"The Haunted Man atTetterby's" — Charles Green's sixteenth illustration for "The Haunted Man" (1895, 1912)

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The Haunted Man at Tetterby's

Charles Green

1895 & 1912

12.1 x 6 cm, vignetted

Dickens's The Haunted Man and The Ghost's Bargain. A Fancy for Christmas Time, The Pears' Centenary Edition, V, 77.

Context of the Illustration: “The good woman, quite carried away by her honest tenderness and remorse, was weeping with all her heart, when she started up with a scream, and ran behind her husband. Her cry was so terrified, that the children started from their sleep and from their beds, and clung about her. Nor did her gaze belie her voice, as she pointed to a pale man in a black cloak who had come into the room.

"Look at that man! Look there! What does he want?" . . . I saw him in the street, when I was out just now. He looked at me, and stood near me. I am afraid of him." ["Chapter Two: The Gift Diffused," 76-78]

[Click on the images to enlarge them.]

Scanned image and text by Philip V. Allingham.

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Commentary

The caption immediately below the illustration points explains it: "A pale man in a black cloak had come into the room" (77, adapted from 77above). The bare caption does not reveal, however, that Redlaw is seen from Sophia Tetterby’s perspective. Since she has already encountered Redlaw while out marketing, Mrs. Tetterby acts under the baneful influence of Redlaw's "double." For instance, she has expressed doubts about the wisdom of having married the small newsagent with the small income. In providing a closeup of Redlaw, Green does not, contrary to the double-page illustration by John Tenniel in the original 1848 sequence, Illustrated Double-Page to Chap. II (see below), show Redlaw juxtaposed against the Tetterbys. Whereas Redlaw, "diffusing" the dubious gift of the Spirit, has an ominous appearance in the earlier narrative-pictorial sequences, here he is merely a middle-aged, middle-class professional in a black cloak and hat — albeit, wearing a slightly pensive look as he draws his cloak across himself. Green employs the cloak to signal Redlaw's spiritual and social alienation, his emotional apartness, as he consciously attempts to isolate himself from others.

Left: Tenniel's study of Redlaw's effect on Sophia Tetterby, Illustrated Double-Page to Chap. II (1848). Right: Furniss's opening study of the professor and his double: The Phantom (1910).

Although previous illustrators have studied the Haunted Man's relationships with other characters and have offered such dual studies of Redlaw and his Doppelganger as Furniss's The Phantom, Green's naturalistic portrait of the chemistry professor presents him as sensitive and introspective rather than possessed and intensely depressed; however, Green admirably implies Redlaw's social and emotional alienation by and shows him standing apart, by himself.

Relevant illustrations from the 1848 and Later Editions

Left: Leech's "Redlaw and the Phantom and, centre, Tenniel's "Redlaw on the Landing" (1848). Right: Darley's As he leaned his arm upon the elbow of his chair, ruminating before the fire (1861).

Left: Eytinge's Redlaw and The Boy (1867). Centre: Barnard's study of the student Denham'sominousvisitor, "Mr. Redlaw!" he exclaimed, and started up (1878). Right: Abbey's "Mr. Redlaw!" he exclaimed, and started up (1876).

Left: Barnard's "You speak to me of what is lying here," the Phantom interposed (1878). Centre: Furniss's The Phantom (1910). Right: Dixon's small-scaleversionof the scene in which thefamily, including Mrs. Tetterby, react with trepidation to the arrival of the cloaked stranger, The good woman ran behind her husband (1906).

Illustrations for the Other Volumes of the Pears' Centenary Christmas Books of Charles Dickens (1912)

Each contains about thirty illustrations from original drawings by Charles Green, R. I. — Clement Shorter [1912]

A Christmas Carol (28 plates) Vol. I (1892)
The Chimes (31 plates) Vol. II (1894)
L. Rossi's The Cricket on the Hearth (22 plates) Vol. III (1912)
The Battle of Life (28 plates) Vol. IV (1893)

Bibliography

Cohen, Jane Rabb. "The Illustrators of the Christmas Books, John Leech." Charles Dickens and His Original Illustrators. Columbus: University of Ohio Press, 1981. 141-151.

Dickens, Charles. Christmas Books. Illustrated by Sol Eytinge, Jr. The Diamond Edition. Boston: Ticknor and Fields, 1867.

_____. Christmas Books, illustrated by Fred Barnard. Household Edition. London: Chapman and Hall, 1878.

_____. Christmas Books, illustrated by A. A. Dixon. London & Glasgow: Collins' Clear-Type Press, 1906.

_____. Christmas Books. Illustrated by Harry Furniss. The Charles Dickens Library Edition. London: Educational Book, 1910.

_____. Christmas Stories. Illustrated by E. A. Abbey. The Household Edition. New York: Harper and Brothers, 1876.

_____. The Haunted Man; or, The Ghost's Bargain. Illustrated by John Leech, Frank Stone, John Tenniel, and Clarkson Stanfield. London: Bradbury and Evans, 1848.

_____. The Haunted Man. Illustrated by John Leech, Frank Stone, John Tenniel, and Clarkson Stanfield. (1848). Rpt. in Charles Dickens's Christmas Books, ed. Michael Slater. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1971, rpt. 1978. II, 235-362, 365-366.

_____. The Haunted Man. Christmas Stories. Illustrated by Felix Octavius Carr Darley. The Household Edition. New York: James G. Gregory, 1861. II, 155-300.

_____. The Haunted Man and The Ghost's Bargain. A Fancy for Christmas Time. Illustrated by Charles Green, R. I. (1895). London: A & F Pears, 1912.

Frye, Lowell T. "Times, The." The Victorian Encyclopedia. Ed. Sally Mitchell. New York and London: Garland, 1988. 805-806.

Created 12 July 2015

Last modified 9 April 2020