International studio (59.1916)

Line Drawings of Charles E. Brock, R.I.

of a century, for his first drawings were published
in 1890, when he was twenty years old, and not
a year has passed since without an abundant
output from his facile pen. One says pen ad-
visedly, for though Mr. Brock became a member
of the Royal Institute in 1909, and many of his
book illustrations have been in colour, his repu-
tation rests principally and securely upon his
admirable work in line.

does not rise to satire, is equally incapable of
malice. There is also to be noted a serious respect
for the detail of his subject which is of a piece
with that thoroughness of method which his
mastery of the pen permits. It is natural that
with such qualities as these an illustrator should
find a congenial field in the great English novelists.
How truly Mr. Brock has found his metier in
the Victorian classics, and how completely he has

His first work of importance was a long series
of pen drawings for the humorous poems of
Thomas Hood. These were published in 1893

been absorbed by the latter, the long tale of books
which he has illustrated clearly shows. Jane
Austen was an author early entrusted to his care,

by Messrs. Macmillan, who also issued, in the

and at one time or another he has illustrated all

following year, over a hundred illustrations by
the artist to “ Gulliver’s Travels.” One of the

her novels. “Westward Ho !” was another early
commission, followed in succeeding years by

latter is reproduced here, and furnishes interesting

“ Ivanhoe,” “ The Lady of the Lake,” and

evidence not only of the high level of
plishment which Mr. Brock attained in
the earliest days of his career, but of the
even, steady keel upon which that career
has ever since been steered.
Few illustrators have experimented less
in public than Mr. Brock, and though
his technique has developed, naturally,
with the passage of time, and of late years
the ease and freedom of maturity have
become increasingly apparent, in 1916 it
remains, in essentials, what it was more
than twenty years ago. These essentials
are sound draughtsmanship and the
thoroughness which comes of knowledge
and capacity. Mr. Brock neither shirks
nor glosses : he has no need of the ex-
pedients to which men less able are some-
times tempted to resort. This accounts
largely for the consistency of his work.
As a rule the contrast between works of
the same hand which are separated by
only a ten years’ interval is startling
enough. But no shock awaits the reader
who compares the illustration to “ Gul-
liver’s Travels” just mentioned, or that
to “The Prairie” dated 1897, with so
recent an example of the artist’s work as
the sketch entitled “ Poetry and Prose.”
The process here is reversed, and surprise
is only created by the width of the
interval between dates.
There is something very English about
Mr. Brock’s illustrations—a fresh vigour
and robustness which is never strained,
a frankness and candour in characterisa-
tion too forceful and direct ever to be sly,

accom- “The Vicar of Wakefield.” Whyte Melville and

ILLUSTRATION TO FENIMORE COOPER’S “THE PRAIRIE,”
BY C. E. BROCK, R.I.


and a tolerant good humour which, if it

(By permission of Messrs. Macmillan &• Co. Ltd.)

94

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