The Townsend Journals: An Artist’s Record of his Times 1928-51 (Inscribed)

With warm presentation inscription to Leslie Martin (Cambridge Architect) by Townsend’s daughter, Charlotte Townsend. Also with a letter from her to the architect and his wife.

When William Townsend died in 1973, besides a considerable body of painting, he left behind him a vast quantity of writing, most of which had never been seen by anyone but himself. Andrew Forge has here edited a fascinating selection from nearly 50 volumes of Townsend’s manuscript Journals now in the care of the library of University College, London. While the main bulk cannot be made generally available until 1993, this book gives us a particularly vivid view of the artist and his world. As a whole the text can be seen as many things: a profoundly honest confession; an acute and sophisticated account of a professional career—with all the gossip and inside talk that implies; a succession of passionately detailed and feeling accounts of places and above all buildings seen; it is the critique of an intelligent and humane man upon his times. Three periods which seem to be of the greatest historical interest have been selected for this preliminary publication: the student years at the Slade, the late thirties and the first year of the War, and the teaching years of 1946 to 1951. Andrew Forge has contributed an informed and sympathetic introduction, and there are more than 100 illustrations throughout the text.

Condition: very good