"Mr. Bob Sawyer's boy . . . . peeped through the glass door" — thirty-eighth illustration by Phiz for Dickens's "Pickwick Papers" (1874)

Mr. Bob Sawyer's boy . . . . peeped through the glass door, and thus listened and looked on at the same time, etc. (See page 269.) by Phiz (Hablot K. Browne) on page 273 in the Household Edition (1874) of Dickens's Posthumous Papers of the Pickwick Club, Chapter XXXVIII, “How Mr. Winkle, when he stepped out of the frying-pan, walked gently and comfortably into the Fire.” Wood-engraving, 4 ¼ inches high by 5 ½ inches wide (11 cm high by 14.1 cm wide), framed, half-page; descriptive headline: "Professional Conviviality" (p. 269). [Click on the illustration to enlarge it.]

Passage Illustrated: Bob Sawyer's "Conviviality" Revisited

There was no singing, because Mr. Bob Sawyer said it wouldn’t look professional; but to make amends for this deprivation there was so much talking and laughing that it might have been heard, and very likely was, at the end of the street. Which conversation materially lightened the hours and improved the mind of Mr. Bob Sawyer’s boy, who, instead of devoting the evening to his ordinary occupation of writing his name on the counter, and rubbing it out again, peeped through the glass door, and thus listened and looked on at the same time. [Chapter XXXVIII, “How Mr. Winkle, when he stepped out of the frying-pan, walked gently and comfortably into the Fire,” 269]

Commentary: Picaresque Characters added for the sake of Character Comedy

Travelling medical students Ben Allen and Bob Sawyer made their initial appearance in Chapter XXX, when old Mr. Wardle introduces Pickwick to the hedonistic pair of bachelors. The scene of the party in the back room of the apothecary shop that the pair have opened in Bristol, but which is running on a shoestring because Sawyer, the dispensing physician, and Allen, the prescription chemist, have been far too generous in extending credit to their working class customers. Apparently the needy clients are not put off by the name of the dispensary, "late Nockemorf" (as in, "nock 'em off").

The basis for this 1874 composite woodblock engraving of the drinking scene in the apothecaries' back-parlour is clearly Conviviality at Bob Sawyer's (May 1837). The scene's ingredients seem identical: the skull on the mantlepiece, the observant shop-boy, and the youthful middle-class tipplers' sharing a toast. Of course, as the 1874 series is in the new, realistic mode of the Sixties' School, the figures are better modelled, and there is some aerial perspective in Phiz's rendering of the parlour. There are, however, some differences in content and composition. Ben Allen (in spectacles) and his lanky business partner are no longer Cruikshankian grotesques "under the influence," and Phiz has moved the curious observer of the revel from a window at the centre to a much smaller window at the right. The bookcase to the left now holds more tomes, and the fireplace occupies a central place in the theatrical set, rather than crammed into the right margin. More significantly, the romantic hero, Nathaniel Winkle (now soberly centre) does not smoke a cigar. Even the punch bowl has shrunk! Here, then, the bibulous conviviality is far more restrained, although still hardly "professional."

The Various Depictions of Bob Sawyer and Ben Allen in Other Editions (1837-1910)

Left: Thomas Nast's American Household Edition's engraving for the Chapter XXXV, "Bless my soul," everybody says, "somebody taken suddenly ill! Sawyer, late Nockemorf, sent for!" (1873). Right: Thomas Onwhyn's "extra" steel engraving for Chapter L (April 1837) shows Mr. Winkle, Sr., interviewing Bob Sawyer and Ben Allen: Mr. Bob Sawyer whose wit had lain dormant. . . .. [Click on the images to enlarge them.]

Left: Harry Furniss's version of the aftermath of the apothecaries' entertaining Winkle: for Bob Sawyer's Party (1910). Right: Phiz's Household Edition original May 1837 steel engraving, Conviviality at Bob Sawyer's. [Click on the images to enlarge them.]

Related Material

Other artists who illustrated this work, 1836-1910

Scanned images and text by Philip V. Allingham. Formatting by George P. Landow. [You may use the images without prior permission for any scholarly or educational purpose as long as you (1) credit the person who scanned them and (2) link your document to this URL in a web document or cite the Victorian Web in a print one.]

Bibliography

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Cohen, Jane Rabb. Charles Dickens and His Original Illustrators. Columbus: Ohio State U. P., 1980.

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

Dickens, Charles. The Posthumous Papers of the Pickwick Club. Illustrated by Robert Seymour, Robert Buss, and Phiz. London: Chapman and Hall, November 1837. With 32 additional illustrations by Thomas Onwhyn (London: E. Grattan, April-November 1837).

_____. Posthumous Papers of the Pickwick Club. Frontispieces by Felix Octavius Carr Darley and Sir John Gilbert. The Household Edition. 55 vols. New York: Sheldon & Co., 1863. 4 vols.

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_____. Posthumous Papers of the Pickwick Club. Illustrated by Hablot Knight Browne ('Phiz'). The Household Edition. 22 vols. London: Chapman and Hall, 1874. Vol. 5.

_____. Posthumous Papers of the Pickwick Club. Illustrated by Harry Furniss. The Charles Dickens Library Edition. 18 vols. London: Educational Book, 1910. Vol. 2.

_____. Posthumous Papers of the Pickwick Club. Illustrated by Sol Eytinge, Jr. The Diamond Edition. 14 vols. Boston: Ticknor & Fields, 1867. Vol. 1.

_______. Posthumous Papers of the Pickwick Club. Illustrated by Thomas Nast. The Household Edition. 16 vols. New York: Harper and Brothers, 1873. Vol. 4.

_______. Posthumous Papers of the Pickwick Club. Illustrated by Hablot Knight Browne ('Phiz'). The Household Edition. 22 vols. London: Chapman and Hall, 1874. Vol. 6.

_______. Posthumous Papers of the Pickwick Club. Illustrated by Harry Furniss. The Charles Dickens Library Edition. 18 vols. London: Educational Book, 1910. Vol. 2.

Guiliano, Edward, and Philip Collins, eds. The Annotated Dickens. 2 vols. New York: Clarkson N. Potter, 1986. Vol. I.

Steig, Michael. Chapter 2. "The Beginnings of 'Phiz': Pickwick, Nickleby, and the Emergence from Caricature." Dickens and Phiz. Bloomington & London: Indiana U. P., 1978. 24-50.

Created 10 March 2012

Last modified 25 April 2024