C J Dennis – sometime illustrator

Somehow or other (and I know not why) I keep finding references (see here and here) to C J Dennis, Australian poet, journalist, columnist and now, I discover, author of children’s stories and a bit of an illustrator.

Here’s a photograph of him from The State Library of Victoria (out of copyright) taken c 1893.

I came across these drawing by Dennis through Trove from The State Library of Victoria’s collection.  Again, all out of copyright so happily shared here.

The first one is a simple pencil drawing from “A Book for Kids” one of several children’s books Dennis wrote.  It’s called Going to School.  You’ll find the illustrations as they appeared in the book (via Project Gutenberg) below with the poem itself.

These coloured drawings (links here and here) were gifts from Mrs Greitje Croll to the Library. Both drawings were gifts from Dennis to Mrs Croll’s father-in-law, Robert Henderson Croll.

My dog (after rabbits) – C J Dennis

Just dossin – C J Dennis

The Project Gutenberg has a copy of “The Glugs of Gosh” (1917) in its free e-book collection.  The illustrations for that book were rendered by Hal Gye.  On 16 June 1923, The Mail (Adelaide) published an article by C J Dennis praising the talents of Gye as an artist.

The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Glugs of Gosh, by C. J. Dennis
Project Gutenberg's A Book for Kids, by C. J. (Clarence Michael James) Dennis
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