• viii •
and other data necessary to complete the record of Rackham’s published work.
Many of the magazine illustrations that appeared from 1896 to 1907 were subsequently published in book form, often in editions which contained the work of other illustrators as well. Others, however, have never been reprinted, and these have special interest to the collector. Rackham’s first work achieved the dignity of publication in book form in 1893 in a modest little volume, now probably the rarest of all his books, To The Other Side. This was nothing more than a guide book designed to encourage travel to Canada and the United States. It was sold in paper wrappers at one shilling and in cloth binding at two shillings, and was distributed by railway and steamship companies. The illustrations were mostly drawings from photographs. It is a far cry from this work to the fine illustrations in Grimm’s Fairy Tales that appeared seven years later and marked the advent of a new master among book illustrators.
Until that time his work had been considered incidental to the text; since then it has been sought after because of its own merit by an ever-widening circle of collectors. Rip Van Winkle, published in 1905, was his first book in a limited signed edition; from then on to the present date most of his books have been published in both limited and trade editions. The list of Rackham’s books is an imposing array of classic tales and contemporary writings to each of which he has imparted fresh or added interest through his imaginative interpretation of the text.
