Mythical Creatures
Throughout her career, Pauline Baynes (1922–2008) was known for pictures of fantastic beasts, from dragons and mermaids to ghouls and goblins. For the Chapin Library’s contribution to Halloween Screamings, we present three original gouache paintings by Baynes for an unpublished series, Mythical Creatures: St. George and the dragon, Lewis Carroll’s Jabberwock, and the giant spider Shelob from Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings. These may be seen in the flat exhibition case on the first floor of Sawyer Library, near the Access Services desk and the new books display, from today through Sunday, November 4th.
Pauline Baynes, the original illustrator of the seven ‘Narnia’ books by C.S. Lewis and of writings by J.R.R. Tolkien, also produced thousands of images for books by other authors. Her archive of original art and her personal collection of books were received by Williams in 2009 and may be seen at the Chapin Library. – WGH
Shown is a fourth painting in the same series, of the dragon Chrysophylax from Tolkien’s story Farmer Giles of Ham. (Art copyright © the Williams College Oxford Programme; all rights reserved.)