It's hard to imagine a book on this topic that's better than
Drawn and Quartered. Authors Stephen Hess and Sandy Northrop have created a history that is lucid, authoritative, and fun. The profuse illustrations are, as one would expect, varied and entertaining. Even better, the cartoons featured do an great job of demonstrating the
Evolution of political cartooning from Ben Franklin (America's first editorial cartoonist) to the present.
Hess and Northrop do an great job of relating cartoons to the political and social climate in which they were created. For example, "Caricatures of [Martin Luther] King, Malcolm X, and the other African American leaders who rose to prominence [in the 1950s and 1960s] are hard to find. Cartoonists and their newspapers grew so sensitive to the volatility of caricaturing black leaders, fearing that they would be perceived as racial slurs. Instead, cartoonists employed generic situations and peopled them with generic black figures. Martin Luther King Jr. became an invisible man in the cartoons of the [era]."
Readers casually interested in the topic will find
Drawn and Quartered an
Entertaining and unique book. Aficionados will be satisfied with the book's sagacity and depth, and may even discover illustrators that they did not know. All will agree that Hess and Northrop deserve a round of applause.
--Michael Gerber
Reader ReviewsThis well-conceived book truly reminds us that political cartooning has held a giant role in our nation's history -- and perhaps more than it has ever been given credit for. The authors make a stong case of cartooning's political vitality, past and present. The book is a very engaging and fun read not only because of its generous use of cartooning, but also because the authors take effort to put each cartoon they use into a fitting historical context. The reader is also on a guided tour of cartooning's historical phases, starting from the 18th century. The authors suggest that some six different phases (eras) of American political cartooning can be traced.
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