[Rarebooks] fs: America's Own Virulent, Quixotic Artist... (1845)

[Joslin Hall Rare Books]

[Osborn, Laughton]  HANDBOOK OF YOUNG ARTISTS AND AMATEURS IN OIL 
PAINTING...BY AN AMERICAN ARTIST.

New York; Wiley and Putnam: 1845.

The first edition of this popular 19th century artist's manual, which was 
based on the French art manuals of Bouvier, Merimee and de Montabert. 
Osborn discusses materials and implements, coloring, finishing, the 
technique of painting drapery, painting landscapes, and finally varnishing, 
cleaning, repairing and lining. The book is a source of much useful 
information on 19th century techniques and materials, and is also of 
interest as an example of an influential 19th century American art manual. 
It was re-issued a number of times in the 1850s and 60s.

Laughton Osborn [1809-1878] was an amateur painter and professional (though 
usually anonymous) author, whose work is now largely forgotten. He is seen 
most vividly today through the eyes of Edgar Alan Poe, who knew him as an 
entertaining, sometimes virulent author, and a poetic contributor to 
several of Poe's magazines.

Poe included a vivid sketch of Osborn in his 1850 essay "The Literati", 
where he related that he had read and been amused by several of Osborn's 
anonymous literary works, the most notable of which had been "The 
Confessions of a Poet, by Himself". "Confessions" had been widely 
criticized by literary critics as obscene. "It is not precisely the work to 
place in the hands of a lady," Poe admits, while judging it "quite 
remarkable for artistic unity and perfection [with] sentiments audacious 
and suggestive at least, if not at all times tenable."

Violent criticism of the "Confessions" from one New York newspaper editor 
brought forth a stinging satirical rebuke from Osborn titled "The Vision of 
Rubeta, an Epic of the Island of Manhattan". This satire, Poe notes, "was 
not only bitter but personal in the last degree. It was, moreover, very 
censurably indecent - filthy is, perhaps, the more appropriate word". 
Still, Poe declares, it was the best satire written to the time in America, 
which was, he admits, not saying all that much, as it was also just about 
the only satire written up to that time in America.

Osborn had once complained in a private letter to Poe that he had 
absolutely no friends, and Poe muses that he was "undoubtedly one of 
"Nature's own noblemen, full of generosity, courage, honor - chivalrous in 
every respect, but, unhappily, carrying his ideas of chivalry, or rather of 
independence, to the point of Quixotism, if not of absolute insanity," and 
that Osborn had "few equals at downright invective."

Odd that he had no friends...

America's own foul-mouthed Quixote was also a playwright, specializing in 
pseudo-historical tragedies and comedies, and an amateur painter, from 
which hobby came his interest in the French works he translated to produce 
this "Handbook of Young Artists".

Poe characterizes him as "a poet, painter and musician (who has) absolutely 
succeeded as each. His scholarship is extensive. In the French and Italian 
languages, he is [quite] at home, and in everything he is thorough and 
accurate." Osborn's "Treatise on Oil Painting," Poe concludes, was "highly 
spoken of by those well qualified to judge."

Well, it would have been, wouldn't it? Who would have wanted to cross pens, 
or paintbrushes, with Laughton Osborn?

Hardcover. 5"x8", xxxiii + 398 pages, plus 7 page catalog of Wiley and 
Putnam books at the rear. Original cloth, covers with some soil and wear, 
contents with some spotting and a bit shaken. Not a wonderful copy, but 
nice to have in the original covers.  [29169] $300.00



JOSLIN HALL RARE BOOKS, ABAA
Fine books of the 16th-20th centuries
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