Posted by Peter H on March 18, 2008 at 00:05:36 from 86.144.113.65 user Peter_H.
In Reply to: Reversed images was Re: Strickland Junction posted by Adam Quinan on March 17, 2008 at 10:53:13:
how Ransome's drawings went from brain to paper to plate
The illustrations in AR's books were printed by the use of metal (most likely copper) blocks. These were either engraved or etched with a mirror-image of AR's original artwork. There is evidence that they were etched, certainly at the time when 'The Big Six' was being printed - in a letter to his mother dated 20 Sept 1940 (when London was being bombed) AR says that "the unfortunate block-maker, deprived of the normal gas supply, is having to hire cylinders of hydrogen to heat his acids and baths." The mention of acids indicates that AR's designs were being etched onto the blocks.
The craftsmen who transferred AR's drawings onto a metal block by first incising the lines into wax would not have inadvertently failed to do a mirror image - they were too experienced. In any case, AR, like any other author, received proofs of the illustrations, and he was generally rather fastidious about these things and would have rejected a reversed image. Once a block is etched, the image on it cannot be printed reversed.
No, the fact is that AR drew 'LETTING FLY' that way round. This drawing is yet more evidence that AR adjusted the topography to suit himself. Fells? - he just moved them. He would no doubt have developed the drawing from a sketch done at Oxenholme, but he may have thought that the composition just looked better the other way round. Unfortunately, the fascinating preliminary sketches contained in Ransome the Artist (an Amazon publication now out of print, I think) do not include one for 'LETTING FLY'.
The above is my theory anyway. Feel free to quibble.