print;
satirical print
- Museum number
- 1868,0822.7112
- Title
- Object: Bookseller & author
- Description
-
Interior of a book-lined room, probably the back-shop of the bookseller who is also a publisher. The bookseller, a stout man, with a pen behind his ear, his spectacles on his forehead, stands with his hands behind his coat-tails, looking down superciliously at an open book or manuscript which the author holds out. The author, lean, deprecating, and nervous, wears a bag-wig and ruffled shirt and stands in a half-crouching attitude with his hat under his arm. Another manuscript protrudes from his coat-pocket. A clergyman in hat and riding-boots stands with his back to the other two, reading near-sightedly a book which he has taken down from a shelf. On the extreme right is a door with glass panels partly concealed by a curtain; this probably leads to the front shop. Next the door, left, is a sloping desk with writing-materials. Piles of heavy volumes lie on the floor, right and left. A set of library steps stands against the wall (left). 25 September 1784
Hand-coloured aquatint and etching
- Production date
- 1784
- Dimensions
-
Height: 342 millimetres
-
Width: 402 millimetres
- $Inscriptions
-
- Curator's comments
- (Description and comment from M.Dorothy George, 'Catalogue of Political and Personal Satires in the British Museum', VI, 1938)
Sketch in Royal Library, Windsor, reproduced, Oppé, 'Rowlandson', 1923, pl. 8. (A rat-trap takes the place of the pile of books on the right) Wigstead exhibited a drawing, 'Poet and Bookseller', at the R.A. 1784. Oppé, op. cit., p. 10.
Grego, 'Rowlandson', i. 148-9.
(Supplementary information)
Some lines blurred from a misadventure while printing.
- Location
- Not on display
- Acquisition date
- 1868
- Department
- Prints and Drawings
- Registration number
- 1868,0822.7112