"Joe Willet and Dolly Varden" by Sol Eytinge

Joe Willet and Dolly Varden

Sol Eytinge

Wood engraving, approximately 10.1 cm high by 7.5 cm wide (framed), facing p. 147.

Sixth illustration for Dickens's Barnaby Rudge in the single volume Barnaby Rudge and Hard Times in the Ticknor & Fields (Boston, 1867) Diamond Edition.

In this sixth full-page illustration, Eytinge provides a dual character study of the romantic leads. Here, a diffident Joe Willet bids a reluctant farewell to the village beauty, Dolly Varden, in chapter 31. [Commentary continues below.]

Scanned image and text by Philip V. Allingham.

[You may use these images without prior permission for any scholarly or educational purpose as long as you (1) credit the photographer and (2) link your document to this URL in a web document or cite the Victorian Web in a print one.]

Having the benefit of being able to study Phiz's original depiction of the parting between Joe and Dolly in the seventeenth number (5 June 1841 weekly part) of the novel from its serialisation in Master Humphrey's Clock, Sol Eytinge chose to focus almost exclusively on the youthful couple themselves, making the heroine more attractive and less self-centred than she appears in "Joe Bids Dolly Good-bye," and offering only a suggestion of where the parting occurs, namely the locksmith's shop. As in the text, Joe holds his hat in one hand and his bundle in the other, as he prepares to set off in search of glory and wealth as an enlistee in the King's army:

Dolly hesitated to lead the way into the parlour, for there it was nearly dark; at the same time she hesitated to stand talking in the workshop, which was yet light and open to the street. They had got by some means, too, before the little forge; and Joe having her hand in his (which he had no right to have, for Dolly only gave it him to shake), it was so like standing before some homely altar being married, that it was the most embarrassing state of things in the world.

"I have come,' said Joe, "to say good-bye — to say good-bye for I don't know how many years; perhaps for ever. I am going abroad."

Now this was exactly what he should not have said. Here he was, talking like a gentleman at large who was free to come and go and roam about the world at pleasure, when that gallant coachmaker had vowed but the night before that Miss Varden held him bound in adamantine chains; and had positively stated in so many words that she was killing him by inches, and that in a fortnight more or thereabouts he expected to make a decent end and leave the business to his mother.

Dolly released her hand and said "Indeed!" She remarked in the same breath that it was a fine night, and in short, betrayed no more emotion than the forge itself.

"I couldn't go," said Joe, "without coming to see you. I hadn't the heart to." [ch. 31, p. 147]

Like Phiz, Eytinge shows Dolly's capacious skirts, exactly as Dickens describes them, but adds a symbol of her coquettish nature, the rose she holds in her left hand.

Bibliography

Bentley, Nicolas, Michael Slater, and Nina Burgis. The Dickens Index. Oxford and New York: Oxford U. P., 1988.

Davis, Paul. Charles Dickens A to Z: The Essential Reference to His Life and Work. New York: Checkmark and Facts On File, 1998.

Dickens, Charles. Barnaby Rudge and Hard Times. Il. Sol Eytinge, Jr. Boston: Ticknor and Fields, 1867.

Last modified 7 November 2011