The Face of Britain (book series)

Cover of Lancashire and the Pennines by Frank Singleton. Designed by Brian Cook.

The Face of Britain was a series of topographical books published by B. T. Batsford from the 1930s to the 1950s that has been described as playing a part in the construction of English identity in that period. ^[1] The series is notable for the covers by Brian Batsford, who worked under the name Brian Cook. ^[2]

Volumes

This list may be incomplete.

England

• Chiltern Country by H. J. Massingham (1940)
• Cotswold Country by H. J. Massingham (1941)
• East Anglia: A survey of England's eastern counties, etc. by Doreen Wallace (1939, 2nd 1943)
• English Downland by H. J. Massingham (1936)
• English Lakeland by Doreen Wallace (1940)
• The Home Counties by S. P. B. Mais (1942) (2nd edition 1947) ^[3]
• The Islands of England: A survey of the islands around England and Wales, and the Channel Islands by J. H. Ingram (1952)
• Lancashire and the Pennines. A survey of Lancashire, and parts of Northumberland, Durham, Cumberland, Westmorland and Yorkshire. by Frank Singleton (1952)
• Lincolnshire and the Fens by M. W. Barley (1952)
• Midland England by W. G. Hoskins (1949)
• North Country by Edmund Vale (1937)
• North Midland Country: A survey of Cheshire, Derbyshire, Leicestershire, Nottinghamshire and Staffordshire by J. H. Ingram (1948)
• Shakespeare's Country by John Russell (1942)
• South-Eastern Survey. A last look round Sussex, Kent and Surrey ... Illustrated from the author's photographs. by Richard Wyndham (1940). Revised as South-East England by Ronald Jessup.
• Wessex: Dorset, Wiltshire, with West Berkshire & East Somerset by Ralph Dutton (1950)
• West Country by C. Henry Warren (1938)

Scotland

• The Highlands of Scotland by Hugh Quigley, photographs by Robert M. Adam. (1936) ^[4]
• The Lowlands of Scotland by George Scott-Moncrieff (1939)
• Scottish Border Country: Roxburghshire and parts of Northumberland, Cumberland, Berwickshire, Selkirkshire and Dumfrieshire. by F. R. Banks (1951)

Wales

• The Face of Wales by Tudor Edwards (1950)
• Welsh Border Country by P. Thoresby Jones (1938)

(Northern) Ireland

• The Face of Ulster: Antrim, Londonderry, Fermanagh, Tyrone, Armagh, Monaghan, Cavan, Donegal and Down by Denis O`Donoghue Hanna (1952)

The television series "Penelope Keith's Hidden Villages" was based on the book series.

See also

• County Books series
• The Regions of Britain
• The Regional Books

References

1. Brace, Catherine (2001). "Publishing and Publishers: Towards an Historical Geography of Countryside Writing, c. 1930-1950". Area. 33 (3): 287–296. doi:10.1111/1475-4762.00032. ISSN   0004-0894. JSTOR   20004166.(subscription required)
2. "The Colourful World of graphic artist Brian Cook (1910-1991)". Derbyshire Life and Countryside. 4 August 2010. Retrieved 24 December 2024.
3. "The Home Counties by S. P. B. Mais", Norah Richardson, Journal of the Royal Society of Arts , Vol. 92, No. 4677 (27 Oct. 1944), p. 633.
4. "The Highlands of Scotland by Hugh Quigley, R. M. Adam", review by P. B., Journal of the Royal Society of Arts, Vol. 84, No. 4370 (21 August 1936), pp. 1042-1043.

Further reading

• Batsford, Brian Cook. (1987) The Britain of Brian Cook. London: Batsford. ISBN   0713457007

External links

• https://www.librarything.com/nseries/67667/The-Face-of-Britain