William Morris and Kids’s Classics

Yesterday I completed listening to an audiobook of The  Secret Backyard by Frances Hodgson Burnett. I’ve beloved that story since I used to be a woman and it was enjoyable for me to revisit the guide. Whereas I used to be trying up some favourite quotes from the textual content, I got here throughout a Puffin classic collector’s series which contains William Morris designs into the covers of the books. The entire covers are designed by Liz Catchpole, who collaborated with the V&A Museum so as to select Morris designs from the museum’s assortment. That is the quilt for  The Secret Backyard within the sequence:

Cowl of “The Secret Backyard,” by Frances Hodgson Burnett, illustrated by Liz Catchpole

The William Morris design chosen for this cowl is “Flower Backyard” from 1879, which is a really acceptable title for a guide a couple of backyard! Nonetheless, it ought to be famous the flowers within the Morris design differ from those talked about within the guide. The Secret Backyard guide mentions numerous flowers, together with snowdrops, roses, daffydowndillys (daffodills), crocuses, irises, delphiniums, primroses, poppies, and cherry blossoms. In contrast, the “Flower Backyard” design contains stylized flowers that appear to be snakeshead (fritillary) and borage. There doesn’t look like any ivy, so the quote on the back of the book cover concerning the “swinging curtain of ivy” is much less related to the Morrisian design.

William Morris, “Flower Backyard,” 1879. Furnishing material of Jacquard-woven silk and wool, made at Queen Sq. Workshop and at Merton Abbey Workshop, England. © Victoria and Albert Museum, London. Used with permission.

All this being mentioned, although, I nonetheless love the usage of the Morris design for this guide cowl. I believe that having the “Flower Garden” sample used as a part of Mary’s costume is intelligent in two methods: 1) it enhances how this design by Morris was used to make Nineteenth-century textiles at Merton Abbey and a pair of) the thriving foliage foreshadows the constructive progress and inside change that Mary Lennox experiences as she lives as Misselthwaite and cares for the Secret Backyard.

The V&A Retailer explains on their website how every of the books within the collector sequence are held inside the Nationwide Library. These are the opposite books within the sequence, together with the Morris designs chosen:

• The Wind in the Willows  cover is Morris’s “Willow Bough” design (1887). I believe this selection is so acceptable, particularly as a result of the leaves overlap and curl as if they’re being moved by the wind.
• The Anne of Green Gables cover is Morris’s “Bird” design (1878). This design jogs my memory just a little of a quote that Anne says whereas she travels with Matthew to Inexperienced Gables from the practice station: “For those who have been out in an incredible huge woods with different timber throughout you and little mosses and June bells rising over your roots and a brook not far-off and birds singing in you branches, you possibly can develop, couldn’t you?”¹
• The Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland  cover is appropriately adorned with Morris’s “Brother Rabbit” design (1880-1881) to reference the White Rabbit.
• The Little Women cover is Morris’s “Larkspur” design (1875). I don’t see a transparent connection between the design and Jo on the quilt. However larkspur is talked about within the guide at the beginning of Chapter 10, in an outline of the completely different flowers that the 4 sisters develop of their respective quarters of the backyard plot.
• The Peter Pan cover is Morris’s “Marigold” design (1875). I don’t see a direct connection to the guide, though the dense foliage may maybe evoke the forest of Neverland.
• The Jungle Book cover is the “Indian” design (produced 1868-70) utilized by Morris & Co. The V&A web site explains that this design was not made by Morris, however was copied from an 18th-century wallpaper or could have been designed by architect George Gilbert Scott, whose firm Watts & Co. produced some wallpapers. I can see why this cowl was chosen, because the dense and spiky vegetation evoke a way of a heat local weather and jungle.
• The Treasure Island cowl design is “Strawberry Thief” (1883). Whereas the birds within the design solely loosely relate to the parrot on Lengthy John’s Silver’s shoulder, I believe that the theme of thievery can function a loosely acceptable parallel between the design and the pirate rogues within the guide.

And in case you’re curious, the William Morris designs are solely on the covers of the books, and never a part of any illustration inside the texts themselves. (One reviewer has wondered if it could be attainable for Liz Catchpole may illustrate the photographs inside the textual content too.) I do know Liz Catchpole has performed just a few different designs for books that embody William Morris patterns, together with The Twelve Days of Christmas, William Morris ABC and William Morris 123. If of different kids’s books which incorporate William Morris designs, please share!