Osbert Lancaster
Sir Osbert Lancaster
The only child of a prosperous family, Lancaster was educated at Charterhouse School and Lincoln College, Oxford; at both he was an undistinguished scholar. From an early age he was determined to be a professional artist and designer, and studied at leading art colleges in Oxford and London. While working as a contributor to The Architectural Review in the mid-1930s, Lancaster published the first of a series of books on architecture, aiming to simultaneously amuse the general reader and demystify the subject. Several of the terms he coined as labels for architectural styles have gained common usage, including "Pont Street Dutch" and "Stockbroker's Tudor", and his books have continued to be regarded as important works of reference on the subject.
In 1938 Lancaster was invited to contribute topical cartoons to
From his youth, Lancaster wanted to design for the theatre, and in 1951 he was commissioned to create costumes and scenery for a new ballet,
Life and career
Early years
Lancaster was born at 79 Elgin Crescent in London in 1908, the only child of Robert Lancaster (1880–1917) and his wife, Clare Bracebridge, née Manger.
Elgin Crescent, Notting Hill, where Lancaster was born and raised, was an upper-middle class area. The family maintained a staff of servants, including a cook and a nurse.[4][6] Such was the mixed nature of London in the early years of the 20th century that a short distance away were the deprived and dangerous Notting Dale and the Portobello Road, where, as Lancaster recalled in his 1953 memoirs, it was said to be impossible for a well-dressed man to walk and emerge intact.[7] From an early age Lancaster was aware of the variety of classes, nationalities, and social attitudes around him.[8]
In 1918 Lancaster was sent to
At the age of seventeen Lancaster passed his final school examinations and gained entrance to
Lancaster tried rowing with the Oxford University Boat Club, but quickly discovered he was no more suited to that than he had been to field games at school.[22] He joined the Oxford University Dramatic Society (OUDS), acted in supporting roles, designed programme covers, wrote, and choreographed.[23] He contributed prose and drawings to Isis and Cherwell magazines, engaged in student pranks,[n 3] staged an exhibition of his pictures,[n 4] attended life classes, and became established as a major figure in the Oxonian social scene.[26] All these diversions led him to neglect his academic work. He had made things more difficult for himself by switching from the history course to English after his first year, a decision he regretted once confronted with the rigours of compulsory Anglo-Saxon, which he found incomprehensible.[27][n 5] Making a belated effort, he extended his studies from the usual three years to four, and graduated with a fourth-class degree in 1930.[29]
1930s
Lancaster's family believed that art was a suitable hobby but an unacceptable profession;
At the Slade, Lancaster enjoyed most of his classes, but particularly those in stage design run by
Lancaster earned a living as a freelance artist, producing advertising posters, Christmas cards, book illustrations and a series of murals for a hotel. In 1934 he secured a regular post with The Architectural Review, which was owned by a family friend and of which Betjeman was assistant editor.[36] The magazine had a reputation as "the mouthpiece of the modernist movement", employing leading proponents such as Ernő Goldfinger and Nikolaus Pevsner.[37] Despite describing the Bauhaus style as "balls",[37] Lancaster was not anti-modernist, but he joined Betjeman and Robert Byron in advancing the countervailing value of more traditional architecture.[38] Chief among his many activities for The Architectural Review was reviewing books, particularly those on art. His biographer James Knox comments that Lancaster's taste was already assured, appreciating the diverse gifts of contemporary artists including Edward Burra, Giorgio de Chirico, Edward Wadsworth and Paul Nash.[39]
Knox singles out as Lancaster's most lasting contribution to the magazine a series of illustrated satires on planning and architecture, under the title Progress at Pelvis Bay. The collected articles were turned into a book, under the same title, published in 1936. It lampooned greedy and philistine property development in a typical seaside resort. Reviewing the book in The Observer, Simon Harcourt-Smith wrote, "Mr Lancaster spares us no horrifying detail of the borough's development ... [his] admirable drawings complete the picture of progress and desolation. I hope that every local authority and real-estate developer will be compelled to read this ghoulish little book."[40] Lancaster followed this with Pillar to Post (1938), a lighthearted book with roughly equal amounts of text and drawings, aiming to demystify architecture for the intelligent lay person.[41] The architectural scholar Christopher Hussey remarked on the author's inventive coinage of terms for period styles such as "Banker's Georgian", "Stockbroker's Tudor" and "By-pass Variegated", and described the book as both perceptive and shrewd.[42]
In 1938 Lancaster agreed to help Betjeman write a series of articles for
Second World War
Shortly after the outbreak of war, Lancaster joined the
The pocket cartoons made Osbert a national figure. They caught the mood of the nation, defiantly facing adversity with good humour. In a time of peril they gave people something to laugh about. Though they were small in size, their contribution to national morale was enormous.
In addition to his official duties Lancaster was art critic for The Observer between 1942 and 1944, and continued to contribute the pocket cartoons to the Express; from 1943 he also drew a large weekly cartoon for its sister newspaper,
In December 1944, the war approaching its end, Lancaster was posted to Greece as press attaché to the British embassy in Athens. After the occupying Germans had withdrawn, opposing factions brought the country to the brink of civil war. Fearing a communist takeover, the British government supported Georgios Papandreou, prime minister of the former government-in-exile, now precariously in power in Athens, backed by British troops.[58] When Papandreou's police fired on a civilian demonstration in full view of the world's press, British support for him came under international pressure.[59] The British embassy, at which Lancaster arrived on 12 December, was the target for gunfire from various anti-government groups, and he joined the ambassador (Reginald Leeper), the British Minister Resident in the Mediterranean (Harold Macmillan) and a staff virtually under siege.[60]
Following an initiative by Macmillan and the personal intervention of Winston Churchill, a new government took office in Athens acceptable to all sides, and peace was briefly restored, in January 1945.[61] Lancaster's task was then to restore trust and good relations between Britain – its government, embassy and military – and the international press corps. In this he was generally thought to have succeeded.[62] After that, he took the opportunity of travelling in the country beyond Athens during the months before civil strife returned in 1946. He explored Attica, Boeotia and Arcadia, and also visited Thessaly, Epirus and some of the islands.[63] He fell in love with Greece,[64] which he revisited repeatedly throughout the rest of his life.[65] During his excursions in 1945 and 1946 he sketched continually, and the results were published with his accompanying text as Classical Landscape with Figures in 1947. Boston describes it as "an unflinching but lyrical account of the conditions of post-war Greece"; The Times called it "a fine work of scholarship" as well as "an outstanding picture book".[66]
Postwar
During the three years between his return from Greece and the end of the decade, Lancaster published two more books, one a comic story originally written for his children, The Saracen's Head, and the other a further satirical book about architecture and planning,
The 1951
It was to be a place of "elegant fun" with a dance hall, amusement park, shopping parade, restaurants, pubs and a wine garden. Osbert was ideally equipped to follow this brief.
James Knox on the Festival Gardens[71]
The gardens attracted about eight million visitors during the 1951 festival.
Lancaster's association with Piper led to a second departure in his professional career: stage design. In connexion with the Festival of Britain,
Although he had provided drawings for a few books by other authors in the 1930s it was not until after the war that Lancaster was continually in demand as an illustrator.
Later years: 1960–1986
In Osbert: A Portrait of Osbert Lancaster, Boston comments that after the dramatic events in Athens his subject's later life was uneventful and industrious with "a somewhat dismaying dearth of rows, intrigues, scandals or scrapes to report."[78] The Lancasters had a Georgian house in Henley-on-Thames, and a flat in Chelsea, where they lived from Mondays to Fridays.[79] He worked at home in the mornings, on illustrations, stage designs, book reviews and any other commissions, before joining his wife for a midday dry martini and finally dressing and going to one of his clubs for lunch.[n 12] After that he would walk to the Express building in Fleet Street at about four in the afternoon. There he would gossip with his colleagues before sitting at his desk smoking furiously, producing the next day's pocket cartoon. By about half-past six he would have presented the cartoon to the editor and be ready for a drink at El Vino's across the road, and then the evening's social events.[82]
Karen Lancaster died in 1964. They were markedly different in character, she quiet and home-loving, he extrovert and gregarious, but they were devoted to each other, and her death left him devastated.
Though generally a commentator rather than a campaigner, Lancaster made an exception for the protection of Britain's architectural heritage, where he became a leader of public opinion.
In June 1975 Lancaster was
Lancaster died at his Chelsea flat on 27 July 1986, aged 77. He was buried with previous generations of his family in the churchyard at West Winch.[94] A memorial service was held at St Paul's, Covent Garden in October 1986.[95]
Works
Architectural history and comment
In 2008 the architectural historian Gavin Stamp described Lancaster's Pillar to Post (1938) – later revised and combined with the sequel Homes Sweet Homes (1939) – as "one of the most influential books on architecture ever published – and certainly the funniest".[96] Lancaster felt that architects and architectural writers had created a mystique that left the lay person confused, and in the two books he set out to demystify the subject, with, he said, "a small mass of information leavened by a large dose of personal prejudice."[97][n 13]
From an early age Lancaster had been fascinated by architecture. He recalled his first trip to Venice and the "staggering" view of San Giorgio Maggiore from the Piazzetta, and as a young man he went on what he described as "church crawls" with Betjeman.[98] His concern for architectural heritage led him to write and draw what Knox describes as "a series of architectural polemics in the guise of disarming 'picture books'". Harold Nicolson said of Lancaster's work in this sphere, "Under that silken, sardonic smile there lies the zeal of an ardent reformer ... a most witty and entertaining book. But it is more than that. It is a lucid summary of a most important subject".[99] Four of Lancaster's books are in this category: Progress at Pelvis Bay lampoons insensitive planners and avaricious developers; Pillar to Post illustrates and analyses the exteriors of buildings from ancient times to the present; Homes Sweet Homes does the same for the interiors. Drayneflete Revealed is in the same vein as Progress at Pelvis Bay. In all these Lancaster employs something of the technique he prescribed for stage design: presenting a slightly heightened version of reality. The twisted columns in the "Baroque" section are not drawn directly from actual baroque buildings, but are the artist's distillation of the many examples he has seen and sketched. By such means, he set out to make the general public aware of good buildings, and "the present lamentable state of English architecture".[98]
Lancaster's sketches and paintings in and around Greece are rarely satirical; they are a record of his love for, and careful scrutiny of the country. When his contempt for tyranny prevented him from visiting Greece while it was under military rule he went instead to Egypt, Sudan, Lebanon and Syria, always with a large sketchbook, in which he wrote and drew. From these sketches he produced Classical Landscape with Figures (1947), Sailing to Byzantium: An Architectural Companion (1969) and, in a different vein, Scene Changes (1978), in which he ventured into writing poetry to accompany his drawings.
Cartoons
Although the Beaverbrook papers were editorially right-wing, Lancaster was never pressured into following a party line.[48] His inclination was to satirise the government of the day, regardless of party, and he felt that his overtly partisan colleagues such as David Low and Vicky were constrained by their political allegiances.[102] He wrote, "It is not the cartoonist's business to wave flags and cheer as the procession passes; his allotted role is that of the little boy who points out that the Emperor is stark naked".[103]
In the late 1940s Lancaster developed a repertory company of characters in whose mouths he put his social and political jokes. The star character was Maudie, Countess of Littlehampton, who managed to be shrewd and flighty simultaneously. She began as what her creator called "a slightly dotty class symbol", but developed into "a voice of straightforward comment which might be my own".[104] Maudie's political views were eclectic: "on some matters she is far to the right of Mr Enoch Powell, and on others well to the left of Mr Michael Foot".[105] Her comments on the fads and peculiarities of the day caught the public imagination;[104] the art historian Bevis Hillier calls her "an iconic figure to rank with Low's Colonel Blimp and Giles's Grandma".[106] Various candidates have been proposed as the model for Maudie,[n 15] but Lancaster maintained that she was not based on any one real person.[110]
Other regular characters included Maudie's dim but occasionally perceptive husband Willy; two formidable dowagers: the Littlehamptons' Great-Aunt Edna, and Mrs Frogmarch, a middle-class Tory activist;
The novelist Anthony Powell commented that Lancaster, having carefully invented and stylised his own persona – "bristling moustache, check suits, shirt and tie in bold tints" – created similarly stylised characters for his cartoons, achieving "the traditional dramatic effectiveness of a greatly extended cast for a commedia dell'arte performance".[114]
Stage design
Lancaster's career designing for the theatre began and ended with
Three of Lancaster's theatre designs have remained in use in 21st-century productions, all by the Royal Ballet: Pineapple Poll, La fille mal gardée and Coppélia.[116] In an article on the second in 2016, Danielle Buckley wrote, "Lancaster's surrealist and stylized designs for Fille amplify the story's pantomime quality, and the exaggerated burlesque of its comedy – but the backdrops of fields that roll into the distance, bundles of hay, dreamy skies and village cottages provide the idealized, pastoral context that the story needs".[117] Buckley adds that Lancaster's designs have been criticised for locating the ballet in no particular time or place – "except, that is, of a 1960s London view of idyllic country life".[117]
Lancaster's stated view was that stage sets and costumes should reflect reality, but "through a lens, magnifying and slightly over-emphasising everything which it reflects".[118] Sir Geraint Evans commented on how Lancaster's designs helped the performer: "[His] design for Falstaff was superb: it gave me clues to understanding the character, and reflected that marvellous, subtle sense of humour which was present in all his work."[101]
Character and views
Lancaster's old-fashioned persona, together with his choice of a countess as his principal cartoon mouthpiece, led some to assume his politics were on the right of the spectrum. But despite what he described as his strong traditionalist feelings he was a floating voter: "I've voted Tory and Labour in my time and I think once, in a moment of total mental aberration, voted Liberal."
Legacy, honours and reputation
Exhibitions
Apart from an exhibition as an undergraduate, Lancaster had four large-scale shows of his works. The first was in
Honours
Lancaster's honours included his
Reputation
In 2008, the year of Lancaster's centenary, Peter York called him "A national treasure ... arguably Britain's most popular newspaper cartoonist, certainly our most effective, popular architectural historian and illustrator and one of the most inspired 20th-century theatre, opera and ballet designers." But York added that in recent years Lancaster had been largely forgotten: "People under 40 don't know him", as they still knew Betjeman from his many television programmes.[126] The Oxford Companion to English Literature called Lancaster "a writer, artist, cartoonist, and theatre designer, whose many illustrated works gently mock the English way of life: he was particularly good at country‐house and upper‐class architecture and mannerisms, but also had a sharp eye for suburbia."[127] The obituary in The Times described him as "the most polite and unsplenetic of cartoonists, he was never a crusader, remaining always a witty, civilized critic with a profound understanding of the vagaries of human nature."[66] Sir Roy Strong wrote that Lancaster's cartoons were those "of a gentleman of the old school ... He never crossed into the brilliant savagery of Gerald Scarfe or Spitting Image. The one-liners in his pocket cartoons were Cowardesque".[128]
Although he was much praised at the time – Anthony Powell said, "Osbert kept people going by his own high spirits and wit"[103][n 18] – Lancaster was conscious that the work of a political cartoonist is ephemeral, and he did not expect longevity for his topical drawings.[128] His legacy as a pocket cartoonist has been the genre itself;[43] his successors in the national press have included Mel Calman, Michael Heath, Marc, Matt and Trog.[43][47][126] Despite the topical nature of Lancaster's cartoons, they remain of interest to the historian; Lucie-Smith quotes a contemporary tribute by Moran Caplat: "No social history of this [20th] century will be complete without him. He has joined the handful of artists who, over the last three hundred years, have each in their time mirrored our nation."[101]
The Times said of Lancaster's stage designs, "When the history of Glyndebourne comes to be written, high in the roll of honour will stand the name of Osbert Lancaster, who has the great gift of designing décor that invigorates every opera".[130] But although theatre designs are less ephemeral than topical cartoons, in general they have a practical lifetime measured in years or at most a few decades.[131][132] The survival of Lancaster's costumes and scenery for Pineapple Poll and La fille mal gardée into the 21st century is exceptional, and most of even his highest-praised productions for repertory works have been succeeded by new designs by artists from Hockney to Ultz.[131][133]
Lancaster's prose style divided opinion. Betjeman teased him that it was "deliciously convoluted"; Boston and Knox both echo this view.[64] But Beaverbrook's right-hand man, George Malcolm Thompson, said of Lancaster, "The annoying thing at the Express was that he was not only the only one who could draw; he could also write better than anyone in the building."[134]
Lancaster's most enduring works have been his architectural books. Pillar to Post and its successors have been reissued in various editions, and at 2018 are in print as a boxed set entitled Cartoons, Columns and Curlicues, containing Pillar to Post, Homes Sweet Homes and Drayneflete Revealed.
Books by Lancaster
Autobiography
- All Done from Memory. London: John Murray. 1953. OCLC 41961553.
- With an Eye to the Future. London: John Murray. 1967. OCLC 470420503.
Architecture
- Progress at Pelvis Bay. London: John Murray. 1936. OCLC 806343579.
- Pillar to Post. London: John Murray. 1938. OCLC 59703720.
- Homes Sweet Homes. London: John Murray. 1939. OCLC 762059431.
- Classical Landscape with Figures. London: John Murray. 1947. OCLC 504056488.
- Façades and Faces. London: John Murray. 1951. OCLC 630417353.
- Drayneflete Revealed. London: John Murray. 1951. OCLC 931341391. Published in the US 1950 by Houghton and Mifflin, under the title There'll Always be a Drayneflete.
- Here of All Places: The Pocket Lamp of Architecture. London: John Murray. 1959. OCLC 932898972. Revised and expanded omnibus version of Pillar to Post and Homes Sweet Homes. Reissued 1975 as A Cartoon History of Architecture.
- Sailing to Byzantium: An Architectural Companion. London: John Murray. 1969. OCLC 310661367.
- Cartoons, Columns and Curlicues. London: Pimpernel Press. 2015. ISBN 978-1-910258-37-8. Boxed set containing reprints of Pillar to Post, Homes Sweet Homes and Drayneflete Revealed.
Cartoon collections
- Pocket Cartoons. London: John Murray. 1940. OCLC 314954570.
- New Pocket Cartoons. London: John Murray. 1941. OCLC 561763522.
- Further Pocket Cartoons. London: John Murray. 1942. OCLC 561763431.
- More Pocket Cartoons. London: John Murray. 1943. OCLC 500269028.
- Assorted Sizes. London: John Murray. 1944. OCLC 800790792.
- More and More Productions. London: Gryphon. 1948. OCLC 637116774.
- A Pocketful of Cartoons. London: Gryphon. 1949. OCLC 561763610.
- Lady Littlehampton and Friends. London: Gryphon. 1952. OCLC 613038890.
- Studies from the Life. London: Gryphon. 1954. OCLC 837847601.
- Tableaux Vivants. London: Gryphon. 1955. OCLC 940635955.
- Private Views. London: Gryphon. 1956. OCLC 2526266.
- The Year of the Comet. London: Gryphon. 1957. OCLC 654132764.
- Etudes. London: John Murray. 1958. OCLC 836387097.
- Signs of the Times. London: John Murray. 1961. OCLC 561763654.
- Mixed Notices. London: John Murray. 1963. OCLC 1017385147.
- Graffiti. London: John Murray. 1964. OCLC 2526270.
- A Few Quick Tricks. London: John Murray. 1965. OCLC 561763416.
- Fasten Your Safety Belts. London: John Murray. 1966. OCLC 836406884.
- Temporary Diversions. London: John Murray. 1968. OCLC 804812804.
- Recorded Live. London: John Murray. 1970. OCLC 1711645.
- Meaningful Confrontations. London: John Murray. 1971. OCLC 2526264.
- Theatre in the Flat. London: John Murray. 1972. ISBN 978-0-7195-2817-0.
- Liquid Assets. London: John Murray. 1975. ISBN 978-0-7195-3238-2.
- The Social Contract. London: John Murray. 1977. ISBN 978-0-7195-3439-3.
- Ominous Cracks. London: John Murray. 1979. ISBN 978-0-7195-3683-0.
- The Life and Times of Maudie Littlehampton, 1939–80. London: Penguin. 1982. OCLC 911979922.
Other
- Our Sovereigns: From Alfred to Edward VIII, 871–1936. London: John Murray. 1936. OCLC 7954562.
- The Saracen's Head, or The Reluctant Crusader. London: John Murray. 1948. OCLC 752970409.
- The Littlehampton Bequest. London: John Murray. 1973. ISBN 978-0-7195-2932-0.
- The Penguin Osbert Lancaster. Harmondsworth: Penguin. 1964. OCLC 600869.
- The Pleasure Garden. London: John Murray. 1977. ISBN 978-0-7195-3438-6. (co-written with Anne Scott-James)
- Scene Changes. London: John Murray. 1978. ISBN 978-0-87645-100-7.
- The Littlehampton Saga. London: Methuen. 1984. ISBN 978-0-7126-5248-3.
Stage designs by Lancaster
- Pineapple Poll, Sadler's Wells, 1951
- Bonne bouche, Covent Garden, 1952
- Love in a Village, English Opera Group, 1952
- High Spirits, Hippodrome, 1953
- The Rake's Progress, Edinburgh (for Glyndebourne), 1953
- All's Well That Ends Well, Old Vic, 1953
- Don Pasquale, Sadler's Wells, 1954
- Coppélia, Covent Garden, 1954
- Napoli, Festival Ballet, 1954
- Falstaff, Edinburgh (for Glyndebourne), 1955
- Hotel Paradiso, Winter Garden, 1956
- Zuleika, Saville, 1957
- L'italiana in Algeri, Glyndebourne, 1957
- Tiresias, English Opera Group, 1958
- Candide, Saville, 1959
- La fille mal gardée, Covent Garden, 1960
- She Stoops to Conquer, Old Vic, 1960
- La pietra del paragone, Glyndebourne, 1964
- Peter Grimes, Bulgarian National Opera, Sofia, 1964
- L'heure espagnole, Glyndebourne, 1966
- The Rising of the Moon, Glyndebourne, 1970
- The Sorcerer, D'Oyly Carte, 1971
Notes, references and sources
Notes
- ^ "Bloods" are defined by Lancaster's older contemporary Frank Harris as the ruling student caste, "who based their pretensions to ascendancy in college and university life on their prowess in sport and in athletics".[13]
- ^ Lancaster's retrospective pride in Charterhouse did not extend to sending his son there: he broke with the family tradition and sent him to Eton.[16]
- ^ Lancaster's first appearance in the columns of The Times was in May 1928 when he and five other undergraduates were fined for staging a spoof duel in Christ Church Meadow.[24]
- ^ Together with a fellow undergraduate, Angus Malcolm, Lancaster presented "Mares and Nightmares" in Oxford in May 1929. It was reported in The Daily Express – his first appearance in the paper for which he later worked for more than forty years.[25]
- ^ In later life Lancaster recalled with horror the moment in his viva "when a particularly aggressive female don thrust at me a piece of Anglo-Saxon unseen, of which the only intelligible words were 'Jesus Christ', which I promptly and brightly translated, leaving her with the unfortunate impression, as they were followed by unbroken silence, that I had employed them expletively."[28]
- ^ As a warning against art as a career, Lancaster's Uncle Jack recalled being at Charterhouse with a boy who did wonderful drawings, but who had come to nothing. The boy, it turned out, was Max Beerbohm. Boston writes that although Beerbohm and Lancaster got to know each other quite well, "Osbert never found quite the right moment to tell [him] the story".[30]
- ^ Boston (p. 107) gives the date as 1 January, but The Daily Express was not published on that date (a Sunday); the first pocket cartoon appeared on page 4 of the paper on Tuesday 3 January. It alluded to the recent New Year Honours, depicting a grandee weighed down by the many medals and decorations on his chest, saying, "any additional honour is merely an added burden."[44]
- The Daily Mail.[49]
- ^ Lancaster described the section to his friend and publisher John Murray as "a rest home for intellectuals ... quite a considerable band of stalwarts pledged to maintain the highest traditions of undergraduate life of the roaring Twenties".[53]
- ^ Among his colleagues was Guy Burgess. Lancaster, observing that "when in his cups [Burgess] made no bones about working for the Russians", later warned another public servant that Burgess was unreliable. The recipient of Lancaster's warning was Kim Philby, who, as a fellow member of Burgess's spy ring, already knew more about the question than Lancaster supposed.[54]
- ^ An example of Lancaster's "Bunbury" style is a cartoon from August 1944, showing the Vichy leaders, Pétain and Laval, attempting to flee Paris and being confronted by the ghost of the executed Louis XVI, head under his arm, saying, "Going my way?".[57]
- ^ He was a member of Pratt's, the Beefsteak, the Garrick, and, until it was disbanded in 1978, the St James's.[80][81]
- ^ By the time the two books were revised and republished in 1959 he had modified some of his earlier views – his inclination to mock Victorian gothic architecture in general and John Ruskin in particular had diminished – but he left his original text largely unchanged. He did so, he said, because although he was conscious of being older he was not sure he was any wiser.[97]
- ^ Kingsley Amis praised Lancaster's skill as a writer of verse, and its "easy and utterly individual mastery".[101]
- ^ They include Patsy, wife of the second Lord Jellicoe,[106] Maureen, Countess of Dufferin and Ava,[107] an ex-actress, Pru Wallace, with whom Lancaster had been briefly emotionally entangled in Athens,[106][108] and Anne Scott-James, whom Lancaster had known for many years before their marriage in 1967.[109]
- ^ Boston comments that Lancaster's political views were encapsulated in a pocket cartoon at the time of the 1950 general election, depicting a young mother holding a baby and saying, "Oh, we're enjoying every minute of it – he's bitten the Tory, been sick over the Socialist, and now I can hardly wait to see what he's going to do to the Liberal".[119]
- ^ Powell dedicated his novel, A Buyer's Market, to him.[129]
References
- ^ a b c d e f Lucie-Smith, p. 184
- ^ "Sir W. J. Lancaster", The Times, 2 March 1929, p. 14
- ^ a b c d e Osbert Lancaster Archived 14 February 2018 at the Wayback Machine, British Cartoon Archive, University of Kent, retrieved 20 January 2018
- ^ a b 1911 Census, Ancestry Institution, Wellcome Library, retrieved 30 January 2018 (subscription required)
- ^ Boston, p. 26; and Robert Lancaster Archived 14 February 2018 at the Wayback Machine, Commonwealth War Graves Commission, retrieved 2 February 2018
- ^ Lancaster (1963), p. 13
- ^ Lancaster (1963), p. 2
- ^ Lancaster (1963), pp. 12–15
- ^ Knox, p. 16
- ^ Knox, p. 18
- ^ Boston, pp. 44–45
- ^ Boston, pp. 44 and 47
- ^ Harris, pp. 131–132
- ^ a b Boston, p. 47
- ^ Boston, p. 46
- ^ a b Boston, p. 48
- ^ Knox, p. 22
- ^ Catto, Evans and McConica, pp. 98–99
- ^ Clark, pp. 73–74; and Boston, p. 54
- ^ Boston, pp. 53–54
- ^ Boston, p. 59
- ^ Knox, p. 25
- ^ Knox, p. 27
- ^ "Undergraduates' 'Duel' at Oxford", The Times, 28 May 1928, p. 12
- ^ "The Talk of London", The Daily Express, 25 May 1929, p. 8
- ^ Knox, pp. 27–28 and 33–34
- ^ Knox, p. 33
- ^ Boston, pp. 65–66
- ^ Knox, pp. 33–34
- ^ a b Boston, p. 70
- ^ Knox, p. 35
- ^ Haskell and Clarke, p. 149; and Boston, p. 73
- ^ a b Boston, p. 73
- ^ Boston, p. 78
- ^ Smith, David. "Timeless appeal of the classic joke" Archived 27 September 2016 at the Wayback Machine, The Observer, 23 November 2008; Boston, p. 41; and Knox, p. 47
- ^ Knox, p. 38
- ^ a b Boston, Richard. "A few home truths for Dr Pevsner", The Guardian, 18 November 1991, p. 36
- ^ Knox, p. 39
- ^ Knox, p. 40
- ^ Harcourt-Smith, Simon. "Improving England: Progress or Destruction?", The Observer, 15 November 1936, p. 9
- ^ Knox, p. 41
- ^ Hussey, Christopher. "What is Architecture?: Man and his Buildings", The Observer, 30 October 1938, p. 9
- ^ a b c Boston, p. 107
- ^ "These Names Mean News", The Daily Express, 3 January 1939, p. 4
- ^ Knox, p. 47; and Boston, p. 107
- ^ Boxer, Mark. "Pocket-size Belgravia", The Observer, 3 August 1986, p. 21
- ^ a b c d e f Fallowell, Duncan. "The Times Profile: Sir Osbert Lancaster", The Times, 11 October 1982, p. 8
- ^ a b Boston, p. 116
- ^ Inglis, Brian. "Christiansen and Beaverbrook", The Spectator, 5 May 1961, p. 8; and Boston, pp. 115–116
- ^ Boston, p. 119
- ^ Knox, p. 48
- ^ Donnelly, p. 70
- ^ Quoted in Fallowell, Duncan. "The dandy cartoonist who spoke for Britain", The Daily Express, 20 September 2008, p. 2
- ^ Lownie, p. 146; and Boston, p. 188
- ^ Knox, pp. 49–50
- ^ Boston, p. 127
- ^ The Sunday Express, 27 August 1944, p. 3
- ^ Horne, p. 240
- ^ Horne, p. 242; and Boston, p. 133
- ^ Horne, pp. 247–248
- ^ Kuniholm, pp. 223–225; and Horne, pp. 239–240
- ^ Boston, p. 151
- ^ Knox, p. 57
- ^ a b Hillier, Bevis. "Lancaster, Sir Osbert (1908–1986)" Archived 5 March 2016 at the Wayback Machine, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, 2004, retrieved 3 February 2018 (subscription or UK public library membership required)
- ^ Knox, p. 85
- ^ a b c "Sir Osbert Lancaster", The Times, 29 July 1986, p. 18
- ^ Lucie-Smith, pp. 126–128
- ^ "Sydney Jones Lecturer", Liverpool Daily Post, 23 November 1945, p. 2
- ^ Turner, pp. 99 and 107–108
- ^ Boston, p. 219
- ^ a b Knox, p. 60
- ^ Boston, p. 220
- ^ "The Lighter Side of London's Festival", The Manchester Guardian, 29 May 1951, p. 5
- ^ Lancaster (1967), p. 17
- ^ Knox, p. 133
- ^ a b Knox, p. 175
- ^ Knox, pp. 175–185
- ^ Boston, p. 164
- ^ Boston, p. 173
- ^ a b "Lancaster, Sir Osbert", Who Was Who, Oxford University Press, 2014, retrieved 11 February 2018 (subscription required)
- ^ Watkins, p. 95
- ^ Boston, pp. 175–179
- ^ Boston, p. 77
- ^ a b Boston, pp. 229–230
- ^ "Osbert Lancaster", The Daily Telegraph, 3 January 1967, p. 13
- ^ a b Knox, pp. 68–69
- ^ a b c White, p. 68
- ^ "The Times Diary", The Times, 28 June 1967, p. 10
- ^ Campbell, p. 391
- ^ "Birthday Honours", The Times, 14 June 1975, p. 4
- ^ Scott-James and Lancaster, p. 112
- ^ "Past Royal Designers" Archived 4 March 2016 at the Wayback Machine, Royal Society of Arts, retrieved 13 February 2018
- ^ Pocket Cartoon, The Daily Express, 8 May 1981, p. 2
- ^ Knox, p. 73
- ^ "Memorial services: Sir Osbert Lancaster", The Times, 3 October 1986, p. 18
- ^ Stamp, p. 44
- ^ a b Lucie-Smith, p. 146
- ^ a b Knox, p. 105
- ^ Nicolson, Harold. "The worst fifty years in English architecture", The Daily Telegraph, 28 October 1938, p. 8
- ^ Lucie-Smith, p. 56; and Knox, pp. 86–99
- ^ a b c d Quoted on cover p. iv of Lucie-Smith
- ^ Boston, p. 112
- ^ a b Quoted in Knox, p. 203
- ^ a b Knox, p. 203
- ^ Lancaster (1984), p. 246
- ^ a b c d Hillier, Bevis. "A Laughing Cavalier", The Spectator, 4 October 2008, p. 33
- ^ Howard, p. 18
- ^ Knox, p. 59
- ^ Whitehorn, Katharine. "James [married names Verschoyle, Hastings, Lancaster], Anne Eleanor Scott-, Lady Lancaster (1913–2009), journalist and author" Archived 22 February 2018 at the Wayback Machine, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, retrieved 22 February 2018.
- ^ Knox, p. 67
- ^ "Obituary: Sir Osbert Lancaster", The Daily Telegraph, 29 July 1986, p. 15
- ^ Knox, pp. 212 and 222
- ^ Lancaster (1975), p. 40
- ^ Powell, Anthony. "Osbert Lancaster", The Daily Telegraph, 29 July 1986, p. 15
- ^ "Sadler's Wells Ballet", The Times, 14 March 1951, p. 2
- ^ "Coppélia", Royal Opera House. Retrieved 30 January 2020
- ^ a b Buckley, Danielle. "How La Fille mal gardée creates pastoral magic through 'Marmite' cartoons" Archived 14 February 2018 at the Wayback Machine, Royal Opera House, 7 October 2016, retrieved 11 February 2018
- ^ Lucie-Smith, p. 169.
- ^ Boston, p. 218; cartoon from The Daily Express, 20 February 1950, reprinted in The Penguin Osbert Lancaster (1964), p. 17
- ^ Bryant, Arthur. "Our Note Book", Illustrated London News, 23 January 1965, p. 8
- ^ Knox, p. 213
- ^ "Mr Osbert Lancaster's Exhibition", The Times, 5 December 1955, p. 12
- ^ Knox, Valerie. "Merry-go-Round", The Times, 15 May 1967, p. 9
- ^ Howard, Philip. "Drayneflete's priceless portraits on display", The Times, 6 March 1974, p. 14; and Ratcliffe, Michael. "A bequest to the nation", The Times, 29 November 1973, p. viii
- ^ "Exhibitions and Displays" Archived 23 October 2017 at the Wayback Machine , Wallace Collection, retrieved 13 February 2018
- ^ a b York, Peter. "Osbert Lancaster: The original style guru" Archived 27 June 2017 at the Wayback Machine, The Independent, 19 September 2008
- ^ "Osbert Lancaster" Archived 14 February 2018 at the Wayback Machine, The Concise Oxford Companion to English Literature, Oxford University Press, retrieved 2 February 2018
- ^ a b Strong, Roy. "Knight of laughter", The Times, 27 September 2008, p. 27
- ^ Jay, Mike. (2013) "Who Were the Dedicatees of Powell’s Works?" The Anthony Powell Society Newsletter.50 (spring): 9-10.
- ^ Quoted in Knox, p. 133
- ^ a b Boston, pp. 224–225
- ^ Higgins, Charlotte. Why is opera so expensive? Archived 18 February 2018 at the Wayback Machine, The Guardian, 29 November 2001
- ^ Lucie-Smith, pp. 173–174; and Christiansen, Rupert “Falstaff at Glyndebourne Archived 18 February 2018 at the Wayback Machine, The Daily Telegraph, 26 May 2009
- ^ Quoted in Boston, p. 178
- ^ "Cartoons, Columns and Curlicues" Archived 18 February 2018 at the Wayback Machine, WorldCat, retrieved 18 February 2018
- ^ McGarrigle, Niall. "Osbert Lancaster drew inspiration for acidic cartoons from built environment – Cartoonist's sharp, satirical and funny works are republished in new edition" Archived 17 April 2016 at the Wayback Machine, The Irish Times, 16 April 2016
- ^ Powers, Alan. "Pillar of wit and wisdom", The Financial Times, 12 December 2015, p. 8
Sources
- ISBN 978-0-00-216324-8.
- ISBN 978-0-224-02482-2.
- OCLC 901267012.
- OCLC 901267012.
- Donnelly, Mark (1999). Britain in the Second World War. London: Routledge. ISBN 978-0-415-17426-8.
- OCLC 214336144.
- OCLC 1643813.
- ISBN 978-0-230-73881-2.
- ISBN 978-1-5098-0005-6.
- Knox, James (2008). Cartoons and Coronets: The Genius of Osbert Lancaster. London: Frances Lincoln. ISBN 978-0-7112-2938-9.
- ISBN 978-1-4008-5575-9.
- Lancaster, Osbert (1963) [1953]. All Done from Memory (second ed.). London: John Murray. OCLC 963633673.
- Lancaster, Osbert (1964). The Penguin Osbert Lancaster. Harmondsworth: Penguin. OCLC 600869.
- Lancaster, Osbert (1967). With an Eye to the Future. London: John Murray. OCLC 470420503.
- Lancaster, Osbert (1975). Liquid Assets. London: John Murray. ISBN 978-0-7195-3238-2.
- Lancaster, Osbert (1984). The Littlehampton Saga. London: Methuen. ISBN 978-0-413-54990-7.
- Lownie, Andrew (2016). Stalin's Englishman: The Lives of Guy Burgess. London: Hodder and Stoughton. ISBN 978-1-473-62738-3.
- ISBN 978-0-7126-2036-9.
- ISBN 978-0-7195-3438-6.
- ISBN 978-1-78131-123-3.
- ISBN 978-1-84513-721-2.
- ISBN 978-0-241-10890-1.
- ISBN 978-1-84792-453-7.
External links
- Reviews of "Cartoons and Coronets", exhibition and book, 2008:
- "An original line" D. J. Taylor, The Guardian
- "Osbert Lancaster: Savage grace", Jonathan Glancey, The Guardian
- Lancaster as a dandy:
- The Importance of Being Osbert, Michael Mattis, Dandyism