“I have made a very great mistake”

“I have just received the complimentary copies of my last book, ‘Sir Launcelot and His Companions,’” wrote Howard Pyle to Charles Scribner’s Sons on October 26, 1907.

Like many authors and illustrators, Pyle may have leafed through the new volume with a mixture of pride and apprehension. And in this case an embarrassing discovery was in store: “I notice in looking it over that I have made a very great mistake, for the picture on page 200 entitled ‘Sir Gawaine of the Fountain’ should read ‘Sir Ewaine of the Fountain.’”

Ever careful Pyle had not been careful enough. As with most of his children’s books, he had delivered Sir Launcelot and His Companions in fits and starts while juggling other work. To safeguard against errors and inconsistencies, on mailing one batch he had asked the publisher “to send me proofs of these drawings as soon as they are reproduced, for I shall maybe use the same characters in later decorations.”

And yet, although the picture served as a frontispiece to Part V of the book titled “The Story of Sir Ewaine and the Lady of the Fountain,” and three other illustrations of which featured Sir Ewaine, “Sir Gawaine” had slipped past Pyle - not to mention everyone else involved with the production of the book.

“Perhaps before any more copies are printed you will have this changed in New York (where almost anyone could do the lettering) or else send it to me to have the lettering changed,” Pyle continued in his letter of October 26. “It is very curious that this mistake should have happened but, as I say, it is altogether my fault.”

The expense of correcting the plate, however, must have been too much for Scribner’s to consider, and Pyle must have forgotten all about it, because the mis-titled illustration has lived on, reprint after reprint, and has never been called out or corrected.

But as I am “almost anyone [who] could do the lettering” (as well as being in New York), I’ve belatedly honored Pyle’s request, below.

The Queen of Ireland seeks to slay Sir Tristram

A semi-desperate attempt on my part to post something “Irish” on this St. Patrick’s Day: “The Queen of Ireland seeks to slay Sir Tristram” comes from Howard Pyle’s second volume of his Arthuriad, The Story of the Champions of the Round Table, published by Charles Scribner’s Sons in 1905.

As far as I know, the original pen-and-ink has yet to surface on the market or in a museum. It’s an interesting composition and it takes some staring at to make sense of what’s going on. Or one could simply read the passage it illustrates:

Now whilst Sir Tristram was in that bath, the Queen [of Ireland] and Belle Isoult looked all about his chamber. And they beheld the sword of Sir Tristram where it lay, for he had laid it upon the bed when he had unlatched the belt to make himself ready for that bath. Then the Queen said to the Lady Belle Isoult, “See what a great huge sword this is,” and thereupon she lifted it and drew the blade out of its sheath, and she beheld what a fair, bright, glistering sword it was. Then in a little she saw where, within about a foot and a half from the point, there was a great piece in the shape of a half-moon broken out of the edge of the sword; and she looked at that place for a long while. Then of a sudden she felt a great terror, for she remembered how even such a piece of sword as that which had been broken off from that blade, she had found in the wound of Sir Marhaus of which he had died. So she stood for a while holding that sword of Sir Tristram in her hand and looking as she had been turned into stone. At this the Lady Belle Isoult was filled with a sort of fear, wherefore she said, “Lady, what ails you?” The Queen said, “Nothing that matters,” and therewith she laid aside the sword of Sir Tristram and went very quickly to her own chamber. There she opened her cabinet and took thence the piece of sword-blade which she had drawn from the wound of Sir Marhaus, and which she had kept ever since. With this she hurried back to the chamber of Sir Tristram, and fitted that piece of the blade to the blade; and lo! it fitted exactly, and without flaw.

Upon that the Queen was seized as with a sudden madness; for she shrieked out in a very loud voice, “Traitor! Traitor! Traitor!” saying that word three times. Therewith she snatched up the sword of Sir Tristram and she ran with great fury into the room where he lay in his bath. And she beheld him where he was there all naked in his bath, and therewith she rushed at him and lashed at him with his sword. But Sir Tristram threw himself to one side and so that blow failed of its purpose. Then the Queen would have lashed at him again or have thrust him through with the weapon; but at that Gouvernail and Sir Helles ran to her and catched her and held her back, struggling and screaming very violently. So they took the sword away from her out of her hands, and all the while she shrieked like one gone entirely distracted.

Happy St. Patrick’s Day!

Still in Howard Pyle’s Studio

Olive Rush and Ethel Pennewill Brown in Howard Pyle’s Studio in 1911 or 1912 (Blanche C. Grant, photographer)

I was looking for this picture in connection with my last post, but couldn’t find it at first since it’s not in the Olive Rush Papers, but in the Miscellaneous Photograph Collection at the Archives of American Art. It’s described there as “Olive Rush (at left) c. 1908” by an unidentified photographer. But the woman on the right is definitely Ethel Pennewill Brown and the photographer is Blanche C. Grant - her head and shoulder are reflected in the mirror as she stoops over the unseen camera. Grant took the picture when she was sharing Howard Pyle’s Wilmington studio with Brown and Rush in 1911 and possibly part of 1912.

The setting is the small anteroom through which one would pass after coming in the front door and before entering the studio proper. On the right is a “Rare Old Tyrolean Cabinet, carved Italian walnut, fitted with pewter basin and fount” that was Lot 161 in the auction of Pyle’s estate in June 1912. (It went for for $185.) And in the mirror is Pyle’s original pen and ink drawing, “Sir Kay showeth the mystic Sword unto Sir Ector,” from The Story of King Arthur.

“Sir Kay showeth the mystic Sword unto Sir Ector” by Howard Pyle (1902)

Mark Twain on Howard Pyle

Today is Mark Twain's 174th birthday - enough of a reason to talk briefly about his (or Samuel L. Clemens's) connection to Howard Pyle.

Of course, the obvious link is that Pyle illustrated Mark Twain's "Saint Joan of Arc" for Harper's Monthly (December 1904). When the magazine initially approached Pyle about the project, they wrote: "It may interest you to know that in [Clemens's] letter accompanying the manuscript he speaks of you as the one man in this or any other country who can make pictures for it." And when Harper's informed Clemens that Pyle had agreed to illustrate the piece, he replied, "I am glad that an artist rich in feeling & imagination is to make the pictures."

But Clemens was already a longtime admirer of Howard Pyle, the artist and the author. Back in early 1884, while staying with the Clemens family, George Washington Cable had noted, "Mrs. Clemens is reading aloud to Mark & the children Howard Pyle's beautiful new version of Robin Hood. Mark enjoys it hugely...." And on New Year's Day in 1903 (shortly after Pyle attended Mark Twain’s 67th birthday party in New York), Clemens reiterated his opinion: "Long ago you made the best Robin Hood that was ever written," and in the same letter he praised Pyle's new version of the King Arthur legends: "They were never so finely told in prose before. And then the pictures - one can never tire of examining them & studying them."

So, by way of a birthday present, here is Pyle's "She believed that she had daily speech with angels" from "Saint Joan of Arc" by Mark Twain. A beautiful thing.