Caricature and the Comic Image in the 1830s

Abstract

This essay forms a brief overview of the extent to which the comic image became inscribed into the print culture of the 1830s. The decade saw a decline in the production of caricature as a satirical force, but developed a wide range of new print forms and genres that allowed graphic satire a broad cultural presence. Some of these, such as down-market single-plate lithographs and short sequences of oblong folio multi-image plates, sought to retain the autonomy of the comic image within a rapidly developing and commercially inventive market place. Other hybrid forms, especially periodicals, were developed as a mechanism for incorporating radical graphic political commentary. The comic image was also used to produce subversive travesty versions of established print forms such as the almanac and the annual. The decade suggests a turbulently inventive and experimental phase in the history of the comic image, and, in spite of the widespread indifference of scholars, offers much of interest to cultural historians.