The portrait and the book : Illustration and Literary Culture in Early America Megan Walsh

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Walsh, Megan (Professor), author.

Series:

Impressions (Series) (University of Iowa Press)

Impressions / Studies in the art, culture, and future of books

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Illustration of books--United States--18th century.

Illustration of books.

Illustration of books--United States--19th century.

Portraits, American--18th century.

Portraits, American.

Portraits, American--19th century.

American literature--Illustrations.

American literature.

Printing--United States--History--18th century.

Printing.

Printing--United States--History--19th century.

Illustrated books--United States--History--18th century.

Illustrated books.

Illustrated books--United States--History--19th century.

Physical Description:

viii, 259 pages : illustrations ; 22 cm.

Place of Publication:

Iowa City : University of Iowa Press, 2017

Summary:

Even before the widespread use of steel engraving and lithography in the nineteenth century, Americans had already established the illustrated book format as central to the nation's literary culture. In The Portrait and the Book, Megan Walsh argues that colonial-era author portraits, such as Benjamin Franklin's and Phillis Wheatley's frontispieces; political portraits that circulated during the debates over the Constitution, such as those of the Founders by Charles Willson Peale; and portraits of beloved fictional characters in the 1790s, such as those of Samuel Richardson's heroine Pamela, shaped readers' conceptions of American literature. Through an examination of readers' portrait-collecting habits, writers' employment of ekphrasis, printers' efforts to secure American-made illustrations for periodicals, and engravers' reproductions of British book illustrations, Walsh uncovers in late eighteenth-century America a dynamic but forgotten visual culture that was inextricably tied to the printing industry and to the early US literary imagination. -- from back cover.

Contents:

Benjamin Franklin's portraits and colonial printing

Phillis Wheatley and the durability of the author portrait

Nationalist portraiture, magazines, and political books

Picturing the seduction heroine in the U.S

Gothic portraiture in Charles Brockden Brown's Wieland and Ormond.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references (pages 233-251) and index.

Local Notes:

HSP Credit Line -- Charles Brockden Brown notebook, pp. 40-41, Brown family papers [Coll. 0084]. Page 179.

ISBN:

9781609385026

1609385020

OCLC:

990337626