WITH TEXT AND INTRODUCTION
BY
H. C. Bunner
Keppler & Schwarzmann
NEW YORK
MDCCCXCIII
INTRODUCTION.
So careless has been the popular use of the words “cartoonist” and “caricaturist,” that to many minds they no doubt seem practically interchangeable. Yet, as a matter of fact, not only do the two titles imply two different functions of pictorial satiric art, but, although there is a school of that art for almost every one of the great races of civilized men, there is but one school that positively demands the union of these two factors in the work of its pupils. That school is the German school, and it is Mr. Joseph Keppler who, as an American cartoonist and caricaturist, has not only imposed its canons and traditions upon this country, but has, in so doing, placed himself at its head, both in this country and in Europe, by virtue of a genius that has made him eminent above the generation of his masters.
The spirit of French comic art turns distinctly—and delightfully—to caricature. The French “cartoon”—the pictorial lampoon, that is—has but to exhibit in an exaggerated form the objectionable characteristics of an individual, to serve its purpose and to touch its public. It is the revelation of character, of purpose, of intellectual or moral scope which affects, apparently, the French mind, by nature rather observant than deductive. The Anglo-Saxon spirit, less quickly perceptive, more deliberately logical, asks something beyond this of the man who tries to reason with it in a picture. It must be approached by means of a fable, a parable, an allegory, something that will stand the test of argument and comparison. Caricature, or the significant exaggeration of physical characteristics, may or may not be an incident to this.
Few of the English cartoonists, for instance, have been caricaturists of any account. The greatest of them all, John Tenniel, is a cartoonist pure and simple—that is, one who draws allegories or parables. In his delightful “Alice in Wonderland” work, he shows his power of caricature; but in his cartoons he is classically faithful to nature, save for just sufficient accentuation to point his satiric intent. And in the United States, up to twenty years ago, the prime idea of the cartoonist was simply to express in drawing a figure of speech—and the more realistically the better.
If it seems a remarkable thing that the influence of one man should avail to change the taste of a nation in such a manner, it must be remembered that the breadth and force of the German school which Mr. Keppler introduced into this country were peculiarly calculated to appeal to a receptive people, delighting in vigorous expression. For the German school carries the art and mystery of cartooning far beyond any of its rivals. The German conception of the cartoon not only involves a picture parable, it demands that the actors of the fable shall be so drawn as to display their characters in their lineaments, and it asks, moreover, that the allegory shall, if possible, take a distinctive dramatic form, suggestive, at least, of action, and not merely of position.