"Phiz" (Hablot Knight Browne), a Memoir

Book excerpt: "Phiz" is a biography about Hablot Knight Browne, an English artist and illustrator. Well-known by his pen name, Phiz, he illustrated books by Charles Dickens, Charles Lever, and Harrison Ainsworth. Excerpt: "Fizz, Whizz, or something of that sort," humorous Tom Hood would say when trying to recall the pseudonym that has since become so familiar using the innumerable works of art to which it was appended. At the time Hablot Knight Browne first used this quaint sobriquet, it was customary to look upon book-illustrators as second, or even third-rate artists—mere hacks..."