The Darker Side of Genius: Richard Wagner's Anti-Semitism

American readers will likely find these cartoons and short comic pieces, published in the English periodical Punch during 1985, unevenly amusing. The Britishness of the humor, more than that of the subject matter, may impede enjoyment on this side of the Atlantic. Nevertheless, there is considerable breadth of topic and approach here. Tidbits clipped from newspapers are used as springboards for a satiric essay or group of cartoonsabout an airport children's lounge, newspaper databases, Boy Scouts conducting seances. There are sections of fractured dialogue in ""Franglais,'' caption competitions (readers are asked to supply new captions for old Punch drawings), caricatures of British political figures as Alice in Wonderland characters, mock advertisements for products useful after a nuclear holocaust. Particularly interesting, providing an amusing glimpse into the life of another time, is a series of cartoons originally printed in the magazine in 1945. (June)