by Duff Hart - Davis (Author)
Illegitimate, half-French, half-American, poorly educated, chronically short of money and obsessed with birds, Audubon came to England in 1826 to find a publisher for his extraordinary paintings. He insisted that they must be reproduced on double-elephant folio paper - sheets almost 40 inches by 30 - so that even the largest species could be represented life size, and no-one in America had been prepared to tackle such a gigantic task. With his dramatic good looks and flamboyant Woodsman's clothes he attracted attention wherever he went. Drawing on Audubon's journals, letters to his wife and the archives of the families with whom he stayed and worked, Duff Hart-Davis recreates Audubon's twelve years in Britain in search of patrons and publishers. It is an extraordinary story of an obsessive genius and his observations of people, places and events in early nineteenth-century England and Scotland.
Format: Hardcover
Pages: 192
Edition: First Edition
Publisher: W&N
Published: 11 Sep 2003
ISBN 10: 029782967X
ISBN 13: 9780297829676
Book Overview: The last complete copy of The Birds of America sold for a staggering USD8.8 million in March 2000 BBC Natural History unit investigating TV possibilities