The wood engravers' self portrait : the Dalziel Archive and Victorian illustration / Bethan Stevens.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Stevens, Bethan (Bethan Kathleen), author.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Dalziel Brothers--History.

Dalziel Brothers.

Wood-engravers--Great Britain--History--19th century.

Wood-engravers.

Illustration of books--Great Britain--19th century.

Illustration of books.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (xxii, 386 pages) : illustrations (black and white, and colour), digital, PDF file(s)

Edition:

1st ed.

Place of Publication:

Manchester : Manchester University Press, 2022.

Language Note:

In English.

Summary:

The wood engravers' self portrait tells the story of the image-making firm Dalziel Brothers, investigating and interpreting a unique archive from the British Museum. The study takes a creative-critical approach to illustration, alongside detailed investigation of print techniques and history. Five siblings ran the wood engraving firm Dalziel Brothers: George, Edward, Margaret, John and Thomas Dalziel. Prospering through five decades of work, Dalziel became the major capitalist image makers of Victorian Britain. This book, based on AHRC-funded research, outlines the achievements of these remarkable siblings and uncovers the histories of some of the 36 unknown artisan employees that worked alongside them.

Contents:

Machine generated contents note: 1. A wordless memoir: the illustrator as archivist

pt. I The Dalziel family and their `woodpecker' employees, 1839

93

2. `The print of [her] feet' (Wordsworth): the wood engravers' self-portrait

3. Ruskin's sinisterity: disjointed hands and brains, and the division of art labour

4. Barnaby Rudge and `the atmosphere of letters' (Craik): apprenticeship, education and employment

5. Ghostwriting the line of the other: Wilkie Collins's After Dark and Dalziel's freelance engravers

6. `This midnight forger' (Trollope): signatures, authorship and relations between engravers and draughtspeople

pt. II Medium and technique at Dalziel Brothers

7. `Off with her head!' (Carroll): execution, technical violence and the discipline of visual cultures

8. `These many ingenious adaptations of photography' (Dalziel): photography and wood engraving, from Eadweard Muybridge to Julia Margaret Cameron

9. `A peculiar brilliancy of black' (DeVinne): the colour of monochrome, and Thomas Dalziel's The May Queen

10. Speed, print, news

11. Conclusion: Greedy rats.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Description based on online resource; title from PDF title page (viewed on March 4, 2026).

ISBN:

9781526156655

1526156652

9781526156679

1526156679

OCLC:

1377819548