walker, and many more. The demands of modern journalism are against the recurrence of such an inspiration. The quick, ready specialist is the man for editors.
The case of draughtsmen with a sense of fun is curious in this country. Caricature itself is much repressed. Satiric, characteristic drawing is hemmed about and limited. The satire of a Forain would find a publisher with difficulty, even if we had a Forain. Draughtsmen are required to limit themselves to the lower middle-class facetiousness of Pick- life-Up, or the upper middle-class joke as we find it in Punch. Mr. Du Maurier is a wit who has struck his right material; with a Phil May Punch is much puzzled what to do, and a number of young men are to be observed in various journals attempting jokes in a wrong social medium. The tyranny of the joke hampers others, especially the grave people who, having planted their figures to get off the dialogue, bustle round to execute the walls and furniture with a heart evidently relieved by that occu- pation.
But if caricature is not permitted in the cause of fun, we find it flourishing in a curious disguise among the decorators. We will not repeat what we have said elsewhere about Mr. Walter Crane, who has fallen upon a terribly dismal caricature of a style in his illustrations of poetry. A more interesting case is that of Mr. Aubrey Beardsley. Being a man of wit, who does not draw except in the sense of making pleasant embroideries of blocks and lines upon his page, he sees that if you do not draw, grotesque is the only caricature-evasion that is not dull. He began with the dis- mal caricature, he now makes grotesque caricatures. If he learned to draw, he might, with his intelligence for design and skill of hand, produce something admirable. Carlos Schwabe, the illustrator of Le Mve, with very much the same designing endowment, is more advanced in drawing power. He has curious lapses ; will stick in little bits of stupid pattern, or objects completely out of scale ; but occasionally attains the right proportion of simplicity and fullness, while giving adequate expression to his mystic types. It is tempting to go on, but these abridged notes on an interest- ing book are all that space allows. The abridgment, we may add, has compelled to an appearance of opposi- tion and fault-finding which does not represent one's main feeling.
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