Italian unification is a process
that spans from 1848 until 1861 when the kingdom of Italy was solidified.
During 1858 and 1859 King Victor Emmanuel and Prime minister Camillo Cavour of
Piedmont formed an alliance with France with the goal of removing the Austrian
presence from Northern Italy. The battle of Magenta represented in the Punch cartoon entitled ‘The Giant and
the Dwarf’, was a battle fought during this period of time. At this time France
and its army were led by Emperor Napoleon III. Continuing the fight of the
Risorgimento, Giuseppe Garibaldi led the ‘expedition of the Mille (thousand)’ into southern Italy in
1860, to the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies. The Risorgimento was regarded by the
British populous with a sympathetic, yet neutral point of view. Due to wider
political relations Britain was relatively uninvolved in the process of Italian
unification, yet the British public looked upon it as a “triumph of nationalism”
(Gooch, 1), to which they were supportive. Because of this the British regarded
the leaders of the Risorgimento as heroes.
John Tenniel joined Punch in 1850 as a member of staff; however, he had published
cartoons before this. By the time that Tenniel was hired “Punch had more or less completed its transformation from radical to
an established journal” (Simpson, 55). Tenniel was born in London and had
little formal training in art and he was blinded in one eye during a fencing
accident. Despite this, Tenniel “learned to draw from memory and developed a
dry ‘shaded-outline’ style suitable for wood-engraving” (Hodnett, 167). Tenniel
had a “genteel, respectful” (Engen, 38) style of satiric cartoons that were
filled with “neoclassical allegories” (Simpson, 59) of the kind of chivalrous
ideals that Tenniel held as preferable to the ideals of Victorian society.
‘The Giant and the Dwarf’ was published on
June 11th 1859 and depicts King Victor Emmanuel and Emperor Napoleon
III during the Battle of Magenta. Napoleon III is placed to the left of the
picture and he is depicted as very tall, dressed in a dressing gown and smoking
a cigar. On the right of the picture is Emmanuel who is depicted as very small,
holding an over-sized sword and pointing to soldiers in the periphery of the tableaux.
Emmanuel’s sword effectively draws the audience’s eyes from the top right hand corner
of the picture, to the centre where it becomes obvious that the humour of the
piece and the effective centre is situated in the fact that Emmanuel is half
the size of Napoleon III. Collins remarks, “To define its distortion, pictorial
satire must embed in itself a picture of the reality it transforms” (Collins,
315). The absurd representation of the size of Emmanuel and Napoleon III holds
within it a distorted caricature of the true comparative size of their nations.
Emmanuel is depicted in his crown, which he is
often wearing in other cartoons and photographs, however, it been knocked off
centre by his involvement in the conflict, under his crown is a bandage that
covers one of his eyes and Emmanuel also appears to have cuts on his face and
arms. These attributes serve to display to the audience that Emmanuel is
physically involved in the battle, which in turn highlights Napoleon III’s absence
from the action. Tenniel and the British public viewed Italian unification with
such a favourable outlook that many of the Risorgimento leaders were idealised
by the media. As Fisher comments in her essay, citing Poovey, this type of
image can be “defined as performing what Poovey has defined as ‘ideological
work’ as ‘part of the system of independent images in which various ideologies
became accessible to individual men and women’” (Fisher, 122). In this way, Tenniel opens up the ideology of Italian righteousness in,
not only the battle of Magenta but in the larger drive for unification. The direct
comparison between Napoleon III and Emmanuel highlights Emmanuel’s dedication
to his cause. This is symptomatic of the British population’s support of the
Italian cause. However, Emmanuel is portrayed as having wide eyes and he is shown
to be small and childlike. Emmanuel’s feet are raised up onto his toes, giving
the impression that he is full of energy, giving him movement within the
picture. The childlike attributes coupled with the impression of movement
undermine the figure of Emmanuel by removing any associations of unyielding
resolve and substantial influence, from his image. This shows a more realistic
view of Emmanuel as someone who is naïve and has less power than he perceives
himself to have. The quip “Bravo, my little fellow: you shall do all the
fighting, and we’ll divide the glory!” at the bottom of the picture reinforces
the idea of Emmanuel’s naivety to the audience. Nevertheless, Emmanuel is still
depicted as the hero in the image.
Napoleon III is depicted in the cartoon as a
distinctly shady character, his eyes are squinted and one of his hands is being
held behind his back. Garvey remarks, Tenniel’s “command of glance and gesture
contrived to impart a believable familiarity to the distorted world” (Garvey,
175) that he portrayed in his cartoons. This covering of a hand is significant
because hands are physically needed for a person to have agency, and it shows
that not all of Napoleon III’s intensions are being shown or communicated
between himself and Emmanuel. Napoleon III’s appearance is a caricature of a stylised,
villainous French man. Welsh comments that, “Satire concentrates on the
correctable but uncorrected faults of man in society, stressing the degree to
which human practice falls short of human ideal” (Welsh, 380), through this we
can see that Tenniel is using caricature to satirise a situation in which he
sees a social injustice. Napoleon III’s feet are firmly planted, displaying his
control over the scene when compared to the movability of Emmanuel. The
portrayal of Napoleon III as a villainous figure is symptomatic of the deep
mistrust within the British collective of the French, however, it may also stem
from a frustration within British political society that Britain is not
standing with the Italians as the French are.
Napoleon
III is drawn as a figure who is very much at leisure, he is smoking and is
wearing a dressing gown that is adorned with bees. This may be a reference to
the introduction of Italian bees to the British Isles in 1859 by Thomas White
Woodbury, who believed they were superior to the British Black Bee. It could be
interpreted that Napoleon III views himself as superior to the Italians and to
Emmanuel in particular. Napoleon III held an inflated view of himself as the
‘new napoleon’, who will lead the French in similar revolutions and with
similar success. Tenniel has drawn a cloud of smoke, rising from Napoleon III’s
cigar, which is physically obscuring the image of fighting in the periphery.
This repetition of concealment serves to further the impression left by the
hiding of his hand, that Napoleon III is deliberately manipulating what is evident.
The quip at the bottom of the picture reinforces the idea- “Bravo, my little
fellow: you shall do all the fighting, and we’ll divide the glory!” suggests that
Napoleon III is trying to manipulate the way in which the battle is received by
outsiders.
The humour in this piece is based in Tenniel’s
satire of the French-Italian relationship, Miller remarks, “Critics had a firm
belief in the superiority of the satire, humour, and comic art of their time”
(268, Miller). By creating a ‘giant’ of France in the form of Napoleon III and
a ‘dwarf’ of Italian unification through the image of Emmanuel, Tenniel
undermines the seriousness of the situation, and helps caricature the two
leaders. The use of the terms “giant” and “dwarf” adds to this sense of subversion
by giving the viewer connotations of fairy tales and folktales which are make-believe
by nature. The quote at the bottom of the picture serves as a kind of political
joke in isolation, however, by accompanying the quip with a picture broadens
the appeal of the piece, as images are more ‘universal’ to read, Codell remarks,
“visual content functions to generate meanings and reader identifications in
periodicals” (Codell, 410).
“Garibaldi the Liberator” was published on 16th
June 1860, a little over a year after “The Giant and the Dwarf”. “Garibaldi the
Liberator” depicts Giuseppe Garibaldi as Perseus, who is about to deliver a
fatal blow to Ferdinand II (Bomba[1]),
who is depicted as a sea monster, and rescue Sicily, who is depicted as
Andromeda. The myth of Perseus is a Greek tale, which involves Perseus using
the head of Medusa to defeat many monsters, including the sea monster from
which he rescues Andromeda before taking her for his wife. By using pastiche to
appropriate the style of neo-classical art and classical myth Tenniel is
potentially undermining his apparent position, Maidment comments, “pastiche and parody both add to yet simultaneously offer a potentially
subversive critique” (Maidment, 133) of their focus.
Garibaldi has been drawn with very little
shading, creating a very light image. Lightness is often equated to purity and
goodness, and so, in comparison Tenniel’s earlier picture becomes even more ambiguous
as it is lacking in the distinct heroic, moral figure that is represented here
by Garibaldi. Fulton comments, “The manly man during this period believed in
patriotism, comradeship, love of home and homeland” (Fulton, 420), Garibaldi,
in reality and in this image, fits this concept. In light of this, the overtly
masculine image of Garibaldi, which could be viewed as satiric as it is so
exaggerated, has a feeling of sincerity. Tenniel has depicted Garibaldi with
wings in “Garibaldi the Liberator”, which are not attributed to Perseus in classical
Greek mythology, but are attributed to angels and divinity, adding to the idea
that Garibaldi is a pure figure. This favourable presentation of Garibaldi is
due to Britain and Tenniel’s veneration of him, displaying again the British idea
that Italian unification is a “triumph of nationalism” (Gooch, 1). Like
Emmanuel, Garibaldi has been turned into a heroic figure. However, the
difference in representations shows the different reception of the two figures
within England. The British public think of Emmanuel as a heroic child, but
Garibaldi is the ultimate champion of Italian unification. Tenniel “crystalized
national sentiment” (Garvey, 176), by
solidifying the British sentimentality over Italian unification.
Garibaldi
is represented as the liberator and in answer to the heroic figure; Ferdinand
II is depicted as a monster and referred to as Bomba. Ferdinand II’s image is
much more shaded than that of Garibaldi, creating a physical darkness to his
appearance, and his body is scaled and very typical of a sea monster, which
signifies his evilness. Though this image was produced a little over a year
after “the Giant and the Dwarf”, there is a similar energy in Britain of
support for Italian unification, coupled with a frustration at not being
involved. Britain is separated from the reality of the Italian wars, however,
the British public are still invested in the situation and so the media creates
a narrative for the British people to have a physical engagement with. This
treatment of Italian unification is symptomatic of the kind of “Myth (is) a
process” (Morales, 2) mode of thinking that is attributed to Morales. To this
end Garibaldi and other leaders in the movement for Italian unification are
manipulated into images of heroes and to balance the narrative villains are
created for the consumption of the British masses, displaying the “game of production
and reception” (Morales, 9) that is employed by the media to create a
‘classical myth’ of Italian unification.
There is humour in the image from the use of
pastiche by Tenniel. When compared with the folklore style of “The Giant and
the Dwarf”, the appropriation of the classical form allows us to see that
Garibaldi is even more venerated than the disadvantaged hero depicted by
Emmanuel. However, the representation of Garibaldi in “Garibaldi the Liberator”
has a slight irreverent feel to it. The addition of the wings to the image of
Garibaldi as Perseus, and the “Garibaldi to the rescue” on his shield, gives
the cartoon a slightly mocking feel. Without the wings and the inscription on
the shield, the image would form a very unfunny homage to Garibaldi. Without
these additions the image looks like a wood engraving of a piece of classical
art and the words under the picture do nothing to open it up to a wider
audience. This image differs from the previous one as the tone is one that can
only be picked up by someone with a classical education. Tenniel’s work offered
an “instantly apprehendable message to the middle and upper classes” (Garvey,
176) but the political sentiment of this piece is not didactically displayed as
it is in “The Giant and the Dwarf” for the masses to comprehend.
Though there are many differences in the two
cartoons by Tenniel, however, the sentiment is very similar. In both images
Italian leaders fighting for unification are venerated. They are both
symptomatic of the British view that Italian unification was a “triumph of
nationalism” (Gooch, 1). However, the difference in representation of the two
leaders, Garibaldi and Emmanuel, predominantly displays the degree to which
Tenniel and the British public revere Garibaldi. Nevertheless, “The Giant and
the Dwarf” creates a more effective joke than “Garibaldi the Liberator” as it’s
more accessible style leaves room for more amusing caricatures. On the other hand, “Garibaldi to the Rescue”
is “histrionic, but effective” (Garvey, 175). The image makes a powerful
political statement for the middle and upper classes of British society to
‘chortle’ over.
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[1] Bomba was a moniker attributed to
Ferdinand II, originally “Rè Bomba” which literally translates as king bomb.
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