EXTRACTS: Pirates! Illustrators Special Edition © 2020 The Book Palace (128 PAGES in Full edition)

3 The Art of Piracy I. Under the Black Flag For over two centuries stories and images of pirates have fascinated the sense of adventure and derring-do in all of us. The classic ingredients are well known: the first fearful sighting of the lone galleon flying the dreaded black flag with the skull and crossbones; the deadly pounding of the ship’s cannons followed by the boarding party and the ensuing, savage, hand-to-hand fighting; the ancient map showing the whereabouts of buried treasure; the marooning of victims on a desert island and, of course, the deadly piratical practice (almost certainly mythical but an essential part of most pirate tales) of forcing their victims to ‘walk the plank’. Howard Pyle (1853-1911), the renowned American illustrator and writer who, probably more than anyone, was responsible for fixing in the public’s mind the visual imagery of the pirate and his world, knew his buccaneers well. This is how he described them, writing at the beginning of the 20th century: FACING PAGE; Blackbeard in Smoke and Flames , oil on canvas by Frank Earle Schoonover, 1922. Painting for the book ‘Blackbeard, Buccaneer’ written by Ralph Delahaye Paine, 1922. Schoonover’s legendary adventure paintings were inspired by the belief that artists should live what they paint—an adage often repeated by his noted teacher, Howard Pyle, and absorbed by his fellow student and friend, N.C. Wyeth. ABOVE: Marooned , goauche on board by Ron Embleton. The traditional punishment for breaking rules or for an unpopular comrade was marooning — the abandonment of the offender on a deserted island with only a bottle of water, gun, bullets and powder. This illustration appeared on page 28 of Look and Learn issue No. 166.