DILEMMA 1891 Sir John Tenniel - William Harcourt PUNCH CARTOON PAGE

Original 10 3/4 inch x 8 1/8 inch Single-Sided Wood Engraved Cartoon page titled THE DILEMMA from Punch, July 4, 1891.

Sir William George Granville Venables Vernon Harcourt KC (1827 – 1904) was a British lawyer, journalist and Liberal statesman. He served as Member of Parliament for Oxford, Derby then West Monmouthshire and held the offices of Home Secretary and Chancellor of the Exchequer under William Ewart Gladstone before becoming Leader of the Opposition. A talented speaker in parliament, he was sometimes regarded as aloof and possessing only an intellectual involvement in his causes. He failed to engender much emotional response in the public and became only a reluctant and disillusioned leader of his party.

Joseph Chamberlain (1836 – 1914) was a British statesman who was first a radical Liberal, then, after opposing home rule for Ireland, a Liberal Unionist, and eventually served as a leading imperialist in coalition with the Conservatives. He split both major British parties in the course of his career. He was father, by different marriages, of Nobel Peace Prize winner Austen Chamberlain and of Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain.

The cartoon was wood engraved by Joseph Swain (1820 -1909) from an illustration by Sir John Tenniel (1820 - 1914), both were regulars on Punch magazine.

Punch, or The London Charivari, was a British weekly magazine of humour and satire established in 1841 by Henry Mayhew and wood-engraver Ebenezer Landells. Historically, it was most influential in the 1840s and 1850s, when it helped to coin the term "cartoon" in its modern sense as a humorous illustration.

The page is in very good condition. Reverse side blank.