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Sir John Tenniel (; 28 February 182025 February 1914)Johnson, Lewis (2003), "Tenniel, John", ''Grove Art Online, Oxford Art Online'', Oxford University Press. Web. Retrieved 12 December 2016. was an English
illustrator An illustrator is an artist who specializes in enhancing writing or elucidating concepts by providing a visual representation that corresponds to the content of the associated text or idea. The illustration may be intended to clarify complic ...
, graphic humorist and
political cartoon A political cartoon, a form of editorial cartoon, is a cartoon graphic with caricatures of public figures, expressing the artist's opinion. An artist who writes and draws such images is known as an editorial cartoonist. They typically combin ...
ist prominent in the second half of the 19th century. An alumnus of the
Royal Academy of Arts The Royal Academy of Arts (RA) is an art institution based in Burlington House on Piccadilly in London. Founded in 1768, it has a unique position as an independent, privately funded institution led by eminent artists and architects. Its pur ...
in London, he was
knighted A knight is a person granted an honorary title of knighthood by a head of state (including the Pope) or representative for service to the monarch, the church or the country, especially in a military capacity. Knighthood finds origins in the G ...
for artistic achievements in 1893, the first such honour ever bestowed on an illustrator or cartoonist. Tenniel is remembered mainly as the principal political cartoonist for ''
Punch Punch commonly refers to: * Punch (combat), a strike made using the hand closed into a fist * Punch (drink), a wide assortment of drinks, non-alcoholic or alcoholic, generally containing fruit or fruit juice Punch may also refer to: Places * Pu ...
'' magazine for over 50 years and for his illustrations to
Lewis Carroll Charles Lutwidge Dodgson (; 27 January 1832 – 14 January 1898), better known by his pen name Lewis Carroll, was an English author, poet and mathematician. His most notable works are '' Alice's Adventures in Wonderland'' (1865) and its sequ ...
's ''
Alice's Adventures in Wonderland ''Alice's Adventures in Wonderland'' (commonly ''Alice in Wonderland'') is an 1865 English novel by Lewis Carroll. It details the story of a young girl named Alice who falls through a rabbit hole into a fantasy world of anthropomorphic creature ...
'' (1865) and '' Through the Looking-Glass, and What Alice Found There'' (1871). Tenniel's detailed black-and-white drawings remain the definitive depiction of the ''Alice'' characters, with comic book illustrator and writer
Bryan Talbot Bryan Talbot (born 24 February 1952) is a British comics artist and writer, best known as the creator of ''The Adventures of Luther Arkwright'' and its sequel ''Heart of Empire'', as well as the ''Grandville'' series of books. He collaborated ...
stating, "Carroll never describes the Mad Hatter: our image of him is pure Tenniel."


Early life

Tenniel was born in
Bayswater Bayswater is an area within the City of Westminster in West London. It is a built-up district with a population density of 17,500 per square kilometre, and is located between Kensington Gardens to the south, Paddington to the north-east, an ...
, West London, to John Baptist Tenniel, a fencing and dancing master of
Huguenot The Huguenots ( , also , ) were a religious group of French Protestants who held to the Reformed, or Calvinist, tradition of Protestantism. The term, which may be derived from the name of a Swiss political leader, the Genevan burgomaster Be ...
descent, and Eliza Maria Tenniel. Tenniel had five siblings; two brothers and three sisters. One sister, Mary, was later to marry Thomas Goodwin Green, owner of the pottery that produced Cornishware. Tenniel was a quiet and introverted person, both as a boy and as an adult. He was content to remain firmly out of the limelight and seemed unaffected by competition or change. His biographer Rodney Engen wrote that Tenniel's "life and career was that of the supreme gentlemanly outside, living on the edge of respectability." In 1840, Tenniel, while practising fencing, received a serious eye wound from his father's foil, which had accidentally lost its protective tip. Over the years, Tenniel gradually lost sight in his right eye; he never told his father of the severity of the wound, as he did not wish to upset him further. In spite of a tendency towards high art, Tenniel was already known and appreciated as a humorist. His early companionship with Charles Keene fostered his talent for scholarly caricature.


Training

Tenniel became a student of the
Royal Academy of Arts The Royal Academy of Arts (RA) is an art institution based in Burlington House on Piccadilly in London. Founded in 1768, it has a unique position as an independent, privately funded institution led by eminent artists and architects. Its pur ...
in 1842 by probation; he was admitted because he had made enough copies of classical sculptures to fill the necessary admission portfolio. So it was here that Tenniel returned to his earlier independent education. While Tenniel's more formal training at the Royal Academy and other institutions was beneficial in nurturing his artistic ambitions, he disagreed with the school's teaching methods, and so he set about educating himself. He studied classical sculptures through painting. However, he was frustrated in this because he lacked instruction in drawing. Tenniel would draw the classical statues at London's Townley Gallery, copy illustrations from books of costumes and armour in the
British Museum The British Museum is a public museum dedicated to human history, art and culture located in the Bloomsbury area of London. Its permanent collection of eight million works is among the largest and most comprehensive in existence. It docum ...
, and draw animals from
the zoo ''The Zoo'' is a one-act comic opera, with music by Arthur Sullivan and a libretto by B. C. Stephenson, writing under the pen name of Bolton Rowe. It premiered on 5 June 1875 at the St. James's Theatre in London (as an afterpiece to W. S. Gi ...
in
Regent's Park Regent's Park (officially The Regent's Park) is one of the Royal Parks of London. It occupies of high ground in north-west Inner London, administratively split between the City of Westminster and the Borough of Camden (and historically betwee ...
, as well as actors from London theatres, which he drew from the pits. These studies taught Tenniel to love detail, yet he became impatient in his work and was happiest when he could draw from memory. Though he was blessed with a photographic memory, it undermined his early formal training and restricted his artistic ambitions. Another "formal" means of training was Tenniel's participation in an artists' group, free from the rules of the Academy that were stifling him. In the mid-1840s he joined the Artist's Society or Clipstone Street Life Academy, and it could be said that Tenniel first emerged there as a satirical draughtsman.


Early career

Tenniel's first book illustration was for
Samuel Carter Hall Samuel Carter Hall (9 May 1800 – 11 March 1889) was an Irish-born Victorian journalist who is best known for his editorship of ''The Art Journal'' and for his much-satirised personality. Early years Hall was born at the Geneva Barracks in Wat ...
's ''The Book of British Ballads'', in 1842. While engaged with his first book illustrations, various contests were taking place in London, as a way in which the government could combat the growing Germanic Nazarenes style and promote a truly national English school of art. Tenniel planned to enter the 1845 House of Lords competition amongst artists to win the opportunity to design the mural decoration of the new Palace of Westminster. Despite missing the deadline, he submitted a cartoon, ''An Allegory of Justice'', to a competition for designs for the mural decoration of the new
Palace of Westminster The Palace of Westminster serves as the meeting place for both the House of Commons and the House of Lords, the two houses of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. Informally known as the Houses of Parliament, the Palace lies on the north b ...
. For this he received a £200 premium and a commission to paint a fresco in the Upper Waiting Hall (or Hall of Poets) in the
House of Lords The House of Lords, also known as the House of Peers, is the upper house of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. Membership is by appointment, heredity or official function. Like the House of Commons, it meets in the Palace of Westminst ...
.


''Punch''

As the influential result of his position as the chief cartoon artist for ''
Punch Punch commonly refers to: * Punch (combat), a strike made using the hand closed into a fist * Punch (drink), a wide assortment of drinks, non-alcoholic or alcoholic, generally containing fruit or fruit juice Punch may also refer to: Places * Pu ...
'', Tenniel remained a witness to Britain's sweeping changes. He furthered political and social reform through satirical, often radical, and at times vitriolic images of the world. At Christmas 1850 he was invited by Mark Lemon to fill the position of joint cartoonist (with John Leech) on ''Punch'', having been selected on the strength of recent illustrations to
Aesop Aesop ( or ; , ; c. 620–564 BCE) was a Greek fabulist and storyteller credited with a number of fables now collectively known as ''Aesop's Fables''. Although his existence remains unclear and no writings by him survive, numerous tales c ...
's ''Fables''. He contributed his first drawing in the initial letter appearing on p. 224, vol. xix. This was entitled "Lord Jack the Giant Killer" and showed Lord John Russell assailing
Cardinal Wiseman Nicholas Patrick Stephen Wiseman (3 August 1802 – 15 February 1865) was a Cardinal of the Catholic Church who became the first Archbishop of Westminster upon the re-establishment of the Catholic hierarchy in England and Wales in 1850. Born ...
. Tenniel's first characteristic lion appeared in 1852, as did his first obituary cartoon. Gradually he took over altogether the weekly drawing of the political "big cut," which Leech was happy to cede to Tenniel in order to restrict himself to his pictures of life and character. In 1861, Tenniel was offered Leech's position at ''Punch'', as political cartoonist, but Tenniel still maintained a sense of decorum and restraint in the heated social and political issues of the day. When Leech died in 1864, Tenniel continued their work alone, rarely missing a single week. His task was to follow the wilful choices of his ''Punch'' editors, who probably took their cue from ''
The Times ''The Times'' is a British daily national newspaper based in London. It began in 1785 under the title ''The Daily Universal Register'', adopting its current name on 1 January 1788. ''The Times'' and its sister paper '' The Sunday Times'' ( ...
'' and would have felt the suggestions of political tensions from Parliament as well. Tenniel's work could be scathing in effect. The restlessness in the issues of working-class radicalism, labour, war, economy, and other national themes were the targets of ''Punch'', which in turn settled the nature of Tenniel's subjects. His cartoons of the 1860s popularised a portrait of the Irishman as a sub-human being, wanton in his appetites and resembling an orangutan in facial features and posture. Many of Tenniel's political cartoons expressed strong hostility to
Irish Nationalism Irish nationalism is a nationalist political movement which, in its broadest sense, asserts that the people of Ireland should govern Ireland as a sovereign state. Since the mid-19th century, Irish nationalism has largely taken the form of c ...
, with
Fenian The word ''Fenian'' () served as an umbrella term for the Irish Republican Brotherhood (IRB) and their affiliate in the United States, the Fenian Brotherhood, secret political organisations in the late 19th and early 20th centuries dedicate ...
s and
Land leagues The first Highland Land League ( gd, Dionnasg an Fhearainn) emerged as a distinct political force in Scotland during the 1880s, with its power base in the country's Highlands and Islands. It was known also as the Highland Land Law Reform Associat ...
depicted as monstrous, ape-like brutes, while " Hibernia" – the personification of Ireland – was depicted as a beautiful, helpless girl threatened by such "monsters" and turning for protection to an "elder sister" in the shape of a powerful, armoured
Britannia Britannia () is the national personification of Britain as a helmeted female warrior holding a trident and shield. An image first used in classical antiquity, the Latin ''Britannia'' was the name variously applied to the British Isles, Grea ...
. "An Unequal Match", his drawing published in ''Punch'' on 8 October 1881, depicted a police officer fighting a criminal with only a baton for protection, trying to put a point across to the public that policing methods needed to be changed. When examined separately from the book illustrations he did over time, Tenniel's work at ''Punch'' alone, expressing decades of editorial viewpoints, often controversial and socially sensitive, was created to echo the voices of the British public. Tenniel drew 2,165 cartoons for ''
Punch Punch commonly refers to: * Punch (combat), a strike made using the hand closed into a fist * Punch (drink), a wide assortment of drinks, non-alcoholic or alcoholic, generally containing fruit or fruit juice Punch may also refer to: Places * Pu ...
'', a liberal and politically active publication that mirrored the Victorian public's mood for liberal social changes; thus Tenniel, in his cartoons, represented for years the conscience of the British majority. Tenniel contributed around 2,300 cartoons, innumerable minor drawings, many double-page cartoons for ''Punch's Almanac'' and other specials, and 250 designs for ''Punch's Pocket-books''. By 1866 he could "command ten to fifteen guineas for the reworking of a single ''Punch'' cartoon as a pencil sketch," alongside his "comfortable" ''Punch'' salary "of about £800 a year".


Alice

Despite the thousands of political cartoons and hundreds of illustrative works attributed to him, much of Tenniel's fame stems from his illustrations for ''Alice''. Tenniel drew 92 drawings for Lewis Carroll's ''
Alice's Adventures in Wonderland ''Alice's Adventures in Wonderland'' (commonly ''Alice in Wonderland'') is an 1865 English novel by Lewis Carroll. It details the story of a young girl named Alice who falls through a rabbit hole into a fantasy world of anthropomorphic creature ...
'' (London: Macmillan, 1865) and ''
Through the Looking-Glass and What Alice Found There ''Through the Looking-Glass, and What Alice Found There'' (also known as ''Alice Through the Looking-Glass'' or simply ''Through the Looking-Glass'') is a novel published on 27 December 1871 (though indicated as 1872) by Lewis Carroll and the ...
'' (London: Macmillan, 1871). Lewis Carroll originally illustrated ''Wonderland'' himself, but his artistic abilities were limited. Engraver Orlando Jewitt, who had worked for Carroll in 1859 and reviewed Carroll's drawings for ''Wonderland'', suggested that he employ a professional. Carroll was a regular reader of ''Punch'' and therefore familiar with Tenniel, who in 1865 had long talks with Carroll before illustrating the first edition of ''Alice's Adventures in Wonderland''. The first print run of 2,000 was sold in the United States, rather than England, because Tenniel objected to the print quality. A new edition was released in December 1865, carrying an 1866 date, and became an instant best-seller, increasing Tenniel's fame. His drawings for both books have become some of the most famous literary illustrations. After 1872, when the Carroll projects were finished, Tenniel largely abandoned literary illustration. Carroll did later approach Tenniel to undertake another project for him. To this Tenniel replied: Tenniel's ''Alice'' illustrations were
engraved Engraving is the practice of incising a design onto a hard, usually flat surface by cutting grooves into it with a burin. The result may be a decorated object in itself, as when silver, gold, steel, or glass are engraved, or may provide an i ...
onto blocks of deal wood by the
Brothers Dalziel The Brothers Dalziel (pronounced ) was a prolific wood-engraving business in Victorian London, founded in 1839 by George Dalziel. The Dalziel family In 1840, George (1 December 1815 – 4 August 1902) was joined in the business by his brother E ...
. These then served as masters for the
electrotype Electrotyping (also galvanoplasty) is a chemical method for forming metal parts that exactly reproduce a model. The method was invented by Moritz von Jacobi in Russia in 1838, and was immediately adopted for applications in printing and several o ...
copies for the actual printing of the books. The original wood blocks are held by the
Bodleian Library The Bodleian Library () is the main research library of the University of Oxford, and is one of the oldest libraries in Europe. It derives its name from its founder, Sir Thomas Bodley. With over 13 million printed items, it is the sec ...
in Oxford. They are not usually on public display, but were exhibited in 2003. The bronze Alice in Wonderland sculpture (1959) in
Central Park Central Park is an urban park in New York City located between the Upper West and Upper East Sides of Manhattan. It is the fifth-largest park in the city, covering . It is the most visited urban park in the United States, with an estimated ...
in
Manhattan Manhattan (), known regionally as the City, is the most densely populated and geographically smallest of the five boroughs of New York City. The borough is also coextensive with New York County, one of the original counties of the U.S. state ...
, New York City, is patterned on his illustrations.


Style


Influence of German Nazarenes

The style associated with the Nazarene movement of the 19th century influenced many later artists, including Tenniel. It can be characterised as "shaded outlines", where the lines on the side of figures or objects are given extra thickness or drawn double to suggest shading or volume. Furthermore, this style is extremely precise, with the artist making a hard clear outline for its figures, dignifying them and the compositions, while giving restraint in expression and paleness of tone. Though Tenniel's early illustrations in the Nazarene style were not well received, his encounter with the style pointed him in a good direction.


Eye for detail

After the 1850s, Tenniel's style was modernised to incorporate more detail in backgrounds and in figures. The inclusion of background details corrected the previously weak Germanic staging of his illustrations. Tenniel's more precisely-designed illustrations depicted specific moments of time, locale and individual character instead of just generalised scenes. In addition to a change in specificity of background, Tenniel developed a new interest in human types, expressions, and individualised representation, something that would carry over into his illustrations of Wonderland. Referred to by many as theatricality, this hallmark of Tenniel's style probably stemmed from his earlier interest in caricature. In Tenniel's first years on ''Punch'' he developed this caricaturist's interest in the uniqueness of persons and things, almost giving a human like personality to the objects in the environment. For example, a comparison of one of
John Everett Millais Sir John Everett Millais, 1st Baronet, ( , ; 8 June 1829 – 13 August 1896) was an English painter and illustrator who was one of the founders of the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood. He was a child prodigy who, aged eleven, became the youngest ...
's illustrations of a girl in a chair with Tenniel's illustration of Alice in a chair shows clearly that Millais's chair is just a prop, whereas Tenniel's chair possesses a menacing and towering presence. Another change in style was his shaded lines. These transformed from mechanical horizontal lines to vigorously hand-drawn hatching that greatly intensified darker areas.


Grotesque

Tenniel's "grotesque" was one reason why Lewis Carroll wanted Tenniel as his illustrator for the ''Alice'' books, in the sense of imparting a disturbing sense that the real world may have ceased to be reliable. Tenniel's style was characteristically grotesque through his dark, atmospheric compositions of exaggerated fantasy creatures carefully drawn in outline. Often the mechanism was to use animal heads on recognisable human bodies or vice versa, as Grandville had done in the Parisian satirical journal ''Charivari''. In Tenniel's illustrations, the grotesque is found also in mergers of beings and things, deformities in and violence to the human body (e. g. when Alice drinks the potion and grows huge), and a proclivity to deal with ordinary things of this world while presenting such phenomena. The most noticeably grotesque is Tenniel's famous Jabberwock drawing in ''Alice''. The ''Alice'' illustrations combine fantasy and reality. Scholars such as Morris trace Tenniel's stylistic change to the late 1850s trend towards realism. For the grotesque to operate, "it is our world which has to be transformed and not some fantasy realm." The illustrations constantly but subtly remind us of the real world, as do some of Tenniel's scenes derived from a medieval town, the portico of a Georgian town, or the checked jacket on the White Rabbit. Additionally, Tenniel closely follows Carroll's text, so that the reader sees the similitude between the written text and the illustrations. These touches of realism help to convince readers that all these seemingly grotesque inhabitants of Wonderland are simply themselves, simply real, not just performing.


Image and text in ''Alice''

One unusual aspect of the ''Alice'' books is the placing of Tenniel's illustrations on the pages. This physical relation of illustrations to text meshes them together. Carroll and Tenniel expressed this in various ways. One was bracketing: two relevant sentences would bracket an image as a way of imparting the moment that Tenniel was trying to illustrate. This bracketing of Tenniel's pictures with text adds to their "dramatic immediacy." However, other, less frequent illustrations work with the texts as captions. Another link between illustration and text is the use of broader and narrower illustrations. Broader ones are meant to be centred on the page, narrower to be "let in" or run flush to the margin, alongside a narrow column of continuing text. Still, words run in parallel with the depiction of those things. For example, when Alice says, "Oh, my poor little feet!", it not only occurs at the foot of the page but is right next to her feet in the illustration. Some of these narrower illustrations are "L"-shaped, and of great importance as some of his most memorable work. The top or base of these illustrations runs the full width of the page, but the other end leaves room on one side for text.


Book illustrations

A selected list: Entirely by Tenniel *''Juvenile Verse and Picture Book'' (1846)British Library catalogue search results
Retrieved 15 August 2017.
*'' Undine'' (1846) *'' Aesop's Fables'' (1848) *
Blair Blair is an English-language name of Scottish Gaelic origin. The surname is derived from any of the numerous places in Scotland called ''Blair'', derived from the Scottish Gaelic ''blàr'', meaning "plain", "meadow" or "field", frequently a “ba ...
's ''Grave'' (1858) *
Shirley Brooks Charles William Shirley Brooks (29 April 1816 – 23 February 1874) was an English journalist and novelist. Born in London, he began his career in a solicitor's office. Shortly afterwards he took to writing, and contributed to various per ...
' ''The Gordian Knot'' (1860) *
Shirley Brooks Charles William Shirley Brooks (29 April 1816 – 23 February 1874) was an English journalist and novelist. Born in London, he began his career in a solicitor's office. Shortly afterwards he took to writing, and contributed to various per ...
' ''The Silver Cord'' (1861) *
Moore Moore may refer to: People * Moore (surname) ** List of people with surname Moore * Moore Crosthwaite (1907–1989), a British diplomat and ambassador * Moore Disney (1765–1846), a senior officer in the British Army * Moore Powell (died c. 1 ...
's ''Lalla Rookh'' (1861), 69 drawings *Lewis Carroll's ''
Alice's Adventures in Wonderland ''Alice's Adventures in Wonderland'' (commonly ''Alice in Wonderland'') is an 1865 English novel by Lewis Carroll. It details the story of a young girl named Alice who falls through a rabbit hole into a fantasy world of anthropomorphic creature ...
'' (1866) *''The Mirage of Life'' (1867) *Lewis Carroll's ''
Through the Looking-Glass ''Through the Looking-Glass, and What Alice Found There'' (also known as ''Alice Through the Looking-Glass'' or simply ''Through the Looking-Glass'') is a novel published on 27 December 1871 (though indicated as 1872) by Lewis Carroll and the ...
'' (1870) *Lewis Carroll's '' The Nursery "Alice"'' (1890) Tenniel's different collaborations: * Thomas Ingoldsby's ''
The Ingoldsby Legends ''The Ingoldsby Legends'' (full title: ''The Ingoldsby Legends, or Mirth and Marvels'') is a collection of myths, legends, ghost stories and poetry written supposedly by Thomas Ingoldsby of Tappington Manor, actually a pen-name of an English cl ...
'' * Pollok's '' Course of Time'' (1857) *''The Poets of the Nineteenth Century'' (1858) *
Edgar Allan Poe Edgar Allan Poe (; Edgar Poe; January 19, 1809 – October 7, 1849) was an American writer, poet, editor, and literary critic. Poe is best known for his poetry and short stories, particularly his tales of mystery and the macabre. He is wid ...
's "The Raven," in ''The Poetical Works of Edgar Allan Poe'' (1858) *''Home Affections'' (1858) *Cholmondeley Pennell's ''Puck on Pegasus'' (1863) *'' The Arabian Nights'' (1863) *L. B. White, ''English Sacred Poetry of the Olden Time'' (1864) *''Legends and Lyrics'' (1865) *
Martin Farquhar Tupper Martin Farquhar Tupper (17 July 1810 in London – 29 November 1889 in Albury, Surrey) was an English writer, and poet, and the author of '' Proverbial Philosophy''. Early life Martin Farquar was the eldest son of Dr. Martin Tupper (1780–18 ...
's ''Proverbial Philosophy'' * Barry Cornwall's ''Dramatic Scenes: With other poems'' (1857)


Retirement and death

An ultimate tribute came to an elderly Tenniel as he was knighted for public service in 1893 by
Queen Victoria Victoria (Alexandrina Victoria; 24 May 1819 – 22 January 1901) was Queen of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland from 20 June 1837 until her death in 1901. Her reign of 63 years and 216 days was longer than that of any previ ...
. It was the first such honour ever bestowed on an illustrator or cartoonist. His fellows saw his knighthood as gratitude for "raising what had been a fairly lowly profession to an unprecedented level of respectability." With his knighthood, Tenniel elevated the social status of the black-and-white illustrator, and sparked a new sense of recognition of his profession. When he retired in January 1901, Tenniel was honoured with a farewell banquet (on 12 June), at which AJ Balfour, then
Leader of the House of Commons The leader of the House of Commons is a minister of the Crown of the Government of the United Kingdom whose main role is organising government business in the House of Commons. The leader is generally a member or attendee of the cabinet of t ...
, presided, and described Tenniel as "a great artist and a great gentleman". Tenniel died on 25 February 1914, three days before his 94th birthday. He was buried in
Kensal Green Cemetery Kensal Green Cemetery is a cemetery in the Kensal Green area of Queens Park in the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea in London, England. Inspired by Père Lachaise Cemetery in Paris, it was founded by the barrister George Frederick ...
in London.


Legacy

The ''Punch'' historian M. H. Spielmann, who knew Tenniel, wrote that the political clout contained in his ''Punch'' cartoons was capable of "swaying parties and people, too". Two days after his death, ''
The Daily Graphic ''The Daily Graphic: An Illustrated Evening Newspaper'' was the first American newspaper with daily illustrations. It was founded in New York City in 1873 by Canadian engravers George-Édouard Desbarats and William Leggo, and began publication ...
'' recalled how Tenniel "had an influence on the political feeling of this time which is hardly measurable.... While Tenniel was drawing them (his subjects), we always looked to the Punch cartoon to crystallize the national and international situation, and the popular feeling about it—and never looked in vain.""Name of article??", ''
The Daily Graphic ''The Daily Graphic: An Illustrated Evening Newspaper'' was the first American newspaper with daily illustrations. It was founded in New York City in 1873 by Canadian engravers George-Édouard Desbarats and William Leggo, and began publication ...
'', 27 February 1914.
This social influence resulted from the weekly publishing of his political cartoons over 50 years, whereby Tenniel's fame allowed for a want and need for his particular illustrative work, away from the newspaper. Tenniel became not only one of Victorian Britain's most published illustrators, but as a ''Punch'' cartoonist one of the "supreme social observers" of British society and an integral component of a powerful journalistic force. The ''
New-York Tribune The ''New-York Tribune'' was an American newspaper founded in 1841 by editor Horace Greeley. It bore the moniker ''New-York Daily Tribune'' from 1842 to 1866 before returning to its original name. From the 1840s through the 1860s it was the domi ...
'' journalist George W. Smalley referred to John Tenniel in 1914 as "one of the greatest intellectual forces of his time, (who) understood social laws and political energies." Public exhibitions of Sir John Tenniel's work were held in 1895 and 1900. Tenniel was also the author of one of the
mosaic A mosaic is a pattern or image made of small regular or irregular pieces of colored stone, glass or ceramic, held in place by plaster/mortar, and covering a surface. Mosaics are often used as floor and wall decoration, and were particularly pop ...
s, ''
Leonardo da Vinci Leonardo di ser Piero da Vinci (15 April 14522 May 1519) was an Italian polymath of the High Renaissance who was active as a painter, draughtsman, engineer, scientist, theorist, sculptor, and architect. While his fame initially rested on ...
'', in the South Court in the
Victoria and Albert Museum The Victoria and Albert Museum (often abbreviated as the V&A) in London is the world's largest museum of applied arts, decorative arts and design, housing a permanent collection of over 2.27 million objects. It was founded in 1852 and nam ...
. His stippled watercolour drawings appeared from time to time in the exhibitions of the
Royal Institute of Painters in Water Colours The Royal Institute of Painters in Water Colours (RI), initially called the New Society of Painters in Water Colours, is one of the societies in the Federation of British Artists, based in the Mall Galleries in London. History In 1831 the s ...
, to which he had been elected in 1874. Tenniel Close, a Bayswater street near his former studio, is named after him.From 1854 Tenniel lived not in Bayswater but in Portsdown Road, Maida Vale, a little north.


Gallery

File:Alice par John Tenniel 14.png, Alice playing with the puppy File:Jabberwocky.jpg, ''The Jabberwock'', as illustrated by John Tenniel for Lewis Carroll's ''
Through the Looking-Glass ''Through the Looking-Glass, and What Alice Found There'' (also known as ''Alice Through the Looking-Glass'' or simply ''Through the Looking-Glass'') is a novel published on 27 December 1871 (though indicated as 1872) by Lewis Carroll and the ...
'', including the poem " Jabberwocky" File:Punch Davy Jones's Locker.png, ''
Davy Jones' Locker Davy Jones's locker is a metaphor for the oceanic abyss (religion), abyss, the final resting place of drowned sailors and travellers. It is a euphemism for drowning or shipwrecks in which the sailors' and ships' remains are consigned to the de ...
'', 1892 ''Punch'' cartoon File:1890 Bismarcks Ruecktritt.jpg, ''
Dropping the Pilot ''Dropping the Pilot'' is a political cartoon by Sir John Tenniel, first published in the British magazine ''Punch'' on 29 March 1890. It depicts Chancellor Otto von Bismarck as a maritime pilot who is stepping off a ship, perhaps a reference ...
'', 1890 ''Punch'' cartoon commenting on
Otto von Bismarck Otto, Prince of Bismarck, Count of Bismarck-Schönhausen, Duke of Lauenburg (, ; 1 April 1815 – 30 July 1898), born Otto Eduard Leopold von Bismarck, was a conservative German statesman and diplomat. From his origins in the upper class of ...
's dismissal File:John Tenniel - Punch - Ripper cartoon.png, ''The Nemesis of Neglect'', 1888 ''Punch'' cartoon commenting on the
Jack the Ripper Jack the Ripper was an unidentified serial killer active in and around the impoverished Whitechapel district of London, England, in the autumn of 1888. In both criminal case files and the contemporaneous journalistic accounts, the killer w ...
murders File:A Christmas Puzzle, Punch, Dec 1895.jpg, ''A Christmas Puzzle'', (Father Christmas: "Now, my little man, where's your stocking?") ''Punch'', 1895


References


Bibliography

*John Buchanan-Brown, ''Early Victorian Illustrated Books: Britain, France and Germany.'' London: The British Library and Oak Knoll Press, 2005 *Lewis Carroll, ''Alice's Adventures in Wonderland & Through the Looking-Glass.'' Edited by Roger Lancelyn Green. Illustrated by John Tenniel. Oxford: Oxford UP, 1971 *Lewis Carroll, ''The Annotated Alice: Alice's Adventures in Wonderland & Through the Looking-Glass.'' Introduction and notes by Martin Gardner. Illustrated by John Tenniel. New York: Bramhall House, 1960 *Morton N. Cohen and Edward Wakeling, eds, ''Lewis Carroll and His Illustrators: Collaborations and Correspondence, 1865–1898.'' Ithaca: Cornell UP, 2003 *L. Perry Curtis, book review: ''Sir John Tenniel: Aspects of His Work.'
''Victorian Studies''. Vol. 40, Bloomington: Indiana UP, 1996. 168–171.
JSTOR recovered 21 November 2010 *L. Perry Curtis, book review: ''Drawing Conclusions: A Cartoon History of Anglo-Irish Relations, 1798–1998'' by Roy Douglas, et al
Victorian Studies. Bloomington: Indiana UP, 2001. 520–522.
JSTOR recovered 21 November 2010 *Edward D. Dalziel and George Dalziel, ''The Brothers Dalziel: A Record of Fifty Years' Work'', London: Methuen, 1901 * *Eleanor M. Garvey and W. H. Bond, Introduction, ''Tenniel's Alice.'' Cambridge: Harvard College Library/The Stinehour Press, 1978 *J. Francis Gladstone and Jo Elwyn-Jones, ''The Alice Companion'
Palgrave Macmillan
1998. *Paul Goldman, ''Victorian Illustrators'', Aldershot, UK: Scolar Press, 1996 * *Marguerite Mespoulet, ''Creators of Wonderland.'' New York: Arrow Editions, 1934 *Harry Levin, "Wonderland Revisited
''The Kenyon Review'', Vol. 27, no. 4, Kenyon College, 1965, pp. 591–616
JSTOR recovered 3 December 2010 * *Frankie Morris, ''John Tenniel, Cartoonist: A Critical and Sociocultural Study in the Art of the Victorian Political Cartoon'', PhD dissertation, Columbia: University of Missouri, 1985 *William Cosmo Monkhouse, ''The Life and Works of Sir John Tenniel'', London: ''ArtJournal Easter Annual'', 1901 *Graham Ovenden and John Davis, ''The Illustrators of Alice in Wonderland and Through the Looking-Glass'', New York: St Martin's Press, 1972 *Forrest Reid, ''Illustrators of the Eighteen Sixties: An Illustrated Survey of the Work of 58 British Artists'', New York: Dover Publications, 1975 *Frances Sarzano, ''Sir John Tenniel'', London: Pellegrini & Cudahy, 1948 * *William Thomas Stead, ed., ''The Review of Reviews'', Vol. 23, p. 406, London: Horace Marshall & Son, 1901 *M. H. Spielmann, ''The History of Punch'', London: Cassell, 1895 *G. P. Stoker,

', U of London PhD thesis, 1994 *Jan Susina, ''The Place of Lewis Carroll in Children's Literature.'' New York: Routledge, 2010 *Jan Susina, book review: "Artist of Wonderland: The Life, Political Cartoons and Illustrations of Tenniel", ''Children's Literature Association Quarterly'', Vol. 31, no. 2, pp. 202–205, The Johns Hopkins UP, 2006 *


External links

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Essay by Edward Wakeling, March 2008
John Tenniel's illustrations for ''Alice's Adventures in Wonderland'' and ''Through the Looking-Glass''
* ttp://arthist.cla.umn.edu/aict/Tennielweb/directory.html A collection of Tenniel's American Civil War-era illustrationsbr>Works by John Tenniel
at HeidICON
Tenniel's ''Alice'' Illustrations
at Lewis Carroll Resources {{DEFAULTSORT:Tenniel, John 1820 births 1914 deaths English illustrators English cartoonists Punch (magazine) cartoonists British children's book illustrators British surrealist artists Knights Bachelor People from Maida Vale Burials at Kensal Green Cemetery Members of the Royal Institute of Painters in Water Colours English people of French descent