Eleanor Vere Boyle (1825-1916) was born as Eleanor Gordon, the youngest daughter of Alexander Gordon, a descendant of the Duke of Ancaster. This Scottish illustrator married Reverend Richard Cavendish Boyle, a son of the Earl of Cork, at 20 years, had five children with him, and started an artistic career right after the birth of the first one. Reverend Boyle became a Chaplain of Queen Victoria and she became one of the most popular Victorian artists.
Sounds intriguing? Read on.
Her style was influenced by Albert Durer and the Pre-Raphaelites. It very much resembles the playful fascination with the imaginary fairy world of children like her contemporaries Richard (Dicky) Doyle and Kate Greenaway. She mostly used the initials E.V.B. to sign her work because the job of illustrating (or any kind of job) was not considered very appropriate for the Reverend's wife. Her earnings were often used for charity, for instance, to provide fresh water to the people from her parish. Her paintings were exhibited in different galleries in London.
She was not extremely prolific with about twenty published books in her lifetime. She wrote or rewrote several of them as well. The Beauty and the Beast is considered one of her finest works. Her approach to the text stayed pretty faithful to Madame de Villeneuve (with six, not three kids) but still relatively short (like Madame Leprince's) with a prolonged intro part praising the good virtues of Beauty. Boyle's most important addition to this classic work of literature for kids is definitely a portrayal of the Beast. As you will see, it's completely different from most depictions of other artists who generally decided to portray anthropomorphized beasts. Eleanor's picture of the Beast resembles some kind of walrus.
With the back cover, we conclude fifteen line drawings and ten full-color paintings by Eleanor Vere Boyle for Beauty and the Beast. Some scenes may look strange but, please don't forget that this story is originally relatively long and that the publisher demanded decorative elements even if the story didn't have enough scenes for satisfactory illustration. Anyways, all presented graphics clearly display EVB's huge talent.
The presented book was very likely published in 1875 (date is not printed) by Sampson Low, Marston, Low, and Searle and printed by R. Clay, Sons, and Taylor in London. It has ten color plates and sixteen line drawings by E.V.B. on 51 pages altogether. The scan of the book is available at the Osborne Collection in the digital branch of Toronto Public Library.
