Originals for sale

A work by Mervyn Peake submitted for sale by a private owner was sold at a London auction house last week, reaching five times its initial reserve. This must have pleased the vendor but surely would have delighted its creator.

An early drawing by Mervyn Peake c1936 is being auctioned by Bonhams of Knightsbridge on 22nd May. Creature with Walking Stick shows a Moccus Book bird-like animal side on while a second creature strides towards the viewer. Signed Mervyn L Peake, this shows, if only in the actual signature, that the influence of Stanley L Wood, an early hero from his China days, still continues to resonate while the drawing itself displays all the hallmarks of the incipient crosshatching later to be developed in so much of his illustrative work.