Virtue vs Vice

Patricia Morley is professor emeritus of English and Canadian studies at
Concordia University and the author of Margaret Laurence: The Long
Journey Home and As Though Life Mattered: Leo Kennedy’s Story.

Virtue vs. Vice is perhaps the most unusual book of 1993. To begin with,
it has almost no text—just captions and an explanatory note. Artists
Cecily Moon (of Toronto and Long Island, New York) and Sandra Meigs (of
Victoria, B.C.) have collaborated to explore, in line drawings, the
emotions behind moral struggles.

Influenced by the Hortus Delicarium, a 12th-century moral tract, the
artists have pitted the traditional seven virtues against the seven
vices, showing them both alone and in combat. Moon represents the
virtues; Meigs, the vices. For example, “Prudence” becomes a fish,
resisting a fat worm on a hook; “Anger” is a busty harridan with a
knife; “Pride,” an elegantly dressed clown; and “Envy,” a
Victorian gossip. Their joint “combat” drawings are particularly
intriguing.

This visual sermon offers food for thought in a novel, witty way.