Dr. Paris's Thaumatrope or Wonder Turner.By John Barnes Sir John Herschel, optical experimenter, and first to propose the photographic enlarger; Charles Babbage, inventor of the mechanical computer, the 'calculating engine'; Sir David Brewster, inventor of the Kaleidoscope; Dr. Wollaston, patentee of the Camera Lucida - these are just some of the famous names that crop up in this story of the invention of a simple cardboard toy. Dr. Paris's Thaumatrope was written in 1950. Shortly afterwards its author John Barnes, with his brother William, went on to arrange what was perhaps the world's first exhibition dedicated to the precursors of cinema, including the Thaumatrope. In 1963 he opened the Barnes Museum of Cinematography in St. Ives, Cornwall, England, where fascinating displays of rare optical toys were to be on view to the public for the next 23 years. Subsequently, John Barnes went on to write a five-volume history of the Victorian Cinema in England. The Thaumatrope was one of the important philosophical toys of the first half of the 19th Century, spurring experiments in visual perception that would eventually lead to the Cinema, and it is appropriate that this monograph - suitably updated - is being published for the first time to coincide with the Cinema's centenary, by the author best known for his writings on the subject. A5,
32pp. 16 illustrations, See the cover illustration |
