The Masses, Vol. 7 No. 3, Oct/Nov 1915

This week, we were supposed to look around the MJP for an interesting piece relating to suffrage and other women's issues during World War I. During my search, I found quite an intriguing illustration in the October/November issue of The Masses, an American journal that was published monthly from 1911 through 1917, whose editors were brought up on charges of obstruction of conscriptment by federal prosecutors. This illustration, which is found on page 4 of this issue, depicts Atlas, the titan, holding the world on his back. However, the earth is plagued by smoke and explosions, and leaking oil all down Atlas' back. Atlas, described by the caption as a "mere man," looks towards a woman of equal size and stature and tells her "this [damned] thing is getting too hot and heavy and slippery for [him] to handle alone" and that she needs to help him out. I find this depiction fascinating, as it calls out the equally titanic stature of man and woman with regards to the history of the world, as well the hubris of men for thinking they carry the wieght of the world solely on their shoulders. This also relates to the topic of suffrage because, as the debate was raging, the illustration highlights the fact that men are only considering the possibility of letting women help run the world and government when the planet is already past saving. Man's hubris made it so the world was in the midst of a suicidal conflict before men could swallow their pride and cede some power to the women. However, as the curt tone of this caption conveys, it's still the woman's fault for not jumping in earlier upon seeing the man needed her help. Atlas sounds like a husband who is mad his wife is not helping him carry a cooler into the house, even though he strongly denied he ever needed help in the first place.

The Crisis August 1915

For this week we were asked to find a piece on the MJP's website about suffrage during WWI. In searching, I found a really interesting section in The Crisis from August 1915. The Crisis was a magazine published monthly created by the NAACP, and was "conducted" by W.E.B. DuBois. I chose August 1915 because there is a section entitled "Votes for Women: A Symposium by Leading Thinkers of Colored America." Within this section there are many smaller articles about women's suffrage. One in particular, "The Logic of Woman Suffrage" by Rev. Francis J. Grimke caught my eye because of a few things. The first was that the author was male and a reverend. This surprised me that a male reverend would be for women's suffrage because I would have thought that opposite was true. While he states that he used to not be for it, he is now because, he says, "The moment I began thinking about it, I became convinved that I was wrong, and swung to the other side, and have been on that side ever since" (178). In his actual argument, he lays out three reasons he believes women's suffrage must happen: women's interests are just as important to the enactment of laws as men, the average woman is as qualified as a man to think form an opinion, and that because women are governed, it is unlawful for them to not have a vote because then they are being governed without a say. He also states that voting is merely the act of showing the government your opinion, but you have formed an opinion regardless of whether you can vote or not. I found all of these arguments compelling, especially given that the points are so well thought out and, as his title suggests, logical. I would be interested to see if there were mailed in responses to this section, "Votes for Women," later on in the same way we saw the responses in The Freewoman vol. 1 no. 19 that we read for this week. 

Joan of Arc in WWI

Something that strikes me about WWI posters is just how many different approaches were used to garner support for the cause. In her introduction, Pearl James outlines some of the various methods used for propaganda and how they varied across communities and nations. In every example, there is a massive disconnect between the image and the realities of war. The Joan of Arc poster below demonstrates a merging of powerful themes:

Joan of Arc is a fascinating choice of subject for many reasons. This image of an armored Joan of Arc with a sword in hand harkens back to a simpler time, in which very different methods of fighting were used. This effectively distances the viewer from the modern horrors experienced in the trenches. In reference to German posters, James asserts that the "recurrent use of an imagined medieval past as a way of consolidating viewers and cloaking the costs of modern warfare" (James 25). Joan of Arc does this successfully, and the striking image is both recognizable and fantastical.

The poster also communicates an international message. It was created by the United States Treasury Department, so the words "Joan of Arc Saved France" could be seen as an attempt to bridge national boundaries. This historical figure could just as easily be included in posters in other countries due to the popularity of her story. Furthermore, her sainthood puts forth the theme of Christianity that also transcends nationality.

The poster depicts a strong woman who fought alongside men. As this is aimed at Americans on the homefront, this seems to be a rallying cry for women to "Buy war savings stamps" in order to feel as if they are fighting alongside the men. Along these lines, James explores many ideas concerning posters' depictions of women. In reference to American posters, James writes, "War posters register a profound confusion about women's place in the nation-at-war" (James 30). When considered next to other posters depicting women, many of which show them as mothers and nurses, this confusion is extremely evident.

In connection with Vera Brittain's Testament of Youth, Roland embodies a disconnect and romantic idealization of war when he first joins. In the same way the story of Joan of Arc seems otherworldly and distant, Roland's intellectualism and literary background provides him with a romantic idea of war. He wants to achieve some kind of glory. Vera might somewhat relate to the poster through her pursuit of nursing, since she does this to feel more connected to Roland while he is away.

La Pieta- WWI Posters and Maternal Sympathy

One thing that struck me after reading Pearl James, was the relative lack of analysis regarding maternal images. The image I selected seems to be a poster for the Red Cross and depicts a nurse holding what appears to be a soldier strapped to a strecher. Importantly, the woman here is much larger than the man she is holding in her arms, yet she is not a "goddess," a fictionalization of the country, or the embodiment of a particular virtue. Rather, when one sees her one is reminded of Michaelangelo's sculpture "La Pieta" which shows the virgin Mary holding the dead body of Christ. Notably, the soldier also seems to be clutched to the breast of the nurse which furthers the maternal parallels. I wonder whether this poster could have been particularly targeted at one religious group?

As James details, this image function on multiple levels simultaneously. On one level, depitcting a woman as a mother is conservative, and a reinforcement of traditional gender roles. However, women might also see the madona as empowering, a phenomenon which has been explored by theorists who discuss Catholicism. Certainly this could be seen as an idealized female role, however, I think the poster also invites women to imagine themselves as a contemporary madona. It's striking to look at this advertisment in light of Britain, who not only works with nuns at one point, but also speaks on multiple occasions of wounded men as being akin to children.

Propaganda and the Rhetoric of War

Considering my previous unfamiliarity with WWI posters, I’ve found Pearl James’ introduction on “Reading World War I Posters” to be quite a helpful starting point.  I was especially interested to read of the pattern of wartime poster themes established by Maurice Rickards, which asserts that posters were “calling first for ‘men and money,’ they for help for the fighting man, then for ‘help for the wounded, orphans, and refugees,’ followed by calls for women workers, economy in consumption, and ‘austerity all the way around’” (qtd. In James 19).  I found this distinction rather fascinating because nearly all of these categories may be easily found featured upon the McFarlin Library Special Collection Flickr page.  One poster, for example, begs financial support for the war by depicting the man in a harrowing battle far away, exclaiming “Strike now!  He’s fighting for you!”  Another poster shows a scene of horror as a mother appeals for help while clasping a child to her chest, another child standing close beside her.  This poster seems to mirror the consumers’ fears and nightmares while appealing for aid, which resounded with rumors of the German soldiers’ atrocities on the front lines (I am reminded of the German soldiers scoffing at the rumors of infant cannibalism in All Quiet on the Western Front).  Still another poster—intending to persuade men to enlist—is inhabited by a group of joyful Scottish youths presented with the heading of “Line up, boys!  Enlist to-day.”  It is this final poster that I am chiefly interested in, because I simply could not help seeing in this imagined group of recruits—who are apparently either on their way to enlist, or soon to be deployed after having enlisted together—a possible reflection of the four young heroes of Vera Brittain’s tragic memoir, Testament of Youth, kilt-clad though the poster-youths may be.

In the poster we have a depiction of four handsome young men, gladly enlisting in order to participate in a just and noble war.  “Line up, boys!” the poster exclaims across the top, with the concluding “Enlist to-day” along the bottom of the image.  In this image am easily able to envision the proud and glad faces of Vera Brittain’s beloved Roland, Edward, Geoffrey, and Victor, as they initially contemplated the glorious deeds and experiences they hoped to attain through the war.  Such idealism is fleeting, for it is only too soon before such hopes and dreams become utterly dashed by the cold realities of the numbing, senseless, mass-produced warfare of World War I.  I feel an interesting claim resides in the particular words chosen for the poster, for they rather suggest that not only is enlisting the natural conclusion every young man must come to, but also that one will be in such great company—and with one’s own fellows, if the depiction of the four joyful youth laughing and smiling together as they proceed means anything—in the endeavor so as to necessitate forming a line in order to maintain order.  The words perhaps even imply that one might be in competition with others of his own group to see who can enlist first.  Although it is possible that this image sets the youths apart in depicting them as Scotsmen, it seems more likely intended to imply that each individual, regardless of his or her own background, must likewise make the right choice, and take part.  As Pearl James notes, “many ritualized displays invited viewers to become participants in the scene depicted by the poster, and so to ratify or personalize its message” (9), and thus, in creating such personalized images posters essentially “redefined the boundaries of public space, bringing national imperatives into private or parochial settings” (James 10).  Here, the war has been brought to the individual, and he or she is expected to respond.

Finally, Jennifer Keene determines that, regardless of the changing in rhetorical styles over the course of the war, posters “never departed from the storyline […] that portrayed the war as one in which individual soldiers could make a difference on the battlefield” (qtd. in James 33).  It is just such an individual difference that the youthful Roland, Edward, Geoffrey, and Victor hoped to make, and yet in actuality the war was one in which a man such as Roland went “unadorned to his grave without taking part in a single important action” (ToY 287), in which Victor could die of a brain injury many weeks after attempting to reestablish his life, and in which Vera Brittain could only agonize over, not only the senseless death of her friend, but of “the superfluous torture of Victor’s long agony, the cruel waste of his brave efforts at vital readjustment” (ToY 358).  Thus, wartime posters such as this cheerful encouragement to “Line up, boys!” and “Enlist to-day” undoubtedly supposes a joyful approach to the wartime conflict that is, in a way, rather lovely to behold.  However, as Brittain’s Testament of Youth vividly illustrates, this hope had been based upon a patriotic ideal of heroic warfare that was very far, indeed, from the brutal realities of World War I.

Knightly Imagery and the Realities of War

Reading the James for Wednesdays class, I stumbled over a particular passage in the Introduction. In it, James references a mailed fist among German propaganda posters. He specifically remarks on page 25 that "Many German posters use the icon of a mailed fist as 'a symbol of somber resolve' to solidify their audience. But as Goebel notes in his essay, that imagery 'backfired on the Kaiserreich' when the imagery was transported abroad and view by others, who saw instead a symbol of German barbarism." I looked around for an example poster, and found this:

  

" Das ist der Weg zum Frieden -- die Feinde wollen es so! Darum zeichne Kriegsanleihe" roughly translates to "This is the way to peace -- the enemy wills it so! Therefore draw war bonds." The fist is a mailed fist obviously, and covered in medieval armor. So the sentence can be understood as saying "Our enemies want to fight, so we're fighting. Give us money so that we can afford it." Sounds an awful lot like those American posters we read. 

The other poster is less striking because the fist is holding a rather blunt looking sword instead of a spike-studded fist. The text I can read says "Deutsche Kriegs," or "German War." The last bolded word might be zustellung, which means "delivery." So literally "German War Delivery." But even if we assume I'm wrong with the last word, the words "German" and "War" are on there with a very medieval looking arm. (Leipzig is a German town, so the poster is probably talking about something happening in Leipzig between November 1916 and February 1917.)

Why, then, would posters like this be considered barbaric? If we look at some of the posters in the McFarlin Collection, we can see:

And then, in Google:

 

The first three posters make heavy use of sword/medieval imagery, with the most obvious being Joan of Arc. The fourth, the "Remember" poster, has Athena as its leading woman.The final poster, obviously, is a British war banner that entreats soldiers to join the fight because firstly their king, then country needs them. From these posters alone it is obvious that Britain and America of all places are leaning pretty heavily on the idea of chivalric warriors for their soldier propaganda. So why was Germany's treated so poorly? Because they used a mailed fist and plate armor? They didn't have the artistic taste to update the equipment of their soldiers?

 

While that sense of hypocrisy interests me, I am also focused on James' accusation that war posters "did not show the war's human costs" (32). Apparently, because they did not show bloodied limbs and gangrenous wounds, WWI propaganda dealt with war "in the most abstract way, avoiding any real evocation of the horrors that war actually entails" (Fogarty, qtd. in James). Most posters on the Mcfarlin Library page show soldiers with bandages, or in the middle of stabbing someone, or women in immediate danger. One even has the Statue of Liberty on fire. And, perhaps most glaringly, on page 7 of the Introduction James shows a poster that says "The Potato is a Good Soldier, Eat It Uniform and All." That sounds a lot like a muted reference to the raw reality of what soldiers (read, what Bäumer and his fellow soldiers experienced in All Quiet on the Western Front) lived in the trenches to me

Boy Scout Liberty Bonds

Much like everyone else posting today, the role of women in these posters is highly intriguing. Aubrey highlights the role of women as carers in a lot of the posters, and how they end up "behind the man behind the gun" to care for the homefront and support the men fighting off on the front. James supports this by saying women in these posters exist to "distinguish male participation as more vital" (James 30). However, this poster, entitled USA Bonds Third Liberty Loans Boy Scouts of America, flips that idea in a compelling manner, setting Lady Liberty in the more masculine fighter role and the Boy Scout almost as a medieval squire. Lady Liberty does appear more manly and much less timid than a lot of the other women seen in the posters in the Special Collections archive. Nevertheless, she stands resolute, holding her shield and draped in an American flag toga, defending the United States against an enemy off in the distance, which would be understood to be the Germans. The use of a sword and shield harkens back to knights and chivalrous fighting, coloring World War I as an honorable fight, and not one waged using "machine guns, long-range artillery, submarines," and chemical weapons (James 1). The presense of the Boy Scout in the foreground, handing the sword up to Lady Liberty, stands as a direct call to action on the homefront. If this child is doing his due diliigence and assisting in the war effort, then the observer of this poster has no real excuse to not buy war bonds and support the soldiers. In addition, "Be Prepared," one of the main tennants of the Boy Scouts of America, is engraved on Lady Liberty's sword. This implies the best way to support the American war machine is to excercise constant vigillance, and that vigillance is the best weapon that the US could employ against their enemies. 

Where Columbia Sets Her Name Let Every One Of You Follow Her

Like others, I was intruiged by the portrayal of women on some of these posters. While they generally had feminine occupations (nurse, mother, wife, etc.), the women on these posters also look determined with serious faces, which are often facing upward. They are dutiful and puposeful while maintaining a sense of grace and delicacy. This sentiment of "contradictory uses of the female figure" was echoed in Pearl James' introduction to reading WWI posters; he notes that the women featured in these posters were used "both to distinguish male participation as more vital to the nation and to invite unprecedented female participation" (James 30).

The poster above features two portrayals of women that would fit in the second category - a Red Cross nurse and Columbia, the personaification of the New World/America. Their shapelessly draped robes, strong facial features, and bulking arms muscles make these women rather androgynous compared to women featured on other posters, which would most likely fall in the first category of women that James recognizes as encouraging male participation. The call to action on the scroll ("Where Columbia Sets Her Name Let Every One Of You Follow Her") is powerful, espcially as Columbia has a pen in her hand that is positioned to take down names. Not only is she in a position of power this way, but also Columbia is wearing a sword. This is another powerful yet somewhat perplexing image, as this war was considered to be "the first fully modern war" with "arsenals that included machine guns, long-range artillery, submarines, airplanes, tanks, and mass-produced industrial goods" (James 1).

When considering this poster in relationship to Vera Brittain's Testament of Youth, one must wonder what Brittain's opinion of such a piece would be. Would this have encouraged her participation as a nurse? Or would she have found this poster to be annoying? Because it challenges Victorian ideals of gender and female fraility, I think she might have appreciated this poster. I would be interested to know what others think on this matter!

Rendering a Racial Other

Similarly to Justin, I was most struck by some of the depictions of German soldiers in these posters.  In particular, J. Allen St. John's "Hun or Home?" poster which depicts a shadowy German soldier with bloody hands crawling after a woman holding a child.  It is interesting that this poster is drawn rather crudely when many of the posters from McFarlin's collection have sharp lines and bright colors.  Although we are looking at a small sample of posters, I do not think it is too far outside the realm of possibility to read this difference as an attempt to render the German soldier as a racial "other."  I would also argue that since the German soldier is hardly even defined as a shape, but more of just an obfuscated figure in contrast to the much more defined woman and child, that this poster also connotes a German primitiveness.  James' introduction highlights that such images were effective at whipping up anti-immigrant sentiment, and that these posters were intentionally playing off "racial tension and racial threat" (24).  However, I found myself wondering how much images like these played into similar racial stereotypes of African Americans.

In terms of marketing, inevitably this poster is trying to sell smething to its audience as right under the question "Hun or Home?" is the command to "Buy More Liberty Bonds."  The use of "More" here is interesting because the advertisement component of this poster making the assumption that its audience has already purchased bonds before.  It also implies that their home will not be safe from the Huns should they choose not to continue investing in the war through bonds.  I found myself wondering if the intent here was to situate potential harm in economic terms even though the imagery itself is of war.  This question of "Hun or Home?" also poses an ultimatum to its audience that I think is ultimately a moot point.  If we think about war time patriotism and the prevalance of these types of posters in public spaces, then the answer is obvious: home.  I think the more important question that is being asked here is what are you willing to continue to do to support the War?  What "more" are you willing to give?

Women as Carers

One of the things I found most interesting this week is the fact that in most of the posters that portray women, they are portrayed as people that care for others (nurses, cooks, mothers, etc.) and people that need protecting. Thus, the women are sending the men away in some of the posters to fight for them while they stay home and care for the house and family. In other posters, like this one, women are portrayed as nurses who care for the wounded men. Again, the women are the ones that are caring for others. In this poster, the language itself lends itself to thinking that women must be protected because instead of remembering the woman “behind the man behind the gun,” the poster asks the viewer to “remember the girl behind the man behind the gun.” This both places the woman as someone in need of protection and the woman as the one who is caring for the men. I find this interesting given that when men left their jobs to go to the war, the women had to take them so that 1) their families would have enough money to survive and 2) the men would have enough support at home from manufacturers and other businesses. In her article “‘The girl behind the man behind the gun': Women as Carers in Recruitment Posters of the First World War,” Angela Smith discusses another poster in which a woman is working as a munition worker. She is in the front of the poster, and the poster reads “On her their lives depend” (Smith 238). Again, instead of this poster showing that the woman is doing her part in the war and doing what is necessary, it puts the woman in the position of caring for the soldiers because she is the one that their lives depend on. Also, as Smith’s title suggests, the phrase “the girl behind the man behind the gun” was used on more posters than just this one. This phrase proliferates the idea that women are girls in need of protection and that they are the one’s solely caring for the men. This vision of women is propaganda because it makes the viewer feel better about the fact that women had to turn to working in factories and as munitions workers. Because the Victorian ideals of society have not yet lost their grip on society, these visions of women as needing protection and, as Angela Smith calls them, “carers,” makes society feel better about the work being done by women, as in "Remember the girl behind the man behind the gun."

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