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Savage Indignation Irish satire in the 20th century

Satirical magazine The Lepracaun Cartoon Monthly took a wry look at the political landscape of early 20th century Ireland.

IN 1905, WHEN Thomas Fitzpatrick founded his satirical magazine The Lepracaun Cartoon Monthly, the political landscape at home and abroad was changing.

In Dublin City Hall new councillors represented the workers and the ‘Irish-Ireland’ movement. At Westminster John Redmond had convinced the leader of the Liberal opposition to support Irish Home Rule. Internationally, Britain and France were forging their entente cordiale while Japan had won an unexpected victory over Russia. There was plenty for a good cartoonist to satirise and Fitzpatrick, or ‘Fitz’ as he was known, was just the man to do it.

Over the next seven years he produced an impressive amount of work, drawing the bulk of the cartoons in his monthly publication. Following his death in 1912 The Lepracaun continued for a further three years, under the management of his daughter Mary; satirising politicians, officialdom, the social elite, the man (and frequently woman) in the street. In contrast to its much shorter-lived predecessors on the Irish market, the magazine’s successful ten year run proved its popularity with readers and advertisers, and confirmed Fitz’s skills as a cartoonist and businessman.

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The Road-Hog. May 1906, p. 259

Cartoons in The Lepracaun commented on the arrival of the motor car, air ships, aeroplanes and Dublin’s public electricity supply – indeed modernity itself. With a pointed and witty pen Fitz, and his fellow cartoonists, highlighted the public’s unwise acceptance of the noisy and dangerous horseless-carriage. (He proposed shooting inconsiderate motorists on sight.) The magazine showed a public afraid of the ‘scareships’, huge gas-filled craft hovering threateningly overhead, but it also comically suggested how they could be used to frighten men opposed to women’s suffrage, or unionists opposed to Home Rule.

The Lepracaun’s attitude to women seems patronising and conservative to the modern reader, but Fitz had a fairly good grasp of the public mood, so cartoons depicting women as terrifying fire-bombers or ridiculous busybodies must have struck a chord with many of his readers.

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When she gets it, what will she do with it? May 1906, p. 259

Cartoons dealing with labour disputes and the 1913 Lockout show that it was not as simple as ‘bosses versus workers’ for people at the time. Fitz and his team were always on the side of the underdog so an unjust employer or slum landlord would always receive harsh treatment. However trade union leaders were shown feasting and drinking while striking workers sat dejectedly around an empty table and bare grate – a case of the innocent being misled by the corrupt in The Lepracaun’s opinion. But when the Dublin Metropolitan Police attacked a crowd of strikers and curious by-standers, killing two people and injuring many more, The Lepracaun’s response was scathing. A deranged brute of a policeman is depicted trampling on his victims – a lifeless infant clutched in one hand and a raised truncheon in the other. An excellent example of the cartoonist’s pen reflecting the public’s response.

Fitz and his cartoonists loathed abuses of power, corrupt politicians and inept officials, these failings inspired their most stinging satire – as they still do for cartoonists today. The purpose of satire is not to amuse or entertain, although these are important methods of achieving its main aim – which is to point out bad behaviour and correct it.

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Flattening him out. November 1913, p. 223

But does satire make any difference? Do cartoons change anything? An earlier Irish (or perhaps English) satirist used words rather than images to tackle the ills of his day. Jonathan Swift pilloried social conventions, gender stereotypes and political chicanery.

His defence of the helpless in ‘A Modest Proposal’ is still shocking today. The blunt logic that, if society and the state continue to allow the children of the poor to die of disease and malnutrition they may as well harvest them as food, is a call for radical change. There is no statistical evidence that anything was improved in eighteenth-century Ireland as a result of Swift’s satire, but the ‘Modest Proposal’ is still read and taught in schools two centuries later. Swift featured, ironically, on the old Irish ten pound note.

More appropriately, his stern gaze still looks down from the above the door to the Chapel Royal in Dublin Castle, observing the comings and goings to whatever tribunal of enquiry happens to be in session. This satirist has continued to play a role – upholding an ideal of good government and fair dealing and reminding us that corruption, idleness and inefficiency are not good enough.

A desire to see the ‘mighty brought low’

Fitz and his Lepracaun Cartoon Monthly made the same point in the early twentieth century. The survival of a satirical magazine for ten years was remarkable enough, but the success of the magazine also pointed out the public appetite for satire – a desire to see the ‘mighty brought low’, and maybe even a willingness to be made uncomfortable when our own failings are presented to us in comic form.

Swift’s epitaph describes the ‘savage indignation’ that he felt throughout his life, the same feeling motivated Fitz to tackle a huge range of subjects in his publication, and continued to inspire it after his death. Readers a century ago paid their penny for each monthly edition and smiled at the gentle humour, or laughed at the gossipy articles, but they also wanted to see their own savage indignation reflected in the pages of The Lepracaun Cartoon Monthly.

Thomas Fitzpatrick and the Lepracaun Cartoon Monthly: 1905-1915 by James Curry and Ciarán Wallace is produced by Dublin City Public Libraries, and is available at all good bookshops or directly from Four Courts Press (r.r.p €19.95). The book contains over 80 pages of cartoons with commentaries, along with illustrated essays on Thomas Fitzpatrick and the social and political context of the day. The artist Jim Fitzpatrick, creator of the iconic ‘Viva Che’ poster and many Celtic art works, and grandson of Thomas, has contributed a foreword.

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    Mute Plantation Watch
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    Mar 1st 2015, 12:38 PM

    The Phoenix came out as Anti-free-speech after the Charlie Hebdo massacre, Ireland badly needs a champion of free speech. If you cant satire everybody, how can you claim to live in a free country?

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    Mute Con Manne
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    Mar 1st 2015, 1:21 PM

    Well Plant. Watch, that is a question woefully inappropriate to an audience that would rather red thumb than pass by or ignore completely. That is how the small minded get their jollies. It is a tilt at their own private windmills. A gesture of disapproval rather than disagreement.

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    Mute Egg Head
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    Mar 1st 2015, 2:06 PM

    We’ve never had free speech in this country, so we’re hardly going to start now when there’s actually consequences to expressing free speech. Some of our restrictions on expression are legal restrictions, such as incitement to hatred legislation (if it’s legal to hate someone, how can expressing your hatred be deemed illegal in a “free country”) and more besides is just those in positions of power silencing dissenters – Scrap Saturday was hugely popular, as was Dermot Morgan at the time, yet he was unofficially banned from RTE until they bought the Channel 4 produced Father Ted many years later. And we don’t have to go back too far to find a time when a woman expressing opposition to the powerful status of the church in this country would soon find herself employed doing laundry for the remainder of her days. Blasphemy is also prohibited by the constitution.
    The Americans are the only country with anything even bordering on true freedom of expression, Europeans don’t seem to value it quite as highly, and we’re behind most Europeans in our defence of this essential right.

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    Mute Jamie McCormack
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    Mar 1st 2015, 9:59 PM

    PW I think you’ve nailed it. I’ve been unsure about Charlie Hebdo up till now, but you’re right. If you’re gonna take offence at someone else taking the piss, well good luck. Be small minded. We Irish have had the Michael extracted for years by the neighbours for being thick, stupid, backward etc.. But we don’t have that anymore, we rose above it to an extent. It mightn’t be the best analogy, but maybe Muslims need to learn to chill. Or if not, don’t come to our countries where you can expect to be annoyed. We don’t migrate to Saudi Arabia or Iran expecting rights and freedom to be offended at your lack of respect for Christianity.

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    Mute Jamie McCormack
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    Mar 2nd 2015, 12:06 AM

    When I said Muslims I meant any extremist types, which thankfully we don’t seem to have. We have a different history with Muslim countries. Not saying we’re their mates but we had the same enemy trying to annihilate us.

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    Mute Dominic Southwell
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    Mar 1st 2015, 1:18 PM

    If “Flattening him out. November 1913, p. 223″ was to be drawn today it would show labour and capitalism dancing on the public rather than fighting over him.

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    Mute Jamie McCormack
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    Mar 1st 2015, 10:33 PM

    Labour and Fat Cats arm in arm dancing a merry jig on the back of the little man. Joan Burton, leader of Labour, has a pension of almost 2.6 million euro waiting for her. Funded by you, me and the guy being danced on.

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    Mute Denis Reidy
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    Mar 1st 2015, 12:46 PM

    Goes to show socially and politically, how far we haven’t come.

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    Mute Eric Duffy
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    Mar 1st 2015, 12:58 PM

    Reading some of the subtext of the captions above, we havnt come too far.

    “The original report said it cost x now it is stated to cost y and further borrowing to finance the project is needed.”

    I don’t think we can be that bad that we have not learned ANY lessons.

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    Mute Mr Phil Officer
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    Mar 1st 2015, 1:06 PM

    We’ve come full circle looks like.

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    Mute Egg Head
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    Mar 1st 2015, 12:35 PM

    Was he too scared to draw cartoons depicting Muhammad I wonder.

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    Mute Anthony Tierney
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    Mar 2nd 2015, 10:35 AM

    A small correction – the caption under the 2nd image (the electricity cable monster chasing the ratepayer) is not the ‘Road Hog’ from May 1906 but ‘In Darkest Dublin’ from Feb 1911. (http://www.fourcourtspress.ie/books/2015/the-lepracaun-cartoon-monthly/)

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