Illustrated texts pre-date the printed book by thousands of years but unfortunately much has been lost from early civilisations, such as Greece, China and Rome due to the fragility of the material. Ancient Egypt is the exception because of the durability of papyrus and the fact that material was carefully and deliberately buried has ensured some remarkable survivals.

Book illustration had to evolve once printing was introduced in the 15th century. Woodcuts were used in most of the earliest illustrated printed books. It was very common for some copies of 15th century books to be coloured by hand to copy the pictures in hand drawn manuscripts. More specifically, the practice of publishing adult fiction accompanied by representational images is strongly linked with 18th- and 19th-century western literature, and the rise of the novel; works by authors such as Charles Dickens and Lewis Carol.

Of course, trends in both book publishing and visual art shifted considerably in the 20th century, and the practice of publishing visual representations alongside text in adult literature saw a major decline, and book illustration became increasingly associated with children’s literature and “low-brow” or popular writing.

Before the introduction of printing to Western Europe during the mid-15th century, all books were written by hand. The Latin for hand, ’manus’, and for writing, ’scriptum’, give us the word manuscript. Making a manuscript was slow and demanding and very expensive. The most luxurious manuscripts were illuminated. This refers to the use of bright colours and gold to embellish initial letters or to portray entire scenes.

There has never been a lack of skilled artists available to create book illustrations, but rather a lack of demand for traditional book illustrations in adult literary fiction. Book illustration started losing out to styles of graphic novels and comics that work as their own narrative as opposed to accompanying text.

'The Book of the Dead' was the earliest collection of illustrated books created by the Egyptians and were intended to help the deceased in the afterlife. Some copies were lavishly illustrated and costly; others seem more mass-produced with blank spaces where the deceased’s name could be filled in to personalize their copy. Despite the text’s long evolution, however, its function remained the same for royalty and nonroyalty alike: to ease the passage of the deceased through the underworld, offering them protection to face the ordeals and terrors lying in wait there.

Nowadays, the placement of visual art within literary texts is typically limited to new editions of classic, or at least newly canonized texts. Companies such as The Folio Society still commission artists to illustrate both classic and new novels, holding contests and prizes for illustrators to continue this practice.