The Autobiography of a Picture. Corrected typescript of the novel.
[Woodleigh House, Totley Brook, near Sheffield: 1909].
Price: $2,500.00
About the item
Published: London: F. V. White and Co., 1910. Typescript on blue paper, with manuscript corrections in ink throughout. [8], 211 leaves, 35 or 36 lines per page, typed on rectos only. 1 vols. 12-7/8 x 8 inches. Sewn into red and tan cloth flexible cover, with author’s address label on upper cover, newspaper reviews of Through the Sun in an Ariship and related clippings on front endpapers, bifolium of 4 pages of advertisements for Mastin’s novels tipped in at end. Some rubbing to binding, internally fine.
Item #261436
The fourth published novel of John Mastin, R.B.A., F.L.S., F.C.S., F.R.A.S., F.S.A.Scot., F.R.M.S. (1865-1932), English artist, popular science writer, schoolmaster, and the author of scientific romances. Among these are two interplanetary novels, The Stolen Planet (1906) and Through the Sun in an Airship (1909); a lost race adventure, The Immortal Light (1907); and the present work of fantasy, Autobiography of a Picture (1910). Mastin trained as an artist, taught drawing, and lived near Sheffield until the great war.
In The Autobiography of a Picture, Mastin literalizes the notion of the artist giving life to his canvas, and the novel records the consciousness of Mira, painted by Rolf Trofford, including her sentiments when the portrait is shown to the human original, Myra, while away at exhibitions (offering a glimpse of the backbiting fellow members of the Orchtown Society of Artists), during the daily life of a teacher of painting (again with lively scenes of artistic pretence, philistinism, and domestic matters), and when she is joined by Rolf’s self-portrait at an exhibition.
The published novel is rare. OCLC records copies only in BL, NLS, and Cambridge.
The typescript is complete, highly legible, and bears frequent corrections to the text.
