HW Trollip | Calligraphist/Calligrapher | "The bees have stings" | April-May 1912
- Mike Roy
- Jan 13
- 3 min read
This is my third article (first two published a year ago) focusing on the drawing books of one HW Trollip (presumably of Cape Town, based on two of his (?) watercolours of scenes from that area). Seven drawing books of his, completed just before and after the outbreak of WW1, came my way from an auction a few years back. These drawing books lend themselves to being dipped into periodically, to be honest when I am running short of more varied auction or barn finds. Gives me something to do when I am in Maastricht, other than watching the Cheetahs play rugby in Amsterdam.
I wonder how many people list "rugby" and "illustrated calligraphy" amongst their interests. Can't be too many of us I suspect. Throw in "women's knitting patterns" and, for good measure, "boxing", and we may have a true outlier situation here. I digress.
Illustrated calligraphy was quite the thing in the early 20th century. Manuscripts or drawing books from that period attract keen interest at auctions these days. For one thing they took quite a while to complete, a commodity that was probably not in short supply over a century ago,
Trollip takes excerpts from classic literature of the time. The words chosen form part of an exquisite work of art, the first letter of the prose being the focal point of the actual calligraphy art. The letter "L' being the case this time around.
For this article I have chosen an illustrated page that is based on a fragment of a verse from one of Shakespeare's (?) plays, "Locrine". There appears to be some doubt as to whether the good bard had anything to do with Locrine, other than perhaps some revisions made by him to the original work by different author(s). Doesn't really matter, above my pay grade.
The words of the extract used from Locrine are as follows:
"Let come what will, I mean to bear it out,
And either live with glorious victory,
Or die with fame renowned with chivalry.
He is not worthy of the honeycomb
That shuns the hives because the bees have stings;"
This passage speaks of courage, risk and strength of character. Nothing worth having comes easily.
Unionist Ian Paisley spoke in Northern Ireland in 2006 as follows, using the above words:
""During the last 35 years we have certainly learned that the bees have stings. We have been stung by journalistic bees, by broadcasting bees, by political bees, by ecclesiastical bees, by government bees and swarms of others, yet we have survived to enjoy the honey. The stings have turned to sweetness, the pain to pleasure, and adversity to victory.'
As a Protestant by default I wonder what I have would been (if I lived in Northern Ireland at the time) during the Troubles, but that is for a separate discussion. My grandfather's family (Protestants) came from County Cavan, just across the border in the Republic of Ireland, leaving for Natal in 1871.
Trollip was of the habit to link his works to a flower that epitomized the meaning of the words he chose to illustrate. For this work he selected the Purple Columbine, a flower associated with the character of "Resolution". Seems a good choice to me, purple being the color of the ribbon attached to the Victoria Cross, the military award for extreme bravery.
Links to my first two Trollip articles:
Link to article on Locrine:
Link to Paisley speech:
Link to article on Western Calligraphy:
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