Edmund Dulac

Edmund Dulac, 1882 to 1953 was a French-born, British naturalised magazine illustrator, book illustrator and stamp designer. Born in Toulouse he studied law but later turned to the study of art the École des Beaux-Arts. He moved to London early in the 20th century and in 1905 was commissioned by the publisher J.M. Dent to illustrate Jane Eyre and 9 other volumes of works by the Brontë sisters. He then became a regular contributor to the Pall Mall magazine, and joined the London Sketch Club, which introduced him to the foremost book and magazine illustrators of the day. Through these he began an association with the Leicester Gallery and Hodder & Stoughton; the gallery commissioned illustrations from Dulac which they sold in an annual exhibition, while publishing rights to the paintings were taken up by Hodder & Stoughton for reproduction in illustrated gift books, publishing one book a year. Books produced under this arrangement by Dulac include Stories from The Arabian Nights in 1907 with 50 colour images; an edition of William Shakespeare's The Tempest in 1908 with 40 colour illustrations; The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam in 1909 with 20 colour images; The Sleeping Beauty and Other Fairy Tales in 1910; Stories from Hans Christian Andersen in 1911; The Bells and Other Poems by Edgar Allan Poe in 1912 with 28 colour images and many monotone illustrations; and Princess Badoura in 1913. He became a naturalized British citizen in 1912. During World War I he contributed to relief books, including King Albert's Book in 1914, Princess Mary's Gift Book, and, unusually, his own Edmund Dulac's Picture-Book for the French Red Cross in 1915 including 20 colour images. Hodder and Stoughton also published The Dreamer of Dreams in 1915 including 6 colour images - a work composed by the then Queen of Romania