~Jackie Morris~Illustrator

Jackie Morris 

Born in Birmingham 1960, Jackie is a well established
illustrator of beautiful luminous watercolours for
over 30 children's books. Her subject matter
include detailed magical landscapes of different
lands and times, biblical and mythological characters,
the natural world involving whales, peacocks, bears,
snow leopards, cats, and tigers.
Each time you look at her work you notice
something previously hidden.

In her earlier days she worked for magazines and
also designed greetings cards for Greenpeace
and Amnesty International.

Jackie's illustrations for greetings cards caught
the attention of author Caroline Pitcher, and Jackie
illustrated her first Childrens Book 'Jo's Storm'
published in 1994.  

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Jackie Morris has since written and beautifully
illustrated the books 'The Seal Children', which she
was awarded the Tir na n-Og Prize by the
Welsh Books Council in 2005', 'The Snow Leopard',
'Lord of the Forest', 'The Barefoot Book of Classic Poems',
'Bears, Bears and more Bears', and
'Cats, Cats and more Cats'.

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Jackie has collaborated with many authors for
children's stories including :- Ted Hughes for
'When The Whale Became' a new edition published
in 2000, Caroline Pitcher - who Jackie collaborated
with for 5 books including 'The Snow Whale',
which achieved The Children's Book Federation
Award shortlist in 1997; and with Sian Lewis for
'The Cities in the Sea', which received the prize
for Best English Book of the Year in 1997 by
the Tir na n-Og Welsh Books Council.

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'Can You See A Little Bear?' written for Jackie by
James Mayhew, was inspired by the illustrations she
created for Christmas cards for the
Musicians Benevolent Fund. This story became
one of Child Magazines top 50 Children's books in America.
This book has also been picked up by the Book Start
Scheme in the UK. James and Jackie are currently
working on a follow up to the successful
'Can You See A Little Bear' originally called
'Starlight Starbright', and the progress of
this book can be viewed on Jackies blog

http://starlightjourney.blogspot.com/

complete with her wonderful illustrations.
Her books and those she has illustrated have been
produced in many Countries including Wales,
Denmark, Sweden, USA, Canada, and Korea.

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Jackie has also designed images for
Terry Pratchetts Calenders since 2004.
She was highly commended in the Australian
Women's Art Award, exhibits her paintings and
prints in Galleries all over the UK, and globally
as far as Queensland, Australia.
She has a collection in the public collection
at the National Library of Wales.
Jackie lives in Pembrokeshire with her two children,
two dogs and numerous cats.

www.wethreecats.blogspot.com 

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.
Curled around my pillow
My dragon sleeps
And keeps
One eye on the door
To be sure
That no monsters creep
Into my dreams.

~Elizabeth Barrett Browning~

 Elizabeth Barrett Browning werd geboren in
Coxhoe Hall, nabij Durham op 6 maart 1806 
Ze is overleden in  Florence op 29 juni 1861
Ze was een Engelse dichteres.
Ze wordt beschouwd als een van de belangrijkste
dichters van het Victoriaanse tijdperk.
Browning schreef de bekende dichtregel
How do I love thee? Let me count the ways.
.
Ze werd geboren als Elizabeth Barrett en groeide
op in Ledbury in een rijke familie die een fortuin
vergaarde op de suikerplantages van Jamaica.
In 1826 publiceerde ze haar eerste dichtbundel,
An Essay on Mind and Other Poems, en in 1833
vertaalde ze de Griekse tragedie
Prometheus Geboeid in het Engels.
.
Na de afschaffing van de slavernij ging het financieel
minder goed met Brownings vader, die met zijn
familie Ledbury verliet en naar Sidmouth en
vervolgens Londen verhuisde.
Browning bleef schrijven en publiceerde in 1838 een
nieuwe dichtbundel, The Seraphim and Other Poems.
Ook correspondeerde ze met verschillende bekende
schrijvers en dichters zoals Mary Russell Mitford.

Na de dood van haar broer Edward in een zeilongeluk
in 1840 trok ze zich enkele jaren terug.
Ze had een slechte gezondheid en verliet nauwelijks
haar slaapkamer. Haar bekendheid nam echter
steeds verder toe, vooral met de publicatie
van The Cry of the Children in 1843,
gevolgd door het tweedelige Poems in 1844.
.
Na de publicatie van Poems ontving ze een brief
van de dichter en toneelschrijver Robert Browning.
Ze ontmoetten, werden verliefd en trouwden in
het geheim in 1846, omdat haar strenge vader zijn
kinderen niet toestond om te trouwen.
Het stel vertrok naar Italië en ging in Florence wonen,
in het herenhuis Casa Guidi, nu een museum.
Hier schreef Barrett Browning het politiek getinte
Casa Guidi Windows (1851), sterk beïnvloed
door de Italiaanse eenwoordingsstrijd, de Risorgimento.
Elizabeth en Robert Browning kregen een zoon,
de kunstenaar Robert Barrett Browning
(1849-1912), bijgenaamd "Pen".

  43 ste Sonnets from the Portuguese:
.

How do I love thee? Let me count the ways.

I love thee to the depth and breadth and height

My soul can reach, when feeling out of sight

For the ends of Being and ideal Grace.

I love thee to the level of everyday's

Most quiet need, by sun and candlelight.

I love thee freely, as men strive for Right;

I love thee purely, as they turn from Praise.

I love thee with the passion put to use

In my old griefs, and with my childhood's faith.

I love thee with a love I seemed to lose

With my lost saints,—I love thee with the breath,

Smiles, tears, of all my life!—and, if God choose,

I shall but love thee better after death.

~~~
Elizabeth Barrett Browning born March 6 1806
She Died June 29 1861

She was one of the most prominent poets of
the Victorian era. Her poetry was widely popular in
both England and the United States during her lifetime.
Browning published many poems in her lifetime,
and many more were published by her husband
after her death. Her works contained early examples
of feminist thought and have been reprinted in several
volumes including The Norton Anthology of English Literature.
She married poet Robert Browning in secret
due to objections by her father.
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  Cheerfulness Taught By Reason;
.
I think we are too ready with complaint
In this fair world of God's. Had we no hope
Indeed beyond the zenith and the slope
Of yon gray blank of sky, we might be faint
To muse upon eternity's constraint
Round our aspirant souls. But since the scope
Must widen early, is it well to droop
For a few-days consumed in loss and taint?
O pusillanimous Heart, be comforted, --
And, like a cheerful traveller, take the road,
Singing beside the hedge. What if the bread
Be bitter in thine inn, and thou unshod
To meet the flints? -- At least it may be said,
Because the way is short, I thank thee, -- God!
~~~
Her first known poem was written at the age
of sixteen or eighteen. The manuscript is currently
in the Berg Collection of the New York Public Library;
By the age of twelve she had written an "epic" poem
consisting of four books of rhyming couplets.
When she was fourteen her father paid for the
publication of a long Homeric poem entitled Z
The Battle of Marathon. Barrett later referred
to this as "Pope's Homer done over again, or
rather undone." By the age of twenty she had
read the principal Greek and Latin authors,
and Dante's Inferno, in their original languages.
She learnt Hebrew and read the Old Testament
from beginning to end.
Essays of the mind was published in 1826,
also at her father’s expense.
~~~

Read more about her life;
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elizabeth_Barrett_Browning
http://www.poetryfoundation.org/archive/poet.html?id=81294

~THE KISS~

Before you kissed me only winds of heaven
Had kissed me, and the tenderness of rain -
Now you have come, how can I care for kisses.
Like theirs again?

I sought the sea, she sent her winds to meet me,
They surged about me singing of the south -
I turned my head away to keep still holy.
Your kiss upon my mouth.
And swift sweet rains of shining April weather
Found not my lips where living kisses are;
I bowed my head lest they put out my glory
As rain puts out a star.

I am my love's and he is mine forever,
Sealed with a seal and safe forevermore -
Think you that I could let a beggar enter
Where a king stood before?

by Sara Teasdale (1884-1933)
Paiting by Marcus Stone

~The Queen of Romania~

   "Oh, life is a glorious cycle of song,
A medley of extemporanea;
And love is a thing that can never go wrong,
And I am Marie of Roumania."
(Dorothy PARKER)
Author of memoirs children books published in London. 
 

Queen Marie of Romania was born Princess Marie of England
on October 29 1875 in England and
died in 1938 in Sinaia, România
(Regina Maria), Princess of Great Britain,
Grand daughter of Queen Victoria and
of Tzar Alexander II of Russia
Spouse of King Ferdinand I, crowned at Alba Iulia.
Mother of King Carol II, Prince Nicolae,
Princesses Marie (Mignon,Queen of Yugoslavia),
Elisabeta (Queen of Greece), Ileana (Acrhduchess of Austria).
Diplomatic Mission Negotiator, War-time
Red Cross Officer, Writer, Patron of Charities
writer. The Queens biography, quotations and
exhaustive bibliography is part of a new Anthology
published as an E-Book under the title:
"Blouse Roumaine - the Unsung Voices of Romanian Women"

She was the daughter of Queen Victoria's son Albert
and his wife Marie who was the daughter
of Czar Alexander II of Russia.
She spent much of her early life in England,
but her father was a navy man so she moved from
England to Malta and then to Germany when she
was young. She spent much of her time growing up
with her brothers and sisters as well as her many cousins.
When she was a teenager her cousin, the future
King George V of England visited her in Malta.
During these visits they fell in love and wanted to marry.
However their mothers did not like this idea.

Shortly after nixing the idea of her nephew being
her son-in law Marie's mother decided to set Marie up
with Grand Duke Ferdinand, the heir to the King of Romania.
They liked each other and married on December 29, 1892.
Shortly after the marriage they moved to Romania where
they lived in a castle with Ferdinand's Uncle King Carol I.
Shortly after this Marie became pregnant later giving
birth to future King Carol II. This led to Marie giving
birth to six little princes and princesses some of which
where not the children of Ferdinand and several of
whom would marry the children of
Marie's cousin Sophie, Queen of Greece.

Marie's life in Romania was not an easy on.
She did not always get along with Ferdinand
and his Uncle and Ferdinand's Aunt Elisabeth
(or Carmen Sylvia) treated Marie with contempt by
taking away her children. To make her life more
bearable Marie would frequently leave Romania,
going to Germany to visit her mother and sisters,
or Russia to visit her cousins the Czar and
Czarina Nicholas and Alexandra. She did this
numerous times, but twice she did this because
she was pregnant with children that were not Ferdinand's.
Things where not easier once Ferdinand became King
in October of 1914. World War One had started in Europe
and it was an awful time for her and her family spread
from Spain to Russia. After the war was not easy
either with her son and then grandson on the throne.
In 1938 the Second World War was soon to start,
but Marie was not feeling well. She had internal
hemorrhages that killed her on July 18 of that year.

A couple of good books on Marie are:
*"Story of My Life" by Marie, Queen of Romania
*"Marie of Romania" by Terence Elsberry
*"The Last Romantic: A Biography of
Queen Marie of Roumania" by Hannah Pakula

  Love, Faith, Courage – with these three
we can win the world.
~Marie~

 

    I was barely seventeen when I came to you.
I was young and ignorant, but very proud of
my native country, and even  now, I am proud to have
been born an Englishwoman... but I bless you,
dear Romania, country of my joy and my grief,
the beautiful country which has lived in my heart.
~Queen Marie of Romania~

~~~
H.M. QUEEN MARIE OF ROUMANIA
Chandor's Portraits
Malcolm Vaughn
Brentano's, New York, 1942

H.M. Queen Marie of Roumania
S.S. LEVIATHAN, 1926
~

  ~

http://www.geh.org/link/sn/queen-marie.html

 

Children Books:
-The Lily of Life illustrations
by Helen Stratton 1913
-The Dreamer of Dreams illustrations
by Edmund Dulac 1915
-The Stealers of Light illustrations
by Edmund Dulac 1916
-Peeping Pansy illustrations
by Mabel Lucie Attwell 1918
-A Christmas Tale illustrations
by Mabel Lucie Attwell 1922
-The Lost Princess illustrations
by Mabel Lucie Attwell 1924
-The Magic Doll of Roumania illustrations
by Maud and Miska Petersham 1929
-Vom Wunder Der Tränen illustrations
by Sulamith Wülfing 1938
-Petru's Candle frames from animated
version of Marie's A Christmas Tale

~The Queen of Roumania~

PEEPING PANSY
BY THE QUEEN OF ROUMANIA
ILLUSTRATED BY MABEL LUCIE ATTWELL
HODDER AND STOUGHTON 1918

The First Door Peeping Pansy Opened.

The Lizards were Dancing!
Pansy never saw anything so funny.

Don't cry, Cussy—when we are naughty,
we must be punished.

I don't like to be caught by him all alone in the forest.

I do not think that any of you would have
hurried if your bath water had begun
singing sweet songs to you.

“May I come in?”  said Pansy, rather timidly.

From between the roots of a huge tree
appeared a little man.

  O! white little ball, So tender and small.

~Arthur Rackham~

 
Arthur Rackham werd geboren in Londen
op 19 september 1867.
Hij is overleden aan kanker in Limpsfield,
Surrey op 6 september 1939.

Hij was een Engelse tekenaar, schilder en
illustrator van boeken.

Hij kwam op de wereld als één van 12 kinderen.
Toen hij achttien was werkte hij als kantoorbediende
bij de Westminster Fire Office en begon een kunststudie
aan de Lambeth School of Art.
In 1892 gaf hij zijn baan op en ging werken voor
de The Westminster Budget als reporter en illustrator.
Zijn eerste boekillustaties werden gepubliceerd in 1893
in de The Dolly Dialogues. Illustrator van boeken
zou hij de rest van zijn leven blijven.

 
In 1903 trouwde hij met Edyth Starkie, samen
hadden zij een dochter Barbara (1908).
Rackham won een gouden onderscheiding op de
Milan International Exhibition in 1906 en nog een op
de Barcelona International Exposition in 1911.

Zijn belangrijkste werken zijn de illustraties bij
-Fairy Tales of the Brothers Grimm (1900)
Rip van Winkle (1905)
-Pete-r Pan in Kensington Gardens (1906), en
-Alice's Adventures in Wonderland (1907) 
- A Midsummer Night's Dream (1908)
-Undine (1909)
de tekst voor Richard Wagners opera cyclus
-Der Ring des Nibelungen ("The Ring of the Nibelung") 
-The Rhinegold & The Valkyrie (1910)
-Siegfried & The Twilight of the Gods (1911)
en talloze andere boeken.
 

Arthur Rackham born 19 September 1867 
and Died of cancer 6 September 1939
He was an English book illustrator.

  

Rackham was born in London as one of 12 children.
At the age of 18, he worked as a clerk at the
Westminster Fire Office and began studying part-time
at the Lambeth School of Art.
In 1892 he quit his job and started working for
The Westminster Budget as a reporter and illustrator.
His first book illustrations were published in 1893 in
To the Other Side by Thomas Rhodes, but his first serious
commission was in 1894 for The Dolly Dialogues,
the collected sketches of Anthony Hope, who later
went on to write The Prisoner of Zenda.
Book illustrating then became Rackham's
career for the rest of his life.

In 1903 he married Edyth Starkie, with whom
he had one daughter, Barbara, in 1908.
Rackham won a gold medal at the
Milan International Exhibition in 1906
and another one at the Barcelona International
Exposition in 1912. His works were included in numerous
exhibitions, including one at the Louvre in Paris in 1914.

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Arthur Rackham?
THEN CLICK HERE!!!