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The "Land & Water" edition of Raemaekers' cartoons, volume 1 cover

The "Land & Water" edition of Raemaekers' cartoons, volume 1

Chapter 64: Ferdinand the Chameleon
By Louis Raemaekers
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ArtHistory - Modern (1750+)History - Warfare

About This Book

A collection of forceful wartime cartoons and accompanying editorial material that confronts militarism and records the brutal consequences of the Great War. The images pair stark, often religiously inflected symbolism with biting satire to portray atrocities, refugees, prisoners, naval and aerial warfare, propaganda, and political hypocrisy; captions and introductory essays present the artist as a moral witness. Arranged as topical plates, the drawings mix direct visual accusation and allegory to stir public sentiment, chronicle civilian suffering, and expose diplomatic and military tensions.

Ferdinand the Chameleon

There is one whole field of the evil international influence of Germany in which Ferdinand of Bulgaria is a much more important and symbolic person than William of Prussia. He is, of course, a cynical cosmopolitan. He is in great part a Jew, and an advanced type of that mauvais juif who is the principal obstacle to all the attempts of the more genuine and honest Jews to erect a rational status for their people.

Like almost every man of this type, he is a Jingo without being a patriot. That is to say, he is of the type that believes in big armaments and in a diplomacy even more brutal than armaments; but the militarism and diplomacy are not humanised either by the ancient national sanctities which surround the Czar of Russia, or the spontaneous national popularity which established the King of Serbia. He is not national, but international; and even in his peaceful activities has been not so much a neutral as a spy.

In the accompanying cartoon the Dutch caricaturist has thrust with his pencil at the central point of this falsity. It is something which is probably the central point of everything everywhere, but is especially the central point of everything connected with the deep quarrels of Eastern Europe. It is religion. Russian Orthodoxy is an enormously genuine thing; Austrian Romanism is a genuine thing; Islam is a genuine thing; Israel, for that matter, is also a genuine thing.

But Ferdinand of Bulgaria is not a genuine thing; and he represents the whole part played by Prussia in these ancient disputes. That part is the very reverse of genuine; it is a piece of ludicrous and transparent humbug. If Prussia had any religion, it would be a northern perversion of Protestantism utterly distant from and indifferent to the controversies of Slavonic Catholics. But Prussia has no religion. For her there is no God; and Ferdinand is his prophet.

G. K. CHESTERTON

FERDINAND THE CHAMELEON

“I was a Catholic, but, needing Russian help, I became a Greek Orthodox. Now I need the Austrians, I again become Catholic. Should things turn out badly, I can again revert to Greek Orthodoxy.”