Current Literature
ENGLISH POTTERY AND PORCELAIN
By W. B. Honey
The inauguration of the new Library of English Art, by Messrs. Black, was happily timed, either by accident or design, to fall within a few montht of the Exhibition of English Art to be held this month at Burlington House. Among the first volumes is English Pottery and Porcelain (Black, 7s. 6d.) by Mr. W. B. Honey, of the Victoria and Albert Museum. The book suffers from one important failing, which is certainly not the fault of the author and perhaps also not that of the publisher. It has only twenty-four pages of plates and a few figures in the text, showing in all only some eighty objects. These would in any ease be insufficient to illustrate the whole history of English Ceramics, but the insufficiency- is all the more striking, since Mr. Honey has entirely the right views about avoiding vaguely generalized statements and instead always refers to his sonnies in the forms of individual speci- mens. But the reader cannot help being irritated by not being able to see more than one-tenth of the pots and figures which Mr. Honey mentions in detail. Unless, therefore, he is so well acquainted with the subject that the mere words, " the Watkin- son posset-pot in the Lomax Collection " call up a clear visual image, he should also have to hand some amply illus- trated work, or he should simply take the book to South Ken- sington and read it among the actual collection, from which many of Mr. Honey's examples are drawn. By either of these means he will derive much profit, for the text of the book is clear and precise, and will be intelligible even to those unac- quainted with the technicalities, since the more baffling terms are explained in the introduction.
Previous page
