http://forbiddenplanet.co.uk/blog/2007/micrographica/ The Best In Sci-Fi & Fantasy, News, Reviews, Graphic Novels, comics and more! Thu, 24 May 2012 20:32:51 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=1721 http://forbiddenplanet.co.uk/blog/2007/micrographica/comment-page-1/#comment-14561 The Forbidden Planet International Blog Log » Illustrated Blake Mon, 15 Jan 2007 10:10:54 +0000 http://forbiddenplanet.co.uk/blog/?p=2451#comment-14561 [...] The British Library in London is celebrating the 250th anniversary of the birth of one of my favourite poets and artists, William Blake with an exhibition which runs until March, which also includes more modern material inspired by Blake, including a portion of Philip Pullman’s manuscript for the Amber Spyglass. Blake, of course, wrote The Tyger among many other famous works and also illustrated editions of Milton’s Paradise Lost and Dante’s Divine Comedy, long, long before comics artists were drawn to tackling those huge works of world literature (for one small example, just look at Mike Carey drawing on Dante for Hellblazer: All His Engines recently. And does’t the main illustration below look like a sketch for a cover of Mike’s Lucifer series?). Central to the exhibition is Blake’s notebook, packed with observations, poetry and his highly imaginative illustrations. And in a piece of great news for those of us who can’t visit the exhibition in London, the British Library has digitised the notebook and added it to their Turning the Pages section of their site, where you use your mouse to actually ‘turn’ over the pages to leaf through the work, making the work accessible to anyone online – what a wonderful idea. Actually while you are on that page have a look at some of the other digitised works the British Library has made available, including The Original Alice by Lewis Carroll, which would be terrific to read ahead of Bryan Talbot’s Alice in Sunderland this spring. Hmm, coming on the back of mentioning Hooke’s illustrations in Micrographia we’re getting a bit literary this week; I may start spouting poetry if we’re not careful (I’m fighting the urge to put the the text of the Tyger on here right now in fact). [...] [...] The British Library in London is celebrating the 250th anniversary of the birth of one of my favourite poets and artists, William Blake with an exhibition which runs until March, which also includes more modern material inspired by Blake, including a portion of Philip Pullman’s manuscript for the Amber Spyglass. Blake, of course, wrote The Tyger among many other famous works and also illustrated editions of Milton’s Paradise Lost and Dante’s Divine Comedy, long, long before comics artists were drawn to tackling those huge works of world literature (for one small example, just look at Mike Carey drawing on Dante for Hellblazer: All His Engines recently. And does’t the main illustration below look like a sketch for a cover of Mike’s Lucifer series?). Central to the exhibition is Blake’s notebook, packed with observations, poetry and his highly imaginative illustrations. And in a piece of great news for those of us who can’t visit the exhibition in London, the British Library has digitised the notebook and added it to their Turning the Pages section of their site, where you use your mouse to actually ‘turn’ over the pages to leaf through the work, making the work accessible to anyone online – what a wonderful idea. Actually while you are on that page have a look at some of the other digitised works the British Library has made available, including The Original Alice by Lewis Carroll, which would be terrific to read ahead of Bryan Talbot’s Alice in Sunderland this spring. Hmm, coming on the back of mentioning Hooke’s illustrations in Micrographia we’re getting a bit literary this week; I may start spouting poetry if we’re not careful (I’m fighting the urge to put the the text of the Tyger on here right now in fact). [...]

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