Cartoons for the Cause – An Irishman’s Diary about the ‘Lepracaun’ magazine

The cartoonist wing of the nationalist movement

Before the actual shooting of Ireland's revolutionary period began, to paraphrase Declan Kiberd, there was a preliminary war in which the weapons were all ideas. They were deployed in poetry and plays, songs and speeches. But among the skirmishers in this intellectual conflict, there was also a monthly satirical magazine called the Lepracaun.

First published in 1905, it lasted 10 years, during which time it formed the cartoonist wing of the nationalist movement. As such, it provided a much-needed defence against the depredations of Punch, whose racist depictions of the ape-like Irish purported to inform opinion elsewhere.

The Lepracaun was founded by, and largely the work of, Thomas Fitzpatrick, then one of the leading political cartoonists in Ireland, although today probably best known as a grandfather of Jim, he of the Celtic art, Thin Lizzy album covers, and the famous Che Guevara poster.

There's an oral tradition, entertaining but probably untrue, that James Joyce was also a contributor to the Lepracaun. And he certainly had an interest in that sort of thing. In fact, in 1903, before departing for exile, he thought about setting up his own humour magazine, to be called the Hobgoblin. Nothing came of that, unfortunately, and he was reduced to writing literature in the end.

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We also know that, while in Italy in 1906, he did read and enjoy the Leprechaun, which somebody had sent him. But the nearest any scholars have come to connecting him with the editorial production was his own stated concerns at the possibility that a satirical poem in the magazine, signed only by the name "Joyce", would be mistaken for his work.

Even by the standards of its time, the Lepracaun was no Charlie Hebdo. Fitzpatrick's satire was more gentle than savage, and after a 15-year hiatus in which the Irish market had been without any rival to Punch, it was also very popular.

Maybe the shortage of political humour during the preceding decade and a half was part of the hangover that followed the death of Parnell, when nationalism split down the middle. Indeed Fitzpatrick had made his name in part through his work for the anti-Parnellite papers.

But this was as likely due to professional expediency as any particular conviction. In any case, his personal popularity and the quality of the drawings ensured a broad welcome for the Lepracaun. Even the then-unionist Irish Times rolled out the carpet for what it called a "capital and entertaining little periodical".

Gentle as it might be, the Lepracaun was not afraid to take on big targets on occasion. Among its apolitical satires, for example, was a well-aimed shot at Guinness, after that brewing behemoth doubled profits in a short period by forcing publicans not to stock rival brands.

And although it tended to support John Redmond’s Irish Party, it also betrayed impatience with those Westminster veterans for whom, as we now know, the tide of history was about to go out.

Fitzpatrick, sad to say, would not live to portray the turbulent decade whose centenaries are now upon us. He died in 1912, aged only 52. Thereafter, the magazine was continued by his daughter Mary and by another top cartoonist, John F O’Hea.

It remained a vibrant publication throughout the 1913 Lockout, in which it criticised both the employers and unions, while sympathising with the public caught between. And it also survived the first months of the war, taking a Redmondite line, with some qualification.

But it was probably itself one of the victims of the conflict. In its last issues, there was a precipitous fall in standards, suggesting a shortage of artistic talent if not of staff in general. Then, in February 1915, it quietly disappeared.

A century later, Dublin City Council has commissioned a history of the Lepracaun as part of its Decade of Commemorations series. To be published next week by Four Courts Press, this sets the magazine in its sociopolitical context, with commentary by James Curry of NUI Galway's Moore Institute, and Ciarán Wallace, from the Centre for Contemporary Irish History in Trinity College Dublin.

The book will have a preface by the aforementioned Jim Fitzpatrick. And to prove that it's not just Irish politicians who form dynasties, there will be yet another generation of the family involved. The book's cover is a 21st-century update on the Lepracaun's original front page designed by Conánn, son of Jim, great-grandson of Thomas, and the latest in a long line of Fitzpatricks to take up pencils for Ireland.

@FrankmcnallyIT