Cartooning as 'Epitheatre': The Case of Victorian and Edwardian London

Abstract

This paper makes a case for a reimagining of Victorian-Edwardian cartooning (c.1820s-1910s) as ‘epithetrical’ in nature. The theatre was an early inspiration for John ‘HB’ Doyle, who effectively established the Victorian form of graphic satire in the 1820s and ‘30s. His lead was followed by the cartoonists of Punch, and its rivals Fun, Judy, The Tomahawk, and others, many of whom were directly or indirectly connected to the stage culture of the day. Working alongside playwrights and critics, cartoonists such as Matthew Somerville Morgan (1837-1890), Marie Duval (1847-1890), and Sir Bernard Partridge (1861-1945) were themselves theatre professionals; Punch’s Sir John Tenniel (1820-1914) an amateur actor; and their contemporaries regularly drew upon theatrical imagery to make their cartoons intelligible to a broad readership.