ford madox brown - eTheses Repository - University of Birmingham

the unfortunate Maria from her poplar, seen on the left, but her beauty and her moving
story have drawn him to her, and the reader is left wondering if, given the
opportunity, Yorick might take advantage of the situation. His expression appears
concerned but there is the faintest glimmer of a grin as well, echoing the undercurrent
of comic eroticism present in Sterne's novel and brought out by other paintings
depicting his work from the mid-nineteenth century such as Frith's The Pulse, Paris in
which a glove seller's husband returns home to find Yorick taking his wife's pulse
(Fig. 69).
An examination of the works on paper related to Sterne's Sentimental Journey in
combination with the oil sketch for Dr Primrose and his Daughters reveals how
closely Brown followed current art trends and chose similar subjects to his
contemporaries in both France and England. Discussing these works has revealed that
he was well aware of the popularity of subjects from eighteenth-century English
literature and was attune to the shifts in the interpretation of these novels.
Conclusion
The vast majority of these drawings have not been the subject of any in depth
scholarly research. As many of the paintings to which these drawings relate are now
lost, examining them has allowed insights into the earliest years of Brown's career. In
the case of The Ascension, the drawings themselves give a better idea of the
influences acting on Brown at this time than the actual oil sketch. Individually, these
works indicate the range of artists from which Brown drew inspiration as a young
artist. It is notable that although the subject matter of the works varies from literature
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