Changing times

Now, a couple of posts about a magazine that seems to me to catch the modern mood. This is a volume comprising the first issues (February to July 1892) of ‘The Idler’ magazine published between 1892 and 1911. Founded by Robert Barr it was a journal for the idle gentleman, a mix of humorous pieces of all sorts, short stories and serials, illustrations by some of the finest writers and illustrators of the time. Barr brought in Jerome K Jerome in help editorially – a shrewd choice. Jerome was at the height of his game following the extraordinary success of ‘Three Men in a Boat’, published in 1889 and still filling the public imagination.

A Victorian magazine but full of a different mood. It belongs to the 1890s, such a transitional decade for the arts and society. It’s satiric, forward-looking and light-hearted. ‘The Yellow Book’ was soon to follow in 1894.

Two things that capture the mood of the magazine. The first is the beginning of a neat little Sherlock Holmes parody (above). Sherlock Holmes was at the height of his powers too, ‘The Sign of Four’ had been published in 1890 and this satire was a year before Holmes was supposedly to fall from the Reichenbach Falls. Then, what could be more modern with what ‘The Idler’ called ‘Choice Blends.’ State of the art camera technology must have been used to merge individual photos to form a composite image. In the one below the faces of the Oxford University Boat Race crew have been merged into one image. Modern, indeed.