"The dressing-room door being hastily flung open, Mr. Mantalini was disclosed to view, with his shirt collar symmetrically thrown back: putting a fine edge to a breakfast knife by means of his razor strop." — Barnard's twentieth illustration for "Nicholas Nickleby" (1875)

The dressing-room door being hastily flung open, Mr. Mantalini was disclosed to view, with his shirt collar symmetrically thrown back: putting a fine edge to a breakfast knife by means of his razor strop. — Chap. xxi, p. 133, from the Household Edition of Charles Dickens's The Life and Adventures of Nicholas Nickleby, illustrated by Fred Barnard with fifty-nine composite woodblock engravings (1875). 10.7 cm high by 13.7 cm wide (4 ⅛ by 5 ⅜ inches), framed. Running head: "Remorse of Mr. Mantalini" (133). [Click on the images to enlarge them.]

Passage Illustrated: Mantalini's Melodramatic Gesture

"Miss Nickleby," cried Madame Mantalini, when this sound met her ear, "make haste, for Heaven’s sake, he will destroy himself! I spoke unkindly to him, and he cannot bear it from me. Alfred, my darling Alfred."

With such exclamations, she hurried upstairs, followed by Kate who, although she did not quite participate in the fond wife’s apprehensions, was a little flurried, nevertheless. The dressing-room door being hastily flung open, Mr. Mantalini was disclosed to view, with his shirt-collar symmetricallythrown back: putting a fine edge to a breakfast knife by means of his razor strop.

"Ah!" cried Mr. Mantalini, "interrupted!" and whisk went the breakfast knife into Mr. Mantalini’s dressing-gown pocket, while Mr. Mantalini’s eyes rolled wildly, and his hair floating in wild disorder, mingled with his whiskers.

"Alfred," cried his wife, flinging her arms about him, "I didn’t mean to say it, I didn’t mean to say it!"

"Ruined!" cried Mr. Mantalini. "Have I brought ruin upon the best and purest creature that ever blessed a demnition vagabond! Demmit, let me go." At this crisis of his ravings Mr. Mantalini made a pluck at the breakfast knife, and being restrained by his wife’s grasp, attempted to dash his head against the wall — taking very good care to be at least six feet from it.

"Compose yourself, my own angel," said Madame. "It was nobody’s fault; it was mine as much as yours, we shall do very well yet. Come, Alfred, come."

Mr. Mantalini did not think proper to come to, all at once; but, after calling several times for poison, and requesting some lady or gentleman to blow his brains out, gentler feelings came upon him, and he wept pathetically. In this softened frame of mind he did not oppose the capture of the knife — which, to tell the truth, he was rather glad to be rid of, as an inconvenient and dangerous article for a skirt pocket — and finally he suffered himself to be led away by his affectionate partner. [Chapter XXI, "Madam Mantalini finds herself in a Situation of some Difficulty, and Miss Nickleby finds herself in no Situation at all," 133-134]

Commentary: A Dysfunctional Marriage

Although she is a highly competent businesswoman, Mayfair dressmaker Madame Mantalini often fails to see through her handsome ne'er-do-well "foreign" husband's blandishments. Alfred (Muntle) Mantalini, a wastral and a spendthrift, has become entangled in Ralph Nicklbey's financial snares, as his personal extravagances result in his wife's business going into bankruptcy. The arrival of a pair of debt-collectors (Tix and Scaley) at Madame Mantalini's West End dress and millinery shop triggers a financial and a domestic crisis. However, Mantalini uses his flamboyant theatricality to elicit his wife's sympathy, although Dickens explodes the notion of a genuine suicide attempt by Mantalini's employing a breakfast knife.

Mantalini's profligate attitude may be a reflection of John Dickens's carelessness about money. However, with his cavalier manner, emotional excesses, and his unprincipled exploitation of his doting wife, Alfred Mantalini is a Dickens original. Barnard gives him a foreign air by giving him an elegant silk dressing-gown, matching trousers, shaggy beard, and undisciplined hair. He seems frantic, but of course this is a studied pose.

Other Editions' Versions of The Elegant but Over-the-top Italianate Husband

Left: Phiz plays up another element of the Mantalini farce, the arrival of the debt-collector: The Professional Gentlemen at Madame Mantalini's (October 1838). Right: Barnard's version of the same scene in the American Household Edition: >"Ah!" cried Mr. Mantalini, "interrupted!" (1875).

Left: Sol Eytinge, Jr.'s American Diamond Editioncomposite woodblock dual portrait of the comi couple: Mr. and Madame Mantalini (1867). Right: Harry Furniss's 1910 lithographic portrait of the florid pseudo-Italian: Mr. Alfred Mantalini, in the Charles Dickens Library Edition.

Related material, including front matter and sketches, by other illustrators

Scanned image, colour correction, sizing, caption, and commentary by Philip V. Allingham. [You may use this image without prior permission for any scholarly or educational purpose, as long as you (1) credit the person who scanned the image, and (2) link your document to this URL in a web document or cite the Victorian Web in a print one.]

Bibliography

Barnard, J. "Fred" (il.). Charles Dickens's Nicholas Nickleby, with fifty-eight illustrations. The Works of Charles Dickens: The Household Edition. 22 vols. London: Chapman and Hall, 1875. Volume 15. Rpt. 1890.

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: Facts On File, 1998.

Dickens, Charles. The Life and Adventures of Nicholas Nickleby. With fifty-two illustrations by C. S. Reinhart. The Household Edition. New York: Harper & Brothers, 1872. I.

__________. Nicholas Nickleby. With 39 illustrations by Hablot K. Browne ("Phiz"). London: Chapman & Hall, 1839.

__________. Nicholas Nickleby. Illustrated by Harry Furniss. The Charles Dickens Library Edition. 18 vols. London: Educational Book, 1910. Vol. 4.

__________. "Nicholas Nickleby." Scenes and Characters from the Works of Charles Dickens, being eight hundred and sixty-six drawings by Fred Barnard et al.. Household Edition. London: Chapman and Hall, 1908.

Created 29 July 2021