I

For Knight, illustration was largely a process of subsuming the plays into a pantheon of factual knowledge; for Meadows, a matter of using extreme visual forms for moral enquiry. The editions produced by Mary and Charles Cowden Clarke, with images by Henry Courtney Selous and others, and Howard Staunton, illustrated by Sir John Gilbert, approached the task rather differently. Both exploit their large format through the inclusion of a larger number of illustrations, fully integrated into the page design, but this apparent freedom brings with it a number of problems for both illustrator and reader. An increase in the number of images immediately raises issues of approach to a wider range of textual episodes. How does a predominantly representational convention deal with passages of text primarily lyrical or metaphorical, or present moments for which no visual convention exists? Providing images for events narrated but not presented in the text offers new challenges for both illustrator and reader, necessitating shifts of viewpoint and time that require sensitive handling. Special difficulties surround the complex choreography of resolution scenes, especially those involving large numbers of characters: but illustrating such scenes provides opportunities to control and enhance the play’s movement by the introduction of suspense, holding back the action by offering the reader moments of visual contemplation.

Just as important is a rhythmic balance between text and image that is satisfactory in terms of both design and narrative progression. Sparseness of imaging followed by profusion will disrupt the aesthetic, and hence imaginative, continuity; rigid regularity will destroy the fluidity of the play’s growth. Selecting the moment for depiction, always crucial, is given further urgency by the question of their location. Simultaneity of event in text and image will not always be practicable; placed before the textual event, an image may remove surprise or slacken tension; placed after it, an illustration might stall the action. Conversely, anticipation or delay may be effective in hastening the action, foreshadowing later events, or providing a valuable delaying function for emotional or conceptual emphasis.