William Powell Frith, English
Of Course Carolyn Was Nervous. It Was Her First Day As Junior VP of Wraps and Shawls and She Didn’t Want To Blow It. Or She’d Be Looking at Two More Years As Assistant Director of Underpants, 1856
Oil on canvas
Follow That Is Priceless on Social Media and GoComics (the Link button):
Click to Follow This Blog or Share This Masterpiece:
/// Younger sister of Nickleby, Kate,
was a character whose life and fate
had been authored by Dickens—
and right here the plot thickens:
Charles asked Frith to, some paintings, create.
/// Dressed in black since the death of her Pop,
Kate here works in a dressmaker’s shop.
At Madame Mantalini’s
petticoats swarm, (won’t see knees).
What Kate holds will be fitted on top.
/// It’s Miss Knag in that mirror who’s seen,
and a client both haughty and mean.
While her clothing was fitted,
that snob woman submitted
her opinion: Kate’s hands weren’t clean.
/// The red bonnet we see on display,
hints that milliners, back in the day,
were rumored to sell
more than hats— (girls as well).
Some vile men treated Kate as their prey.
/// Kate was badly in need of a friend;
on her uncle she could not depend.
Lecher Hawk, (a true raptor),
very nearly entrapped her,
but she married her Frank in the end.
The name of the painting appears to be “Kate Nickleby at Madame Mantalini’s” and Charles Dickens had requested that the artist, William Powell Frith, paint Kate (a character from “Nicholas Nickleby”) nine years earlier. Dickens paid a total of twenty pounds for that painting and one of a different one of his female characters, (Dolly Verge). Having received that prior commission, Firth felt he had permission to create a second depiction of Kate, the one we see above. (Or, at least, that’s what I’ve read online.)