The Story of E.H. Shepard: The Man Who Drew Pooh

by Arthur R. Chandler

A richly illustrated biography of one of the foremost children’s book artists of the 20th century, who gained international fame as the illustrator of Winnie–the–Pooh. Beautifully produced with more than 150 examples of his work.

Genres: Biography

192 pages, Hardcover

First published March 15, 2001

Reviews

[Natalie (CuriousReader)]

Rather than being a biography of the illustrator and artist, Ernest H. Shepard, and his long life working with many illustrious and well-known figures of the 20th century; this book is an art collection, with companion text as a kind of general time-line to which each art piece can be placed in its correct historical context. The book opens up with the disclaimer that Ernest Shepard himself wished for no biography to be written about him, until thirty years after his death. It is likely this is the reason that the book itself rarely delves very deep into the person behind the artist, the mind behind the art. Arthur R Chandler has been given access and right to share some of the sketches, art work, photographs, and even some documents that now belong to the University of Surrey. Within the book’s pages we find things such as diplomas of military service, personal notes of Shepard himself, photographs of him and his family members, as well as many of his art pieces. This book is first and foremost a kind of coffee table book, although it does contain quite a bit of text along-side it.

Full Review: https://weneedhunny.wordpress.com/201...

[Laine Calhoun · Rating 3 out of 5]

The works by E.H. Shepard in this are fantastic to look through. Having lived and worked over such a long period of time, you see a changing world through the eyes -- and pen -- of one man. I will say the writing is a bit rough around the edges: sometimes it reads like a 15-year-old student with a word count to hit and sometimes the author draws conclusions from Shepard's words or actions that feel unsupported.

It's hilarious how in the introduction the author notes that, since Shepard requested no biographies be written about him for thirty years after his death, the book isn't a biography but a "look through the University of Surrey archives." And it just happens to detail Shepard's life in chronological order "as context." According to the book the archive holds boxes of letters by Shepard as well as sketches, so honestly I feel the book would've been better if it let Shepard speak for himself through his letters. And if more sketches were included in general. ALSO the last third of the book textually is almost literally a print out of Shepard's bibliography.

TLDR: Illustrations = great, wish there were more. Text = needs work.

[Carrie Cantalupo-Sharp · Rating 5 out of 5]

Lovely book about a lovely man/husband/father.

[PJ Ebbrell · Rating 4 out of 5]

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/2... one complaint about this book was how did E H Shepard become friends with Harry Stopes-Roe?

Easily readable account with lots of great illustrations.