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The Faces of the Enemy in the Two World Wars
above-mentioned caricature from Magyarsdg (K, July 6, 1941). In Kladderadatsch
caricatures published after 1941, the bear rarely appears without Stalin’s face drawn
into its figure (for example, on his stomach). The shadow of the red bear haunts
over Europe, or Stalin snarls at the small nations or even at his allies. One can see
the injured bear in Kladderadatsch, but not often. In the caricatures in Magyarsdg,
the bear is gripped by a pair of pliers bearing the swastika (K, February 14, 1943;
K, March 19, 1944; M, November 27, 1941).
The English heraldic animals—the unicorn and the lion—appear in the same
way as the bear: when the entente or allied troops lost battles or resources on the
continent, caricatures were published showing the lion with injuries, bandages,
bleeding, with lost limbs or crying (a very cowardly act) in the caricatures of both
wars (Fig. 48). No respect is given to the king of the beasts in the caricature in
which he begs the Turkish pasha in Egypt (K, October 31, 1915). The unicorn ap¬
pears rarely and only in Kladderadatsch, his most characteristic feature being that he
crashes into something, for instance into a flagpole with the Turkish flag (K, Janu¬
ary 3, 1915). Britain also appeared as a sea lion in the period of WWI when the
caricaturist wanted to refer to a naval battle (K, July 23, 1916). Another animal
generally connected with Britain is a bulldog, snarling next to Churchill, which
emphasises British aggression (BJ, April 7, 1918).
Sometimes one can see more than one injured animal in a caricature, for in¬
stance, the bulldog and the Gallic rooster together (Fig. 49). The depiction of
France using a rooster wearing the Gallic cap has no connection to the French
coat of arms, although it is deeply rooted in tradition. The Romans used the word
‘Gallic for the territory of modern France, and the Latin word means both ‘Gallic
man’ and ‘rooster’. This animal was also depicted wounded or with bandages (K,
July 23, 1916). In the period of WWII one cannot find the rooster after 1940, after
the German occupation of France.
The aim and logic of caricatures with the symbolic figure of a country—Mari¬
anne in the Gallic cap for France, Ivan the Cossack for Russia, later the Bolshevik
worker for the Soviet Union, the figures of Uncle Sam and John Bull—or depicting
leading politicians (K, November 26, 1939) who are also injured, missing limbs or
bleeding, is the same as with the animals. In both analysed periods caricatures of
deformed human beings were published in great numbers. These caricatures are in
stark contrast to the caricatures referencing the in-group (see section Depiction of
the Self), in which the German eagle flies over the battlefields, or in which brave
and strong German soldiers are smiling. The extent of the deformation of human
beings differs in the two analysed periods. The politicians and personifications of
the countries were shown more amorphously (for example with a disproportional
body or ugly features) during WWII and more frequently than earlier. While Mag¬
yarsäg changed the facial features or the normal proportions of the human body,
the caricaturist of Kladderadatsch modified the figures in more varied ways: the
characters of the latter are often shown without clothes (referring to their immo¬
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