Handsomely Illustrated

THE CONTRIBUTORS’ CLUB

SINCE the Atlantic is not illustrated (save in its advertisements) I may hope to find place in its uniform pages for my quarrel with the “ handsomely illustrated.” Being in precarious relations with the editors of illustrated magazines, I prefer to exhibit my views anonymously in the department of Clever-Things-Guess-Who -Wrote - ’Em. It is safer sometimes to fight with a mask.

Illustrations include two sorts of pictures, — those which decorate, and those which elucidate. To pure ornaments no one need object; it is proper for any book or magazine to bear designs on the cover, and to contain illuminated initials, tail-pieces, scrolls, swirls, and other fanciful embellishments. My objection is to most pictures the function of which is indicated by the intellectual sense of the word illustration.

In a novel of American society I find both in the book and in the numbers of the magazine which offered the story in serial parts a dozen pictures “ handsomely illustrating ” the text. “ She smiled and looked up at him expressively.” Half-tone picture of her smiling expressively. The picture does not give a better idea of her smile or of his manner of receiving it than the reader could get from the printed words. Unless the illustrator has had personal conference with the author he derives his idea from the text just as the reader derives his. “ ’Good - evening,’ he remarked, removing his hat politely.” Half-tone drawing of a brick pavement on which stands a young man with his hat held in his right hand four inches from his hair. In the story this polite incident is recounted by a few words tucked into the narrative. It is a passing detail which the illustrator has raised to the importance of a full page. The young man may be worth looking at, but so he is in that mental picture which the skill of the writer has conjured forth in the mind of the excited reader. Here, again, the illustrator proceeds with no more certain or ample knowledge than the author affords to any human being who reads his words. Indeed, the picture may hinder perfect understanding, for the modern illustrator frequently leaves his author behind, and tracks off into the human wilderness in independent quest of the model young man. The gesture as represented in the picture has no significance ; neither has the hat. We all know how hats are removed. If the picture appeared in a book of fashions, published by a merchant tailor, the shape of the hat might increase our grasp of the prevailing styles. Possibly, too, the kind of hat depicted may tell us something of importance by indirect exposition. A silk hat would indicate that the courteous episode took place in the afternoon. An opera hat would fix the time after six o’clock. A derby hat might establish the hour broadly between seven in the morning and five in the afternoon. The significance might be still deeper. A slouch hat would indicate that the story is laid in the South, or that the young man is a college student. But here, again, we should learn only facts which we could descry by such scrupulous study of the text as most of us devote to current fiction.

Illustrations have thorough value in exemplifying printed information about unknown things and unusual people. An article on the compass should contain both a diagram of the compass and a good picture of the arrangement of a compass on a real ship. A photograph would be best because it would be accurate, and with modern photographic improvements it might be beautiful and interesting in itself. Similarly an essay on Thibet should be illustrated with views of the people, the houses, and the landscape. Likewise some Personal Reminiscences of George Washington and Abraham Lincoln might be accompanied by good portraits of those great men.

In addition, there is value in illustrations of strange and difficult fiction. Suppose an American magazine publishes an expurgated story of modern French life, in which occurs a fight between two of the villains. “ ‘ La-la-la ! ’ cried Aston, kicking Galphonse deftly behind the ear.” This needs an illustration. We do not understand that kind of fighting. The magazine should send to Paris a staff of artists to get valid pictures of typical footfights, and should publish a good picture, carefully studied, whereby we should see with full knowledge and an understanding heart this thrilling encounter and know the technicalities of the contest. The corresponding episode in an American novel of Indiana life would need no picture. “ The big fellow was almost laid away by the left hook jab, but negotiated heavily with his right, and landed on the point of Percy Frederick Billington’s jaw.” No picture is necessary. Every true American, every honest Englishman, would understand that incident at the first flash of the words.

In some other modern stories illustrations are legitimate, especially in realistic fiction, which is so perplexingly unreal. I should like to own an illustrated edition of Henry James for my wife and children. The vague, interthreaded abstractions would, under the touch of a really great illustrator, solidify into visual actualities which any child could apperceive — were he not enfolded by the veil of a temperamental density, were he not of a weakness relating to certain ocular defects of heredity, which, had he known it, would have deterred him, no doubt, for a time, at least, from essaying with show of hope of success any visual activity whatsoever. The style is easy to write, but difficult to read (propter hoc). The illustrator who could depict James’s women probably does not exist. If he could be found, what a benefactor would he be of his race and generation.

The whole matter is clear. Decorations should decorate ; illustrations should illustrate. Other sorts of pictures reduce a book or a magazine to a mere picture album.