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Fig. 1Marcellus Laroon, O Rare Shoe (1687). EXEBD 70244.
EXEBD is the record number for the Bill Douglas Centre for the History of Cinema and Popular Culture, University of Exeter.
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Fig. 2L. P. Boitard, The Cries of London In Six Parts, Being a Collection of Seventy Two Humourous Prints drawn from the Life by that Celebrated Artist Laroon, with additions and Improvements, (London: Robert Sayer, 1760). Private collection.
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Fig. 4William H. Pyne, ‘The Half-Penny Showman', (London: William Miller, 1805). EXEBD 70251.
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Fig. 5[Charles Rossiter?], The Battle of Waterloo Peepshow, (c. 1850). EXEBD70073.
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Fig. 6Edward Edwards after William Marshall Craig, ‘A Showman' , (1805). EXEBD 70357.
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Fig. 7Unattributed, Kriss Kringle's Raree Show for Boys and Girls, (New York: W.H. Murphy, 1846), frontispiece. EXEBD46174.
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Fig. 8Unattributed, Kriss Kringle's Raree Show for Boys and Girls, (New York: W.H. Murphy, 1846), p. 1. EXEBD46174.
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Fig. 9Peter Parley, Sergeant Bell and His Raree Show, (London: Thomas Tegg, 1839), frontispiece. EXEBD42992.
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Fig. 10Peter Parley, Sergeant Bell and His Raree Show, (London: Thomas Tegg, 1839), pp. 231-2. EXEBD42992.
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Fig. 11Unattributed, The Picture Pleasure Book, (London: Addey and Co., 1853). EXEBD46131.
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Fig. 12Unattributed, The Picture Pleasure Book, (London: Addey and Co., 1853), p. 40. EXEBD46131.
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Fig. 13Professor Wolley Cobble, The Fool's Paradise; with the many wonderful adventures there as seen in the strange surpassing peepshow of Professor Wolley Cobble, (London: Griffith and Farran, 1883). EXEBD29772.
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Fig. 14Professor Wolley Cobble, 'The Woeful Panorama of the Toothache', (London: Griffith and Farran, 1883). EXEBD29772.
From The Fool's Paradise; with the many wonderful adventures there as seen in the strange surpassing peepshow of Professor Wolley Cobble.
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Fig. 15Mrs George Cupples, Our Parlour Panorama, (London: T. Nelson and Sons, 1882), front cover. EXEBD46188.
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Fig. 16Mrs George Cupples, Our Parlour Panorama, (London: T. Nelson and Sons, 1882), pp. 18-19. EXEBD46188.
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Fig. 17F. M. Allen, Through Green Glasses, (London: Ward and Downey, 1888). EXEBD42993.
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Fig. 18Unattributed, The Peep Show: A Picture Magazine for Little Readers, (April 1876), frontcover. Courtesy of National Library of Scotland.
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Fig. 19Unattributed, ‘Some Magic Lantern Slides', (28 June 1882). EXEBD28101.
From vol 4 of Boy's Own Paper, p. 712.
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Fig. 20Unattributed, ‘The Christmas Gift. A Goose Story for Magic Lantern or Shadow Show', (25 December 1880). EXEBD28103.
From vol 3 of Boy's Own Paper, p. 198.
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Fig. 21Alfred Crowquill, Comic History of the Kings and Queens of England, from William the Conqueror to the Present Time, (London: Read and Co, c. 1855). EXEBD70404.
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Fig. 22Unattributed, Royal Moveable Punch and Judy, (London: Dean and Son, 1870). EXEBD14883.
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Fig. 23Unattributed, Royal Moveable Punch and Judy, (London: Dean and Son, 1870). EXEBD14883.
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Fig. 24Unattributed, Dean's New Book of Magic Illuminations, (London: Dean and Son, 1862). EXEBD14758.
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Fig. 25Unattributed, Dean's New Book of Magic Illuminations, (London: Dean and Son, 1862). EXEBD14758.
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Fig. 26Unattributed, Dean's New Book of Dissolving Views, (London: Dean and Son, 1860). EXEBD14756.
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Fig. 27Unattributed, Dean's New Book of Dissolving Views, (London: Dean and Son, 1860). EXEBD14756.
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Fig. 28Unattributed, The Magic Lantern StruwellPeter, (London: F. Warne and Co, 1896). EXEBD14750.
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Fig. 29Unattributed, The Magic Lantern StruwellPeter, (London: F. Warne and Co, 1896). EXEBD14750.
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Fig. 30Unattributed, The Underwood Travel Library, (c. 1905), Volumes I and II. EXEBD.
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Fig. 31Unattributed, Realistic Travels and Keystone View Company Stereograph Cases, (c. 1905-1918). EXEBD.
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Fig. 32Unattributed, The Motograph Moving Picture Book, (London: Bliss Sands and Co, 1898). EXEBD46221.
Abstract
Optical shows and devices played a key role in nineteenth-century popular culture. Panoramas, dioramas, peepshows and magic lanterns were a widespread form of domestic and public recreation. The growth of optical recreations as a leisure activity parallels that of popular publishing, and this essay explores the concomitant aesthetic crossover between optical and print media. It particularly focuses on the production of a significant number of illustrated and movable books, usually aimed at a juvenile audience, which exploited the novelty of the latest optical recreation. These children's publications attempted to replicate the viewing experience of peepshows, panoramas and the magic lantern. The pervasive presence of optical recreations in popular culture meant that they exerted a creative pressure upon both the conceptual and material organisation of the book. This essay demonstrates the way that, in so far as it was possible, a raft of novelty books structured themselves as peepshows, dioramas or panoramas.
How to Cite:
Plunkett, J., (2007) “Moving Books/Moving Images: Optical Recreations and Children's Publishing 1800-1900”, 19: Interdisciplinary Studies in the Long Nineteenth Century 5. doi: https://doi.org/10.16995/ntn.463
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![Fig. 5 [Charles Rossiter?], The Battle of Waterloo Peepshow, (c. 1850). EXEBD70073.](/jms/public/journals/1/no5_Plunkett_fig5_full.jpg)
