Under the Hill, and Other Essays in Prose and Verse

by Aubrey Beardsley

Under the Hill, published six years after Beardsley’s death, is an extraordinary book: its text - his verse, letters and an unfinished novel - have more than an intrinsic literary fascination; its superb illustrations indicate new influences, new directions, in the artist’s work. In Under the Hill he was total master of his media and his subject matter, and words and pictures together demonstrate how frenetically and how fruitfully Beardsley developed his creative imagination during the brief time left to him before his tragically early death.

Genres: Poetry, Fiction, Literature

86 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1904

About the author

Highly individual black and white, often erotic drawings of British illustrator Aubrey Vincent Beardsley typified the art nouveau style.

Aubrey Vincent Beardsley identifies an English author. Japanese woodcuts influenced his executions in ink; he emphasized the grotesque, the decadent. This figure led in the aesthetic movement, which also included Oscar Wilde and James McNeill Whistler. Beardsley significantly contributed to the development of the poster movement despite the brevity of his career before tuberculosis caused his early death.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aubrey_...

Reviews

[Bruce Graham · Rating 3 out of 5]

Beardsley wanted to be a writer. He didn't make it. "Turner is only a rhetorician in paint," Beardsley declared. Rather than writing, Beardsley only draws in black and white. Oh, but how he draws!

I will go farther, and declare that Beardsley, by his grotesque and powerful pictures of several hideous phases or life, dealt a death blow to decadence. Had he lived till now, it is quite possible that the Royal Academy might have justified its existence by recognising in him the greatest exponent of the most vital of the graphic arts—namely, Black and White. Introduction, John Lane in Aubrey Beardsley. Under the Hill, and Other Essays in Prose and Verse, (London: John Lane, 1904). ..