Mervyn Peake: The Man and his Art
- Artist: Mervyn Peake
- Published: 2007
- Publisher: Peter Owen Ltd, London
- Format: Paperback
- Height: 28cm
- Pages: 216
- Illustrations: Illustrated throughout in colour
£19.95
Add to basketMervyn Peake: The Man and his Art
Shortlisted for the 2007 Locus Art Book Award.
In this highly illustrated book, his son Sebastian Peake has collaborated with Alison Eldred and G. Peter Winnington, author of an highly acclaimed biography of Mervyn Peake, to compile a stunning collection of illustrations, paintings, photographs, letters, notebook pages and other material – much of which has never been published – to produce a unique memoir of the artist’s life and work. Contributors who discuss various aspects of his literary and visual output include the writers Michael Moorcock and Joanne Harris, Langdon Jones, editor of Titus Alone, artists John Howe and Chris Riddell, David Glass and John Constable, creators of the stage version of the Gormenghast trilogy, and Estelle Daniels, producer of the BBC dramatization.
This Mervyn Peake book includes sections on his upbringing as the son of a missionary in China, his development as an illustrator, artist and writer, marriage and fatherhood, his wartime experiences, creation of the Titus trilogy, Mr Pye and other literary works, and his tragic decline as illness overcame him, resulting in early death. It is the most comprehensive of catalogues on Peake and gives further insight into the man who's centenary exhibition is currently on show at Pallant House Gallery. For further details of the Mervyn Peake: A Centenary Celebration exhibition visit the Pallant House Gallery Website.
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Artists Biography
Mervyn Peake was born in China in 1911 of medical missionary parents. He began to draw, paint and write stories at an early age and his first book of poems, Shapes and Sounds, was published in 1941.
Peake is probably best known for his Titus novels — Titus Groan, Gormenghast and Titus Alone — but other well known poetry collections include: The Glassblowers and The Rhyme of the Flying Bomb.
Peake married Maeve Gilmore in 1937 and was later awarded the W.H. Heinemann Foundation Prize by the Royal Society of Literature in 1950. Mervyn Peake died after suffering a long illness in 1968.
