H J P Arnold, William Henry Fox Talbot; Pioneer of Photography
and Man of Science
(London: Hutchinson Benham, Ltd, 1977).
This book, the standard biography of Talbot, outlines the full range
of his activities and interests. It is extensively documented and endnoted;
the family trees and bibliography are a useful appendix. The illustrations,
while numerous, are small and secondary to the text. Arnold's research
was cut by about a third for publication (with the cuts mostly in non-photographic
areas). The full unpublished text may be consulted in typescript at
the Fox Talbot Museum in Lacock and in the Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center of The University of Texas at Austin.
Gail Buckland, Fox Talbot and the Invention of Photography
(Boston: David R Godine, 1980).
Buckland, the former curator of the Royal Photographic Society collection,
gives a lively and sensitive account of Talbot's activities, concentrating
on photography. Whereas the text is less extensive and less documented
than Arnold's, Buckland's selection of Talbot's images is superb. The
quality of the monochromatic reproductions is uneven but the full colour
reproductions give a very good sense of the originals.
Larry J Schaaf, Out of the Shadows; Herschel, Talbot & the
Invention of Photography
(London: Yale University Press, 1992).
This work examines the invention of photography from the contemporaneous
points of view of Talbot and his scientific friend, Sir John Herschel.
The progress of invention was governed not only by scientific and technical
advances, but also by more mundane factors such as the weather, the
inventor's state of health, and the misunderstandings common in human
endeavours. This book contains numerous full-colour illustrations of
very early Talbot and Herschel photographs.
Matilda Talbot, My Life and Lacock Abbey
(London: George Allen and Unwin, Ltd, 1956).
Talbot's Scottish-born granddaughter changed her surname to Talbot
when she inherited Lacock Abbey. More than anyone else, Matilda Talbot
was responsible for preserving Talbot's archives and his photographic
legacy and for inspiring scholars to study his work. Her title is accurately
descriptive, and there is very little in this volume directly about
Henry Talbot. However, it gives a good sense of the environment in which
the inventor of photography worked. |
