HB#00944
Almond, D. Skellig.
Hodder Children's Books. London. (1999). ISBN 034076483X. First Hardback Edition.Near Fine/Near Fine. Blue Boards. Octavo. Hard Cover. 170 pp. Small stains on the front board. Lamination of the dust-jacket slightly rubbed. David Almond (born 15 May 1951) is a British children's writer who has penned several novels, each one to critical acclaim. He was born and raised in Felling and Newcastle in post-industrial North East England and educated at the University of East Anglia. His first children's novel, Skellig (1998), set in Newcastle, won the Whitbread Children's Novel of the Year Award and also the Carnegie Medal. It has been adapted into a stage play, film and opera. His works are highly philosophical and thus appeal to children and adults alike. Recurring themes throughout include the complex relationships between apparent opposites (such as life and death, reality and fiction, past and future); forms of education; growing up and adapting to change; the nature of 'the self'. He has been greatly influenced by the works of the English Romantic poet William Blake. €50.00
Sourced from Wikipedia.
HB#00894
Robinson, C.
Black Bunnies. Blackie & Sons. London c1907
Pocket Book. Hard Cover. Fair. Pictorial Boards. No Jacket. Unpaginated, concertina-style. Variant copy. Silhouette Illustrations by Charles Robinson. Does not seem to be the first edition of 1907, but a later issue. The first issue of the book appears to call for a green cloth spine with bunnies and gilt on the spine, gilt title on the front board with two black bunnies. This copy has a red cloth spine and pictorial paper-covered boards, no gilt titles and single a bunny silhouette on the front board. Undated, however inked inscription on the front paste-down reading either '07 or '09. Black bunny silhouettes against monochrome backgrounds. Concertina block almost detached from the spine, some pencil marks in the hand of a child. Boards are slightly creased and grubby. Charles Robinson, an illustrator of children’s books in the “Golden Age” (1880’s -1920’s), was born 1870. The Golden Age is defined as a period of unprecedented excellence in book and magazine illustration. It developed from advances in technology which permitted accurate and inexpensive reproduction of art, combined with a voracious public demand for new graphic art. In Europe, Golden Age artists were influenced by the Pre-Raphaelites and by such design-oriented movements as the Arts and Crafts Movement and Art Nouveau . Leading artists included Walter Crane, Edmund Dulac, Aubrey Beardsley, Arthur Rackham and Kay Nielsen. Robinson, along with his brothers, Thomas Heath Robinson and William Heath Robinson, were among the first generation of artists who could actually see their work reproduced in books by way of photo engraving. Previously, artists would have their work interpreted by specialty engravers, such as the Robinson brothers’ father, who would copy the illustrator’s work in preparing the actual engravings which could be used for printing. Interior colour reproduction was difficult and expensive as individual plates that were “tipped in”, or added to the book after it was printed.
Charles Robinson was the son of the wood engraver Thomas Robinson. In fact, many in his family were illustrators, including his father, uncle, elder (Thomas Heath Robinson) and younger brother, the younger being none other than W. Heath Robinson. Apparently, he was sometimes known to use the pseudonym Awfly Weirdly. He was apprenticed to a printer for seven years and took evening art classes which earned him a spot at the Royal Academy which he could not take up due to financial constraints. However, he persisted and at age 25 the first full title book illustrated by him appeared, Robert Louis Stevenson's A Child's Garden of Verses (1895). His illustrations are found in works by A.A. Milne, W. Copeland, W. Jerrold, P.B. Shelly and Oscar Wilde. He is especially well-known for his illustrations of fairy tales and children's books, many of which he penned himself, but he was also a gifted painter. He died in 1937.
€200.00 - SOLD
Sources :
1. Wikipedia
2. www.linesandcolors.com
3. http://www.artcyclopedia.com/history/golden-age.html
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