The Old Engravers Of England In Their Relation To Contemporary Life And Art 1540 1800

Author : Malcolm C. Salaman
Publisher : Forgotten Books
ISBN 13 : 9781330398852
Total Pages : 345 pages
Book Rating : 4.3/5 (988 download)

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Download or read book The Old Engravers of England written by Malcolm C. Salaman and published by Forgotten Books. This book was released on 2015-06-26 with total page 345 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Excerpt from The Old Engravers of England: In Their Relation to Contemporary Life and Art, (1540-1800) While attempting, in the following pages, to trace the art of copper-plate engraving in England through, as it seems to me, the most interesting period of its history, namely, from its introduction in the middle of the sixteenth century to its climax at the end of the eighteenth, I have had no thought for that print-collector with whom considerations of "state" and margin are more urgent than the appeal of pictorial beauty or human interest. To him the price at Christie's will count, perhaps, for more than the intrinsic interest of the print, or the life-story of the engraver. And to him these pages would probably say nothing. But to lovers of old times, who would eagerly turn from their intimate delights among the pages of Pepys and Evelyn, Lord Hervey and Horace Walpole, Mrs. Delany, Fanny Burney, Mrs. Montagu, or any of the old chroniclers, diarists or letter-writers, to visualise their impressions with the contemporary prints, to them I venture to hope my pages may serve a little for guidance. There is a charm about old prints quite apart from their quality as engravings. They are links of intimacy with bygone times. The printed page may stir us with vivid passages of history, or quicken our imaginations with the social sidelight, or the contemporary gossip of personal or fashionable import, but the prints of the period bring us at once eye to eye with the people themselves. So we may see what they actually saw, the very faces and persons of their contemporaries, the costumes they wore, the attitudes they affected. So we may judge the taste of their day in the pictures that responded to it, and in the scenic aspect of their favourite plays. In a word, the old prints revive for us the human atmosphere of a past age. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.