Victorian Illustrated Books (ENG910 F2020) Dashboard

Leader

Lorraine Kooistra

Description

Students in Lorraine Janzen Kooistra's English Capstone Seminar at Ryerson University in Toronto in F2020 aim to make a virtue of pandemic necessity by engaging collaboratively and critically with the digital surrogates of a wide variety of Victorian illustrated books published between 1843 and 1899.

Using the interpretive model of image/text/context for both synchronic and diachronic analyses, and drawing on a range of digital tools, this course aims to understand the past through the present and the present through the past.

Our study begins with Charles Dickens's iconic Christmas Carol: A Ghost Story of Christmas, illustrated by John Leech (1843), then turns to two examples of poetry and illustration: Alfred Tennyson's "The Lady of Shalott," illustrated by Pre-Raphaelite artists William Holman Hunt and Dante Gabriel Rossetti (1857); and Christina Rossetti's "Goblin Market," illustrated by her brother, Dante Gabriel (1862). These mid-century works will provide the foundation for our study of the illustrated books that proliferated at the end of the century. We'll analyze a variety of fin-de-siècle genres and styles, starting with Arthur Conan Doyle's popular detective stories, The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, illustrated by Sydney Paget (1892). Next up is Salome: A Tragedy in One Act, Oscar Wilde's censored play based on a biblical story, which was infamously "embroidered" by decadent artist Aubrey Beardsley (1894). Fairy tales and fantasies aimed at adult audiences allowed counter-cultural writers and artists to protest existing norms and imagine other worlds; our examples are Laurence Housman's self-illustrated collection, The House of Joy (1895) and Clemence Housman's gothic novella The Were-Wolf, with wood-engraved illustrations by the author after her brother Laurence's designs (1896). The Annancy Stories, a self-illustrated collection of folktales by Pamela Colman Smith, is the first-known publication featuring this Jamaican trickster figure (1899). Students examine the final work, A Christmas Carol: The Graphic Novel (2019), for evidence of the legacy of Victorian illustrated books today.

The following texts are available in COVE (see D2L for the other digital surrogates):

Charles Dickens, A Christmas Carol: A Ghost Story of Christmas (1843): A COVE Studio Text for class annotation

Clemence Housman, The Were-Wolf (1896): A COVE Annotated Edition 

Christina G. Rossetti, Goblin Market (1862): A COVE Annotated Edition 

Alfred Tennyson: The Lady of Shalott (1857):  A COVE Studio text for class annotation

Victorian illustrated books resulted from the collaboration of a number of social agents, including authors, artists, engravers, editors, publishers, and readers. Using the COVE toolset, students and instructor work collaboratively to build resources that critically curate Victorian illustrated books in cultural contexts ranging from the nineteenth century to the present. 

We will use the COVE annotation tool to hone our close reading and editorial skills. In COVE Studio, each student will provide TWO TEXTUAL ANNOTATIONS, one on "content," one on "craft," for Dickens's A Christmas Carol and Tennyson's "The Lady of Shalott."

We will use the Gallery Image tool to provide bibliographic and contextual information and iconographic commentary and analysis on illustrations, and to associate these with events in the Timeline and places in the Map.

We will use the Gallery Exhibition tool to critically curate illustrated books in cultural contexts, situating works synchronically, within their originating moment of production and reception, and diachronically, in terms of their ongoing moments of production and reception. 

We will use the COVE Timeline tool to provide information about historical events relevant to Victorian illustrated books, both at the time of their first publication, and in their ongoing re-production over time and across media.

We will use the COVE Map tool to associate places relevant to illustrated books and their makers and the cultural contexts that we showcase in the Gallery and on the Timeline. 

Galleries, Timelines, and Maps

There is no content in this group.

Pages

Individual Entries

Blog entry

Blog Post #4 || Oct 1st || Module 4

Posted by Alicia Beggs-Holder on Thursday, October 1, 2020 - 17:49

I enjoyed annotating "The Lady of Shalott“ poem as it really added more information and considerations into a poem that has been read numerous times. It makes the experience more unique, so to speak. I hadn't really thought too deeply about the poem previously, save for the examination of its content generally. But to add it into the context of the Victorian period and understanding what influenced the illustrations - the pre-Raphelites, gender roles etc - it adds a whole new layer. The detail in the wood engravings was also pleasing to look at, seeing the effort and time it took into having it all done - I could really see the effort put into illustrations (how it naturally draws the eye into looking at the finer details of the art - the mirror, the way the Lady looks, the detail of each strand of hair).

I found it interesting how heavily the cultural context  impacts the way an artist will do their illustration for a piece of literature. More specifically, how much...

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Response Blog 4 (Oct 1)

Posted by Payton Flood on Thursday, October 1, 2020 - 17:12

While creating annotations for Alfred Tennyson’s “The Lady of Shalott,” I struggled to find a word or phrase that was unusual or unfamiliar to me and worthy of annotation.  Because the text is extremely visual, the “content” annotation was much more difficult to procure than the “craft” annotation.  My “craft” annotation was “Tirra lirra;” at first, I thought this phrase would be perfect for a “content” annotation because it was an unfamiliar phrase.  I then decided it was more suited for a “craft” annotation because of its rhyme and rhythm.  Once my research proved that there was no literal meaning to the phrase and that it is meant to imitate a musical sound, I realized it was better suited to be categorized as “craft.”  Unfortunately, I appear unable to view my classmate’s annotations’; I shall continue to explore COVE and attempt to resolve the issue.  When I began exploring this week’s material, I...

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Blog #4 || Oct. 1

Posted by Kyle Sarjeant on Thursday, October 1, 2020 - 15:30

Annotating “The Lady Shallot” and its associated illustrations this week presented a unique challenge for me in that I struggled to balance and condense all of the many facets of history and culture that surrounded the production of the poem. With the “Lady of Shallot” for example, it was difficult to attempt to condense the cultural context of wood-engraving and mass production, the Pre-Raphaelites’ influence on art and illustration, the societal tensions regarding the emerging women’s rights movement—all seemingly pertinent to Tennyson’s poem and Rosetti and Hunt’s illustrations. It occurs to me that this is perhaps the core struggle of a synchronic mode of analysis: sifting through all of the historical and cultural contexts of a texts production and trying to situate a work within its broader, contemporary culture. Especially when trying to annotate, where the goal is to be as succinct as possible.

Though it...

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ENG 910: English Capstone Seminar: Week Four

Posted by Anjali Jaikarran on Thursday, October 1, 2020 - 15:28

   This week, our focus was Lord Alfred Tennyson's 'Lady of Shalott' which is includes aspects of Arthurian legend. I learned that the poem was in print for 25 years before the 1857 version was published with its illustrations by William Holman Hunt and Daniel Gabriel Rossetti. Our focus today was to make meaning between the originally published poem and its accompanying illustrations. Naturally, my mind gravitated towards understanding women in the cultural moment of the Victorian era; which delegated them to their homes to protect their chastity and sensibilities. However, it wasn't enough to create meaning. Professor Janzen mentioned crinolines or hoop skirts, skeletal garments that women wore under their dresses to make them voluminous and keep their shape. Connecting this idea that while women took up physical space in public, through poems like 'Lady of Shallot', women were being confined within the bounds of these poems as passive, chaste figures whose deaths depict them as...

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Poetry Interpretation

Posted by Patricia Lucreziano on Thursday, October 1, 2020 - 14:34

I really enjoyed the process of annotating “The Lady of Shalott” and the two illustrations by different Pre-Raphaelite artists. I was even more so intrigued with the poem in compaison to the other works we have looked at. It was so easy to read and felt like it the analyzing came extremely naturally and allowed for soem great food for thought. I annotated a piece in Part IV that was talking about the blood freezing within the Lady of Shalott and her mournful singing. That piece of the poem held some really vivid and dark imagery that was breathtaking to read. Interpretating the images was extremely rewarding as well but for myself personally, the poem was my favourite that we have looked at thus far. I feel as thought my perosnaly intermretation of the images and text were very much so aligned with the perspectives of my peers, but being able ot hear others perspective is very important to me so I can grasp the best understanding that I can of the images and...

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Blog Post 4 Oct.1

Posted by Simon Mancuso on Thursday, October 1, 2020 - 14:09

In performing annotations for both image and text there were a number of things that I found particularly engaging both within the text and the context of “The Lady of Shalott”. Firstly, I will say that I found the text itself to be incredibly engaging. This is the first poem that we have studied in this course and I found the medium to be one that I particularly enjoyed. The way in which Tennyson was able to weave together a narrative while retaining the flow of his poetry was impressive. With regard to the content itself I particularly enjoyed the references to Arthurian legend that were made throughout the text. The comparisons between the idealized Camelot and Victorian era england are something that I find interesting if not mildly controversial. Furthermore I found that the poetry format really lent itself well to the creation of illustration as the language used throughout was incredibly dense both symbolically and thematically. With regard to...

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Blog Post - Oct 1, 2020

Posted by Alexandra Monstur on Thursday, October 1, 2020 - 13:58

This week, we looked at the poem "The Lady of Shalott", and had a chance to annotate parts of it individually, and then together, for the image portion of the text. My group annotated William Holman Hunt's illustration for the text; this image is a wood-engraved framed inset illustration, denoted by the linear border that surrounds it on the page. What I found most fascinating about this image is how it essentially encapsulates the entirety of the poem. Understanding the image within its historical context helped to illuminate the broader interpretation of the poem. Knowing that the period in which the poem was written was one in which women were constrained by the mores of their society speaks to how The Lady is herself trapped by her weaving materials within the photo. This understanding is furthered by the contrasting reflections of Sir Lancelot in one mirror alongside the image of Jesus' crucifixion. As was touched upon in class...

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Week Four Blog Post!

Posted by Marina Arnone on Thursday, October 1, 2020 - 13:39

I enjoyed doing the annotations on content and craft last week, but I felt as though doing them for “The Lady of Shalott” proved to be very helpful. I often struggle to understand poetry, therefore it was helpful to have the opportunity to take a close look into the text. I also enjoyed listening to what my group members had to say, but also being able to see what other students wrote for the parts we were not assigned to. We were assigned the first image by WHH, therefore there were a lot of details that I did not notice. Her hair was very unruly and took up a large portion of the page, but when I first saw the image I thought that was a ceiling design which altered the feel of the image a little. 

Learning about the context of the time period was helpful in understanding the message that might have been trying to come through. I think women’s issues were very significant during this time, therefore I do...

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The Pedestal as a Cage

Posted by Nicole Bernard on Thursday, October 1, 2020 - 12:29

Annotating "The Lady of Shalott" was an engaging process. Tennyson layers references and commentary on the social position of women and their lack of social mobility. The first impression of the poem is the base description of the Lady falling to her doom through her attraction to Lancelot. However, there are more intricate details within the poem that come to light through a focused critical analysis. The text is rife with allusions but what I enjoyed most was the symbols of the constrained life of the Lady of Shalott.

In William Holman Hunt's interpretation, the isolation of the Lady is exaggerated through her immediate physical bonds (the wool that she is weaving around herself) and those that have been imposed upon her by external forces in the form of her tower. This is superimposed by smothering guilt in the illustrations within her chamber. The frame to the left seems to depict shields (representing the work of the state to protect her), the frame on the right depicts...

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Weekly Blog #4

Posted by Yousef Farhang on Thursday, October 1, 2020 - 12:15

This week's class was once again focused on the text-image relationship but it was also very much focused on the weekly reading which gave great historical context on illustrators and how they went about illustrating their images. For example, as mentioned in class, the poem itself was published 25 years before its illustrations were released which not only shows how popular the poem was 2 decades after its releas, but also how the ilustrators grew up reading the poem since childhood. Therefore, the poem's illustration is a mix of the illustrator's childhood envisionment of the poem, and their analetical perspective towards the poem 2 decades later. 

A striking point that really piqued my interest in teh first illustration was how giant the Lady of Shalott looked in her tower. I think that was a great way to symbolize how little space there is for her physically and mentally as she imagines the outside world and how it looks like. Furtheremore, understanding the historical...

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