Blackadder's Print Collection
Unsurprisingly, while watching the British comedy classic 'Blackadder's Christmas Carol' over Christmas, we were most interested in the prints hanging on the wall of the time-travelling malcontent:
After much replaying of scenes, we found that chez Blackadder Baldrick moves out of the way just enough to allow identification of these four plates from Hogarth's classic morality series of two apprentices, 'Industry and Idleness', of which we currently have the complete set:
(This is the diamond formation in which Blackadder's four prints appear). The prints, although published in 1747, around a century before Blackadder's Christmas Carol is set, say something about the master-servant relationship played out by Blackadder and Baldrick. As Paulson (Hogarth's Graphic Works) writes, 'The master who bought Industry and Idleness read it as a moral exemplum, while the apprentice automatically sided with Tom Idle against the more successful and respectable Goodchild'. Although even the master, Blackadder, gives up on the life of virtue by the end of the Carol, an event foreshadowed by the predominance of the idle apprentice Tom Idle in the four prints he hangs on his wall!
Industry and Idleness. The Fellow 'Prentices at their Looms. [&] The Industrious 'Prentice performing the Duty of a Christian. [&] The Idle 'Prentice at Play in the Church Yard, during Divine Service. [&] The Industrious 'Prentice a Favourite, and entrusted by his Master. [&] The Idle 'Prentice turn'd away, and sent to Sea. [&] The Industrious 'Prentice out of his Time, & Married to his Master's Daughter. [&] The Idle 'Prentice return'd from Sea, & in a Garret with a common Prostitute. [&] The Industrious 'Prentice grown rich, & Sheriff of London. [&] The Idle 'Prentice betray'd by his Whore, & taken in a Night Cellar with his Accomplice. [&] The Industrious 'Prentice Alderman of London, the Idle one brought before him & Impeach'd by his Accomplice. [&] The Idle 'Prentice Executed at Tyburn. [&] The Industrious 'Prentice Lord-Mayor of London.
Designed & Engrav'd by Wm. Hogarth.
Publish'd according to Act of Parliament 30 Sep. 1747. [c.1780s.]
Set of 12 engravings on thick wove paper, 1-10 c.265 x 350mm, 10½ x 13¾"; 11 & 12 c.275 x 405mm, 10¾ x 16". Generally good impressions with margins; plates 4 and 7 with small tears into lower edge.
A fine example of one of the most famous of the sets of morality satires by William Hogarth (1697 - 1764), charting the careers of two London apprentices.
Hogarth later described the series as ‘calculated for the use & Instruction of Youth’. The ‘good’ apprentice, Francis Goodchild, and ‘bad’ apprentice, Tom Idle, are seen together in Plates 1 and 10. Throughout the rest of the series their respective ‘careers’ are compared and contrasted. The apprentices’ physical appearance is also contrasted. Goodchild’s expressions are serene and polite, his demeanour elegant and gentlemanly, while Idle’s features become increasingly contorted and grotesque, and his posture slovenly and misshapen.
The first plate sees the two apprentices together in the same silk-weaving workshop in Spitalfields. Goodchild works diligently at the loom, while Idle is fast asleep. Two volumes entitled ‘The Prentices Guide’ are strategically placed, symbolising their respective attitudes to work and authority. Goodchild’s is in pristine condition, carefully propped against a thread winder but the other is soiled, ripped and discarded on the floor. The series' end sees Goodchild’s triumphal procession as Lord Mayor at the heart of the City of London, while Idle’s ignominious end is execution on the gallows at Tyburn.
All plates numbered; biblical quotations in cartouches to lower parts of frames.
BM Satires: 2896. Paulson: 168, II. Ex Coll: F.D. Klingender.
[Ref: 13997] £1,200.00
