The beauty of book illustration

The Falls of Rauros, from J.R.R. Tolkien's 'The Lord of the Rings', painted by myself around 1997 (I think)



My love for art is intertwined with my love for books. My passion for drawing and painting matches my passion for writing. I see the beauty of art and the beauty of language as two sides of the same coin, which is why I love book illustration so much.

One of my most treasured childhood books is Once Long Ago, a magnificent collection of fairytales from around the world, retold by Roger Lancelyn Green (who’d been a student of CS Lewis) and illustrated by Czech artist Vojtěch Kubašta, who was also an architect and a world pioneer in pop-up books. This treasure trove was published in 1962, I reckon my dear dad must have given it to me around 1968. It disappeared at some point, perhaps my dear mum donated it to charity while I was at university! In 2002 I determined to track down whatever copies still existed and was over the moon to discover an edition through Abe Books.

I adore Kubašta’s rich, beautiful, colour illustrations to this day. They’re utterly enchanting. I also love the great Danish artist Kay Nielsen, a theatre costume and set designer who also illustrated Grimm's fairytales and Scandinavian sagas and legends. Google him, he’s fantastic.

Another beloved childhood classic of mine is The Golden Treasury of Poetry, fabulously selected by Louis Untermeyer and fabulously illustrated by Joan Walsh Anglund – her cutesy illustrations of children were a very popular gift brand in the 1970s, but this book truly showcases the gorgeousness of her work.

Then there’s the exquisite art of two other famous fairytale illustrators, Arthur Rackham and Edmund Dulac. One of my favourite Tolkien artists is Alan Lee, who worked on Peter Jackson’s film sets alongside John Howe, another renowned Tolkien artist (I think they both had cameo parts as Ringwraiths!) And I will forever love the work of Pauline Baynes, whose iconic illustrations for the Narnia books are inseparable from the text.

Perhaps ACW members of a certain generation remember Shirley Hughes, who illustrated 200 children's books throughout her career, thus selling more than 10 million copies. I loved her pen and ink illustrations for children’s classics like Little Women. Who remembers her Alfie books, and My Naughty Little Sister?

(And who among you remembers the Puffin Club? Oh, the rapture that would fill me at the age of ten when I would spot a new Puffin paperback in a delightful little card shop called, appropriately, Cardy’s, in my local high street!)

Then there are all the gifted fan artists whose work can be found in fandom spaces like DeviantArt, many of them as talented as professional artists. This is perhaps more common to fantasy and sci-fi, but fanart is not confined to those genres. I’ve done my own fanart on occasion, for example creating my own artistic interpretation of Tolkien’s Middle-earth, and I share one of these paintings above.

Who are your favourite book illustrators? Perhaps name them below.

For those of you who have specifically written books for illustration, what is it you look for in the artist who is commissioned to illustrate your story?

And … do you ever draw your own characters and landscapes? Just for fun, if nothing else?

I’m a Licensed Lay Minister in the Diocese of Rochester. I also work full-time for the United Reformed Church at URC Church House. I wrote a devotional for the anthology Light for the Writer’s Soul, published by Media Associates International, and my short story ‘Magnificat’ appears in the ACW anthology Merry Christmas Everyone.