Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam illustrated by George T. Tobin, was first published by Frederick A. Stokes Company, New York, in 1899 as one of their “Collection of Masterpieces” series. Using FitzGerald’s third version it contained 20 illustrations by Tobin, many of which are well executed but rather unimaginative. Thus Fig.1a illustrates the famous quatrain 12 (“And Thou beside me singing in the Wilderness”); Fig.1b, quatrain 37 (“Gently, Brother, gently pray!”); Fig.1c, quatrain 81 (“And ev’n with Paradise devise the Snake”); and Fig.1d, quatrain 100 (“Through this same Garden – and for one in vain!”) Other illustrations, though, are more imaginative.
Thus, Fig.1e illustrates quatrain 24 (“Sans Wine, sans Song, sans Singer and – sans End!”) and depicts a young woman (singer ?) at the entrance to a tomb, with what seems to be a lyre with broken strings beside her (= sans song ?)
Fig.1f illustrates quatrain 31 (“And many a Knot unravell’d by the Road; But not the Master–knot of Human Fate”) and depicts an old man (at the entrance to a sealed tomb ?) contemplating a young infant next to a flourishing plant of some kind: the Philosopher contemplating Life from Birth to the Grave, perhaps.
Fig.1g illustrates quatrain 44 (“Why, if the Soul can fling the Dust aside”.) It shows the soul of a young woman shedding her robe and escaping heavenward so as to “naked on the Air of Heaven ride.” Her abandoned dead body is symbolised by the broken pot beneath her (“this clay carcase.”)
Fig.1h illustrates quatrain 64 (“Not one returns to tell us of the Road”) and seems to depict an old man about to enter his tomb (“the door of Darkness”), preceded by the dark figure of Death. The old man seems to be holding the door open for Death with his left hand, whilst holding on to a doorpost with his right, perhaps indicating a welcoming of Death’s release at the same time as a reluctance to leave Life and set out on a one–way journey into the Unknown.
Fig.1i illustrates quatrain 68 (“A moving row of Magic Shadow–shapes that come and go”) The moving row is here represented by Man developing from a child, through adulthood, to old age, and thence descending into oblivion.
Fig.1j illustrates quatrain 71 (“The Moving Finger writes; and having writ, Moves on”), with the moving finger here not literally writing but seemingly conveying the cyclic nature of things by tracing out a circle.
[The illustrations can be browsed here.]
As Paas notes (##4194–4211), though the first edition of the Tobin Rubaiyat appeared in 1899 and was dated, it was reprinted in a variety of bindings up until 1918, some seemingly undated – hence, I presume, the dating of Potter #209 to [1906].
At Christmas 1900 Frederick A. Stokes issued an Omar Khayyam calendar. The following notice is from The New York Tribune, 15 December 1900 (p.17):
Sooner or later the cult for Omar Khayyam was bound to be recognized outside the sphere in which new editions of him, with commentaries, are prepared. Frederick A. Stokes Company is in the field with an “Omar Khayyam Calendar,” an affair of six pages, each bearing a quatrain and an illustration by Mr. George T. Tobin.
These are extremely rare today and I have never seen one, or even seen one mentioned other than in contemporary newspapers. In fact, as The New York Times reported (22 December 1900, p.29), the Omar Khayyam Calendar was only one among a number of other calendars issued by Frederick A. Stokes, these including “A Calendar of Notable Art,” “The Society Girl Calendar” (with illustrations by Archie Gunn) and “A Calendar of Favorite Actresses.”
Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam was one of at least four books illustrated by Tobin for Stokes (1). Another three were Our National Songs and Kipling’s Recessional, both published in 1898, and Dickens’ A Christmas Carol, published in 1899. All three were in the “Collection of Masterpieces” series.
Our National Songs contained 20 illustrations by Tobin, and predictably enough, given the title, followed a traditional and patriotic path. Two examples will suffice to give the gist of the whole: Fig.2a is one of the illustrations for “The Star–Spangled Banner” (p.23) and Fig.2b one of those for “Dixie” (p.119).
Recessional contained 20 illustrations by W. St. John Harper as well as Tobin, of which 14 were by Tobin. This short poem of five verses was originally commissioned to celebrate the Diamond Jubilee of Queen Victoria in 1897, and was initially published in The Times in London on 17 July of that year. It was unusual for Kipling, for although he was still in Queen and Empire mode – the English are God’s Chosen People with “Dominion over palm and pine” – he now sounded a cautionary note (“Lest we forget”) – for that dominion may crumble, and the British Empire end like “Nineveh and Tyre”, defunct. Again, many of Tobin’s illustrations are routine, but some show more imagination. Thus Fig.3a illustrates the line “The Captains and the Kings depart” in verse 2, the transience of earthly power being represented by the ghost of Napoleon gazing down into a desolate chasm; Fig.3b (Nineveh) & Fig.3c (Tyre) illustrate the lines “Lo, all our pomp of yesterday / Is one with Nineveh and Tyre” in verse 3, the transience of empires being represented by contrasting images of Nineveh in its heyday and Tyre fallen into ruin and decay; and Fig.3d illustrates the line “Drunk with sight of power” in verse 4 and shows modern day imperialists worshiping an illuminated Lion and Orb, representing the British Empire, the Houses of Parliament in the background.
A Christmas Carol contained 20 illustrations by Tobin, and was brought out in time for Christmas 1899, “in a tiny volume that is intended to take the place of the old-fashioned Christmas card,” as a notice in the New York newspaper The Buffalo Commercial put it (23 November 1899, p.6.) Fig.4a shows Scrooge confronted by the ghost of Jacob Marley (p.25); Fig.4b the Ghost of Christmas Present (p.61); and Fig.4c the Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come leading Scrooge to view his own future grave (p.108.)
[The illustrations can be browsed here.]
George Timothy Tobin was born in Weybridge, Vermont on 26 July 1863. His father, William Tobin, was born in Ireland; his mother, Mary Ann Tobin (née O’Flannigan – spellings vary), was born in Vermont, of Irish parents. George was the youngest of their five children (2) – he had three brothers (Theobald, William & Wallace) and a sister (Jessie). An obituary of his mother, which appeared on the front page of the Vermont newspaper The Swanton Courier on 5 November 1914 gives us a good snapshot of the family background, and gives us some useful information about Tobin’s father, William, as well as about his mother:
Mrs. Mary A. Tobin, ill for several months, died last evening at the home of her daughter, Mrs F. E. Rogers, aged 88 years. She had been a resident of Swanton a long time, most of these years, until three years ago, making her home with her son Wallace. She was born in New Haven, Vermont, and her father was Timothy O’Flannigan, born in New Castle, Ireland, and her mother was Phichea Porter of Puritan ancestry, born in Great Barrington, Mass. Her husband, William Tobin, well remembered by some of our readers, died in Swanton twenty–eight years ago. The surviving members of the family are, T.M. Tobin and Mrs Jessie Tobin Rogers of this place and Geo. T. Tobin, artist of New York. Will Tobin, another son, for some years a resident of Swanton, died at South Paris, Maine, in 1886 and Wallace Tobin dropped dead at Vergennes three years ago. Lyman Tobin, a grandson, is in New York and little Wallace is with his mother in Ipswich, Mass. Philip Tobin, a grandson, is in Montreal. An only sister, Mrs S.S.Waugh of Middlebury, died several years ago.
Her girlhood and much of her married life was passed in Weybridge at what was known as “Paper Mill Village,” just across the Middlebury line, where her father and husband were engaged for years in the manufacture of linseed oil and print paper industries that her father in particular built up, making that locality an important manufacturing center for the times.
She was a great reader of good literature, well informed on affairs of the day, artistic in taste and possessing much strength of character. Failing in health for several months she was a patient sufferer but for several days before death came she was quite comfortable retaining her mental faculties in a marked degree until she dropped peacefully away into that sleep that knows no wakening.
By way of explanation, after the fashion of the time, “Mrs F. E. Rogers” uses the initials of Jessie’s husband, Fred E. Rogers – hence the “Mrs. Jessie Tobin Rogers” later in the obituary. T.M. Tobin is Theobald, of course.
As for George T. Tobin, he died in Swanton, Vermont on 5 May 1956, at the ripe old age of 92. By the time of his death, he was famous enough to merit an obituary in many newspapers, and that given in the Vermont newspaper The Burlington Free Press on Monday 7 May 1956 (p.11) gives a useful summary of his life and career:
St. Albans. May 6 – George Timothy Tobin, 92, retired artist, died at the Boucher Nursing Home in Swanton, Saturday evening.
As a young boy he moved to Swanton from Weybridge, where he was born on July 26, 1863. Mr Tobin has made his home with his niece, Mrs. Bert Vail, in St. Albans, for the past five years.
A native of Weybridge, he was educated in public schools, going to New York in 1880 to work for an importing firm. Later he studied under George DeForest Brush at the Art Students League and taught art at the Ethical Culture School and the Browning School.
As a painter Tobin did portraits from life of Woodrow Wilson, Theodore Roosevelt, Charles Dana Gibson, Harvard President Charles T. Eliot, and Chief Justice Charles Evans Hughes. Other portraits include Lady Randolph Churchill, Nicholas Murray Butler, and Pope Pius X.
A freelance illustrator with studio in New Rochelle for many years, he did illustrations for Century, Scribners, The Lamp, St. Nicholas and numerous other national magazines. Books Tobin illustrated were editions of Omar Khayyam, Siegfried and Beowulf, Kipling’s Recessional and many others.
Turning to a new medium in the 1930’s he produced a series of dry point etchings of nudes acclaimed for their spiritual quality. His work in dry points is in permanent collection at the Smithsonian Institution in Washington.
Other work included a series of religious pictures for the Methodist Book Concern and other publishing houses.
Tobin exhibited at Grand Central Galleries for many years. He was a life member of the Art Students League, a member of the American Artists Professional League and honorary member of the New Rochelle Art Association.
Enlisting in the U.S. Army in 1918, he served in the Quartermaster Corps, and was credited with being the oldest private volunteer in Service in World War I.
In 1895 he married Marie Jacquenot, of France, who died in 1916.
Besides his niece, Mrs. Bert Vail of St. Albans, he is survived by three nephews, Lyman Tobin of Swanton, Donald Tobin of Richmond, and Wallace Tobin of Vineyard Haven, Mass.
A portrait of Tobin done in 1931 is shown in Fig.5a and a photograph of him at his dry point press, dating from 1934, in Fig.5b. Quite why Tobin’s use of dry point led to a series of pictures of nudes is not clear, and what makes these nudes more spiritual than any other nude is likewise not clear. Whilst “Solace” (Fig.6a) and “Contemplation” (Fig.6b) are arguably spiritual in conception – in the former the girl is presumably being offered solace by the ethereal robed figure with outstretched arms; the latter is perhaps related to Eve in Fig.1c – it is difficult to see what is spiritual about “Ginkgo” (Fig.6c) and “Reverie” (Fig.6d). Nevertheless, all are skilfully done and though arguably of a titillating nature, they are hardly pornographic – indeed “Solace” was chosen for inclusion in the 1935 edition of Fine Prints of the Year, and it and “Contemplation” were exhibited together at the annual Illustrators’ Exhibition of the New Rochelle Art Association in that same year. Also, of course, Fig.1g is a precursor to this phase of Tobin’s work.
[The illustrations can be browsed here.]
Of Tobin’s portraits, that of Theodore Roosevelt (Fig.7a) is shown here. This portrait was one done from life, as the above–quoted obituary tells us, and it was done especially for the book Theodore Roosevelt the Citizen by Jacob A. Riis (The Outlook Company, New York, 1904.) But Tobin also did portraits from photographs, or other sources, for publication in magazines. That of Pope Pius X, which was the frontispiece of the March 1904 issue of The Century magazine was based on a small snapshot taken of the Pope when, as the Patriarch of Venice, he passed by some unknown cameraman in the Procession of Corpus Christi. This is shown in Fig.7b. Again, Tobin did a portrait of Queen Victoria for Harper’s Bazar (issue of 16 February 1901), and this is shown in Fig.7c. It was used as the frontispiece of an article by Margaret Hamilton Welch, titled “Victoria as Queen and Woman” (the queen had died on 22 January 1901, remember, and numerous drawings and photographs of her had appeared in the press at that time which might have served as Tobin’s ‘model’.) Previously for Harper’s Bazar (issue of 27 October 1900), Tobin had done the imagined portrait of Cleopatra shown in Fig.7d. This was used as the frontispiece to an article about the queen by Margaret Deland, and one wonders whether Tobin had actually read it before he did his illustration, for as the author says, about the only evidence we have of what Cleopatra actually looked like comes from the coins issued in her reign, and though the portraits on these do vary, they do generally agree that Cleopatra was rather plain, and with something of a hooked nose! But then beauty is in the eye of beholder, as the saying goes, and particularly in Imperial Roman eyes, it seems. As Deland says, “It is curious how the world’s imagination creates beauty in connection with power and with sin – at least in women.” One of my favourites of Tobin’s portraits, though, is that of the elderly John Ruskin, which featured in the May 1904 issue of The Lamp (the literary magazine, not the Catholic magazine of the same name.) This is shown in Fig.7e. (It is very like a photograph of Ruskin taken by Sarah Acland in 1893.)
Also for magazines, almost as a follow–up to illustrating The Rubaiyat, Tobin illustrated at least three poems for The Cosmopolitan magazine, the most notable example being Richard Le Gallienne’s poem “From a Lover’s Note Book”, which featured in the issue of June 1905 (3). The last of its three pages (Fig.8) gives the style and flavour of the whole.
Tobin also did his fair share of magazine covers. Just two examples are shown here, though many others could be cited: The Housewife (July 1909) in Fig.9a; and McCall’s Magazine (January 1912) in Fig.9b.
[The illustrations can be browsed here.]
As regards Tobin’s army career, not only was he the oldest private volunteer, he must also have been one of the shortest serving. Army records reveal that he enlisted on 14 September 1918 and was discharged on 19 December 1918.
One of the more unusual projects in which Tobin was involved occurred in 1923 when he was one of a group of ten local artists commissioned to design new street signs for the ten main routes into New Rochelle. In accordance with its Huguenot origins in 1688, Tobin’s sign depicted, in silhouette, the arrival of a boat load of Huguenots at the site of their future settlement. The illustration of it in Fig.10 is taken from The Kansas City Star (issue of 20 June 1923, p.15.)
The next event worthy of note is the theft of some of his art–work in 1934. Under the heading “Tobin Works Stolen From Print Studio: Discriminating Thief Picks Out Local Man’s Sketches” an article in the New Rochelle newspaper The Standard–Star (issue of 13 January 1934, p.2) read thus:
Robbers with discrimination entered a New York print shop this week and selected among other things for their loot, three nude sketches and five dry points, the work of George T. Tobin, artist and illustrator of New Rochelle.
Mr Tobin had only one other picture in the shop and that had evidently been unintentionally overlooked as it was mixed with some other drawings which had been removed from their places and later discarded by the thieves as not worth taking.
Artist friends of Mr Tobin’s are inclined to extend congratulations rather than condolences on the fact that his pictures were stolen. They say it is generally considered among artists the highest possible tribute to their work to have it attract sufficient attention so that a man will risk a prison term to break in and steal it.
Moving forward to 1949, George T. Tobin was stabbed in the back – literally. Piecing together the sequence of events from the accounts in various newspapers, on 10 September 1949 a fourteen year old boy who had formerly delivered newspapers to the artist and had formed a friendship with him, stabbed Tobin in the back on a visit to his studio home. The motive was said to be robbery, though actually the boy had become frightened and left without stealing anything. It later transpired that Tobin had actually helped the boy out in the past with small amounts of money, and that the boy regarded him as kindly old gentleman, and held no grudge or grievance against him. The boy was found to have what today are politely called “psychological problems”, and was committed to a State Institution. As for Tobin, he was in intensive care for some time, but soon fully recovered. What became of the unnamed boy is not known.
As mentioned in the above–quoted newspaper obituary of Tobin, he illustrated Siegfried and Beowulf (its full title was Siegfried the Hero of the North and Beowulf the Hero of the Anglo Saxons.) Both tales were translated by Zenaïde A. Ragozin. The book was published by G.P.Putnam’s Sons: the Knickerbocker Press of New York, and was issued in 1898. It was one of their series of “Tales of the Heroic Ages.” Tobin did eight illustrations for it, of which I give two examples here. Fig.11a shows the death of Siegfried and Fig.11b shows Beowulf doing battle with the water–monster known as the Old Wife of the Mere. Both are fine examples of Tobin’s art work.
In 1901 Eaton & Mains of New York, in conjunction with Jennings & Pye of Cincinnati, published Beppino, a novel about a young Italian orphan boy and his extraordinary ability to play the violin, by Felicia Buttz Clark. It contained a frontispiece and five other full page black and white illustrations by Tobin. Fig.12a is the frontispiece, showing Beppino and his adoptive father, Giovanni, playing outside a café in Rome, where they are seen by wealthy Englishman, Mr Carroll, and his son, Robert, who is learning to play the violin. The Carrolls invite Beppino to join Robert in his violin lessons, with the use of Mr Carroll’s Stradivarius. This valuable violin is subsequently stolen by Giovanni’s son, and of course suspicion falls on the innocent Beppino. Fig.12b shows Beppino being warned by the portiera of the Carrolls’ apartment that he is suspected of the theft, and he escapes before the police arrive. In the end, Beppino retrieves the stolen Stradivarius, and returns it to the Carrolls, who adopt him and take him back to England with them. The book was apparently reprinted in 1912, 1914, and again in 1916, by the Abingdon Press of New York, with whom Tobin was to work on several other publications.
In 1921 the Abingdon Press published Mountains of the Morning, a novel about a preacher, Wayne Norton, bringing reconciliation to two feuding communities, as well as rescuing the beautiful Mary Morrison from the clutches of the dastardly Richard DuMont, and subsequently marrying her, of course. It was by Guy Fitch Phelps, himself a Bible–thumping Temperace–promoting preacher with an equal disdain for Catholics and Evolutionists, not to mention some decided views on the White Slave Trade. Tobin did a coloured frontispiece and two black and white plates for this melodramatic extravaganza of nearly 400 pages. Fig.13 (facing p.365) shows the triumphant Norton between the two reconciled heads of the feuding communities.
The next four books illustrated for the Abingdon Press by Tobin were collections of children’s stories by brother and sister team Ethel and Frank Owen.
Coat Tales from the Pockets of the Happy Giant was published in 1927. It consists of a series of stories, stored in the pocket of the Happy Giant, and told to his sister, Wanda Moon. Tobin did a coloured frontispiece and two other colour plates for it, plus numerous drawings in black and red. Fig.14a is the frontispiece and Figs.14b & 14c two examples of the drawings, title–page illustrations to two of the stories – in the former Old Daddy Dookleberry is a poor man who is rich on account of the care he gives to others; in the latter, two little girls are sitting on a stile happily singing songs, having been visited by the brownie whose special task is to bring joy to all he encounters – Brownie Joy.
The Dream Hills of Happy Country followed in 1928. It has a coloured frontispiece and two other colour plates, plus numerous drawings in black and yellow. Fig.15a is one of the colour plates and Figs.15b & 15c two of the drawings, both title–page illustrations to two of the stories (“The Clock that Lost a Tick” and “The Moon Tangle”.) Fig.15a, incidentally, also relates to the tale of “The Moon Tangle,” the little old man being the Man in the Moon, whose rising Moon has accidentally become tangled up in a tree. And for the benefit of the curious, “The Clock that Lost a Tick” is the story of a grandfather clock that had somehow lost its tick, and went tock–tock instead of tick–tock, this state of affairs being rectified by Mr. Bobo the Tick–Tocker and three mice, Skit, Skat and Skoot (and yes, in case you are wondering, the mice did run up the clock.) My favourite of Tobin’s illustrations for this book, though, and, I think, one of my favourites of all his illustrations, is shown in Fig.15d. It is an illustrated poetic explanation of the title “Happy Country,” and to my mind it is a perfect example of old–style children’s book illustration.
Wind Blown Stories was published by the Abingdon Press in 1930. It contained ten stories each with its own illustrated title–page. Tobin also did a frontispiece for the book and two other full–page illustrations. Fig.16a is the illustrated title–page of the opening story, “A Bag of Stories,” the tale of an itinerant story–teller; & Fig.16b is one of the full–page illustrations, this relating to the story “Frog Town”, in which a little boy Tim is invited to have a close–up view of frogs at work and at play, as a reward for once having rescued an important member of the frog community. The title of the book, incidentally, arises from the opening story in which the story–teller keeps his stories in the bag between his feet in Fig.16a. Then one day a strong wind blows the bag away and scatters its stories here, there and everywhere. Fortunately, a band of children is on hand to retrieve them and, as a reward, the story–teller promises to put their favourite stories into a book for them, this being titled, needless to say, Wind Blown Stories.
The next collection of stories by Ethel and Frank Owen is of an Oriental nature, which might be regarded as odd since neither of the Owens seems ever to have visited the Orient! But then that is not actually unusual, for Thomas Moore wrote Lalla Rookh without ever setting foot in India, and, of course, Edward FitzGerald composed The Rubaiyat without ever setting foot in Persia! (Incidentally, one of the tales in Wind Blown Stories – “The Willow Flower Fairy” – is also of an Oriental nature. Its illustrated title–page is shown in Fig.16c. “The Singing Sands” and “The Rose” in Coat Tales from the Pockets of the Happy Giant are also set in China.)
The Blue Highway was published by the Abingdon Press in 1932. Tobin did a frontispiece and eleven full page illustrations for it, the illustrations being effectively frontispieces to the various tales. Thus Fig.17a illustrates “Butterfly Flowers” and shows the sleeping Princess Lee Lee being transported back to her bedroom by butterfly flowers; Fig.17b illustrates “The Blue Dragon”, the story of a good–natured, book–loving dragon whose best friend was Hipple–Hop the Frog; and Fig.17c illustrates “The Moon Brownies”, and shows the Moon Brownie Koo giving pieces of the Old Moon to Kwoh Mang, the Lantern Maker of Canton, to use in making a special lantern. The title of the book, incidentally, comes from a prefatory poem in which the Sky is “The Blue Highway of stars and dreams.”
Speaking for myself, the illustrations Tobin did for these children’s stories are some of his best work, his line drawings being particularly fine. Having said that, and to get back to where we started, his illustrations for The Rubaiyat are certainly also worthy of note, and well deserve their place in the canon of the Art of Omar Khayyam.
[The illustrations can be browsed here.]
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Note 1: According to an advert placed by Stokes in the New York newspaper The Sun (issue of 27 November 1897, p.7) the company had just issued a new edition of Ruth Ogden’s novel Courage, “With twenty original illustrations by Frederick C. Gordon and George T. Tobin, beautifully executed.” But I have been unable to find a copy of this anywhere, nor indeed any other record of it. The original edition of the novel, published by Stokes in 1891, with a reprint in 1893, had twenty illustrations, all by Frederick C. Gordon.
Note 2: Online information about Tobin and his family throws up many problems, some, for example, arising from our artist being listed simply as George Tobin, and there being a lot of George Tobins out there to confuse him with. Misquoted ages cause other problems. And though it might seem a godsend to find family trees in which George T. Tobin features, it is disconcerting to find that they disagree on the number of his brothers and sisters. However, the 1910 US Federal Census solves the various problems, for in accordance with the obituary of Mary Ann Tobin, quoted above, that census reveals that she was then living with her son, Wallace E. Tobin, his wife Emma, their sons Wallace E. Jr. and Lyman. Most conclusively, though, this census recorded for each female the number of children born to them and the number still living at the time of the census. In Mary Ann Tobin’s case she had had five children, of which four were still alive. The one who had died before 1910 was William (“Will”) Tobin Jr., as noted in the obituary.
Note 3: Le Gallienne, as many readers of this will know, wrote Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam: a Paraphrase from several Literal Translations, first published in 1897, and panned by one critic as an impertinence to FitzGerald. He also wrote a rather curious little book of rubaiyat–style verses entitled Omar Repentant, published in 1908. It is set in a Broadway bar, and in it a middle–aged Omar–type drinker warns a much younger man of the dangers of the demon drink – a demon which Le Gallienne himself had had to face.
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I must thank Joe Howard and Fred Diba for proof reading this article and sharing their thoughts on Tobin’s various illustrations.
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