The most important work of American artist and illustrator Lynd Ward, Gods' Man is a powerfully evocative novel, told entirely through woodcuts. Ward (1905-85), in employing the concept of the wordless pictorial narrative, acknowledged his predecessors the European artists Frans Masereel and Otto Nuckel. Released the week of the 1929 stock market crash, Gods' Man was the first of six woodcut novels that Ward produced over the next eight years. It presents the artist's struggles in a world characterized by both innocence and corruptions and can be considered a forerunner of the...

One of the finest wood engravers of the twentieth century, Lynd Ward took his work to a new dimension when he created the "wordless novel. "Gods' Man, his first novel in woodcuts, appeared in 1929; during the 1930s, he published five more pictorial narratives. Ward earned the Library of Congress Award, the Caldecott Medal, and other prestigious awards. Vertigo, published in 1937, is considered to be his masterpiece. Telling this poignant story with 230 stylized woodcuts, the artist rewards his readers' eyes with the intricate beauty of his craft -- and satisfies their...

Nearly 200 years ago, a teenager dreamt of a scientist who experimented with restoring life to the dead. Encouraged by her literary-minded friends, she expanded her fantasy into a gripping story that became the epitome of the Gothic novel. Mary Shelley's suspenseful narrative of a misbegotten monster's revenge resounds with compelling questions about ambition, responsibility, and other issues that continue to enthrall modern readers.
Acclaimed as both the first modern horror novel and the first science-fiction novel, Frankenstein has inspired numerous interpretations. This...