Arthur Rackham: Alice in Wonderland

From "Alice in Wonderland," illustrated
by Arthur Rackham

"Arthur Rackham’s next undertaking after Peter Pan was the most controversial of his whole career. This was nothing less than a fresh illustration of 'Alice in Wonderland,' a work so completely identified with the drawings by John Tenniel that it seemed to many critics almost thought it blasphemous for anyone to attempt to prepare alternatives. As soon as it became clear, however, that a spate of new illustrated editions was being planned to follow the expiry of the original copyright (in fact, at least seven appeared in England in the first possible year, 1907), it was surely not to be regretted that an artist of Rackham’s quality had taken up the challenge. ​

Rackham’s model for Alice was Doris (Jane) Dommett, who told the story of her sittings to the Evening News (14th December 1939) after Rackham’s death.

‘He chose me from a number of little girls,’ ​said Miss Dommett, ‘and I was so pleased he copied my print frock exactly, because it was one my mother had allowed me to design myself. The woollen stockings I wore were knitted by my old French nannie Prudence. They were thick, to keep out the cold, and how they tickled!’ In the mad tea-party picture she sat in Rackham’s big wing-back chair, and the table was laid with Mrs. Rackham’s best china. The Rackhams’ kitchen, and their cook, contributed to the kitchen scene. Miss Dommett remembered asking doubtfully: ‘Will she throw plates?’ ‘Oh, no,’ said Rackham, ‘they’ve been broken already.’ He had actually thrown a few to get the detail right.'

Rackham certainly made the greatest impression of all Tenniel’s multitude of successors. The Rackham volume is still in print with Heinemann (1960) and the illustrations have appeared in American, French and German editions. The drawings were successfully shown at the Leicester Galleries. Nevertheless, Rackham was somewhat shaken and disappointed by the amount of adverse criticism he received, and he did not proceed to illustrate 'Through the Looking-Glass,' although Macmillan (Lewis Carroll’s original publishers) offered in 1907 to produce his illustrations of the Looking-Glass before the copyright had expired, in a uniform edition with Heinemann’s Alice – a remarkable gesture of confidence."

To be continued

(Excerpts from "Arthur Rackham: His Life and Work" by Derek Hudson.)