DOI issue:
No. 248 (November 1913)
DOI article:Newbolt, Frank: The etchings of E. M. Synge, A. R. E.
DOI Page / Citation link:https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.21208#0123
E. M. Synges Etchings
at twenty-four years of age, he went to Shropshire
to try an open-air life and learn the duties of a
land-agent on Lord Boyne’s estates, and a year
later he was appointed agent to Mr. Locke-King
at Weybridge, where he remained, immersed in
the duties of a laborious profession, until, in 1901,
a change in his circumstances enabled him to take
the great plunge and abandon what had appeared
to be his life’s business for his one real ambition.
Being entirely free from the common desire for
luxury and display, he never for a moment regretted
his choice, and in 1908 he was fortunate enough to
meet and marry a kindred spirit in Miss F. Maloney,
herself an artist, etcher, and printer, and they lived
in entire happiness, marred only by ill-health, until
his death at Byfleet a few months ago. As an
amateur, Synge was, of course, an enthusiast, but his
was not the perfervid, headlong, youthful enthusiasm
which tore Strang from the office stool and whirled
him up to London with his copy of a drawing by
Ernest George, or that which drove Hollar from
the dusty purlieus of the law and brought him at
the risk of his life to England, but the restrained
and cultivated enthusiasm with which the captive
at the oar looks through the porthole at glimmering
landfalls, where men are free. He was, in fact, for
years a captive with the secret happiness of a
dream, and it is a curious thing and a tribute to his
individuality that little or no trace is to be found in
his work of the influence of the masters whom in
early days he so greatly admired.
Always busy with his pencil, his first step in
learning was taken in Claud Hayes’ studio at
Addlestone, where a few of us gathered for a time
to draw a village model in charcoal, and I well
remember the fatigue of those nocturnal visits on
bicycle or on foot after a heavy day’s work.
When the course was finished and others fell away
Synge snatched from his scanty leisure the time to
join an evening class at the Westminster School of
Art, encouraged by Seymour Haden, whom he
highly appreciated, and later by Frank Short, whose
“in the cotswold country” (By permission of Messrs. James Connell Cf Sons) by e. m. synge
ioi
at twenty-four years of age, he went to Shropshire
to try an open-air life and learn the duties of a
land-agent on Lord Boyne’s estates, and a year
later he was appointed agent to Mr. Locke-King
at Weybridge, where he remained, immersed in
the duties of a laborious profession, until, in 1901,
a change in his circumstances enabled him to take
the great plunge and abandon what had appeared
to be his life’s business for his one real ambition.
Being entirely free from the common desire for
luxury and display, he never for a moment regretted
his choice, and in 1908 he was fortunate enough to
meet and marry a kindred spirit in Miss F. Maloney,
herself an artist, etcher, and printer, and they lived
in entire happiness, marred only by ill-health, until
his death at Byfleet a few months ago. As an
amateur, Synge was, of course, an enthusiast, but his
was not the perfervid, headlong, youthful enthusiasm
which tore Strang from the office stool and whirled
him up to London with his copy of a drawing by
Ernest George, or that which drove Hollar from
the dusty purlieus of the law and brought him at
the risk of his life to England, but the restrained
and cultivated enthusiasm with which the captive
at the oar looks through the porthole at glimmering
landfalls, where men are free. He was, in fact, for
years a captive with the secret happiness of a
dream, and it is a curious thing and a tribute to his
individuality that little or no trace is to be found in
his work of the influence of the masters whom in
early days he so greatly admired.
Always busy with his pencil, his first step in
learning was taken in Claud Hayes’ studio at
Addlestone, where a few of us gathered for a time
to draw a village model in charcoal, and I well
remember the fatigue of those nocturnal visits on
bicycle or on foot after a heavy day’s work.
When the course was finished and others fell away
Synge snatched from his scanty leisure the time to
join an evening class at the Westminster School of
Art, encouraged by Seymour Haden, whom he
highly appreciated, and later by Frank Short, whose
“in the cotswold country” (By permission of Messrs. James Connell Cf Sons) by e. m. synge
ioi