René Bull was an illustrator born in Dublin on 11 December 1872. Bull went to Paris to study engineering, but embarked on an artistic career after meeting and taking drawing lessons from the French satirist and political cartoonist Caran d’Ache (Emmanuel Poiré). Moving to London in 1892, René Bull drew for “Illustrated Brits” and created cartoons in the style of Caran d’Ache for ‘Pick-Me-Up’ from 1893.
From 1905 he illustrated books, starting with an edition of La Fontaine’s ‘Fables’. Other major titles he illustrated included The Arabian Nights (1912), Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám (1913), The Russian Ballet (1913), Carmen (1915) and Andersen‘s Fairy Tales.
Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám is the title that Edward FitzGerald gave to his 1859 translation from Persian to English of a selection of quatrains attributed to Omar Khayyam (1048–1131), dubbed “the Astronomer-Poet of Persia”
Presenting to you are the illustrations from the First edition of Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam, a famous selection of Persian poems popularized after the translation to English by Edward Fitzgerald. Published by Hodder & Stoughton, London, 1913.
Art Gallery: René Bull – Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam 1913
BOOKSTORE: Rare, Antiquarian, First editions, Illustrated Children's Books
