57. Today in 1920s Turkey: 4 February 1924 (Suspicious Hearts)
English:
(Above) Everyone’s Suspect
(Below) — I wonder if my wife is cheating on me?..Türkçe:
(Üstte) Herkes Şüphede
(Altta) — Acaba karım bana hıyanet ediyor mu?..
Comments:
This cartoon is one of two illustrations featured on the same page of the satirical gazette, Akbaba. The two cartoons are, in fact, thematically related. Like its sister cartoon on the same page, this one focuses our attention on the institution of marriage and spousal relations. Both cartoons expose bastardized (but wholly realistic) versions of “ideal/pure love.” Here, we are assured that jealousy and lack of mutual trust afflicts all kinds of couples. Although this particular pair appears to be a mature couple, they are not above developing their own insecurities about their most sacred of interpersonal relationships. The cartoonist offers a glimpse of the husband as he springs up in the middle of the night, as if awoken from a nightmare. In bed, alongside his wife, the man breaks the fourth wall and looks directly out at the reader and with a crazed look in his eyes, reveals his suspicions about his wife. The ridiculousness of the man’s midnight accusation is compounded by the fact that he is having these thoughts while his wife is right beside him in bed, fast asleep.
The artist of this cartoon, Ramiz, was not only one of the most prolific cartoonists of the 1920s but he was also a skilled chameleon as far as style was concerned. For instance, The Ugly Husband which appears on the same page as the current cartoon is also signed by Ramiz (his signature resembles the letter “P” to readers of the Latin script). Yet the two cartoons look nothing alike; they may as well have been drawn by entirely different cartoonists.
Originally published at https://steemit.com on February 5, 2017.
