Katherine Owens describes The Purple Parasol by George Barr McCutcheon.

Katherine Owens describes The Purple Parasol by George Barr McCutcheon.

Katherine Owens

Spring 2020

Caroline Martin

An audio clip and transcript of Katherine Owens describing the physical qualities of The Purple Parasol by George Barr McCutcheon and why it is her favorite book in the "Beautiful Books" Collection.
[Audio recording is located at the bottom of the page under "Files."]

Book Design

Born-Digital Audio File (MP3) and Images

English

The records for this book are located in these two collections: "Beautiful Books" Exhibit Collection and "Beautiful Books" Lobby Display Collection.

Rights to the audio file and transcription are retained by Miss Owens. For permission to use, please email Miss Owens at kowens@flagler.edu and allow 2 weeks to process your request.

2 Minutes and 7 Seconds

Howdy! As Curator of Special Collections, it is rather daunting to have to select one book as my favorite as many of the books in the collection have interesting stories or endearing qualities. However, one of the most precious books in our collection is by George Barr McCutcheon from 1905 entitled, The Purple Parasol. Seeing the illustrations, or even just thinking of them makes me smile. I’ve read the story and the best word to describe it is – corny! The contents certainly are not an example of high literature. One could almost hope that the story was created to flesh out the illustrations rather than the other way around.
Speaking of the illustrations brings us to the point. This is an illustrated book with glossy plates of the main characters and line drawings of a putto, or several putti, incorporated into the text. While the cover and the illustrations are standard for their time, the putti are what make this book memorable. You are familiar with cherubs, those cute little fat-squishy baby cheeked faces with wings? Well, a putto is a fat-cheeked and thighed baby with wings. Unlike cherubs which in some cases look like seven or eight-year-old children, putti are always babies between the ages of about a year to three-years-old. Images of Cupid are usually as an older putto.
There is an occasional girl putto, but most of the putti in this book illustrate the emotions of the main male character. That is what makes them particularly endearing. Think of them as Dorian Gray’s self-portrait locked away in his attic. The putti represent a variety of different attitudes from happy, to sulky, to haughty, to penitent.

Please see the related book records in this digital exhibit for more pictures and refer to the flyer and handout from the event to see more putti.