Browne, Hablot Knight

Hablot Knight Browne, pseudonym Phiz, (born June 15, 1815, Lambeth, near London—died July 8, 1882, Brighton, East Sussex, Eng.), British artist, preeminent as an interpreter and illustrator of Dickens’ characters.

Browne was early apprenticed to the engraver William Finden, in whose studio his only artistic education was obtained. At the age of 19 he abandoned engraving in favour of other artistic work, and a meeting with Dickens two years later determined the form which this would take. Robert Seymour, the original illustrator of The Pickwick Papers, had just committed suicide, and the serial publication of the book was in danger from the lack of a capable successor. Browne applied for the post, and the drawings that he submitted were preferred by Dickens to those of a rival applicant—W.M. Thackeray. His pseudonym of “Phiz” was adopted in order to harmonize with Dickens’ “Boz,” and it was by his work for Dickens (especially in Pickwick, David Copperfield, Dombey and Son, Martin Chuzzlewit, and Bleak House) that his reputation was made. He also illustrated the best-known novels of Charles Lever and Harrison Ainsworth in their original editions, and his work was in constant demand by publishers until a stroke of paralysis, in 1867, permanently injured his powers.