By Jon
Publisher: Bellew Publishing
ISBN: 0-947792-73-2
I'm rapidly approaching 40 but before last year, when I read Mark Bryant's World War II In Cartoons, I'd never heard of Jon's Two Types, which is a sad reflection of how something that can shape and reflect a period of time can slowly fade from the public consciousness. The Two Types are moustachioed officers of the Desert Rats, superbly acclimatised to North Africa at the expense of uniform and attitude. As the war progressed the Two Types saw themselves move from Africa to Italy and beyond, but their personalities, carved from the North African front, remained the cornerstone of the gags.
Those gags almost all revolve around the experiences of the soldier (well, officer, actually) serving abroad, specifically their frustrations, bafflement or bemusement. Over the course of the book, and some considerable time, the two characters change very little, adding a sense of surrealism to the cartoons' charm.
As a historical document, it's interesting reading enough on its own, as you follow the Two Types responses and reactions to the problems of war. I did struggle in many places to make head nor tail of some of the gags, so intertwined are they with the lingo and the period, but had I spotted the glossary at the back of the book earlier it wouldn't have been so much of a problem.
The book also contains a foreword by Lord Cudlipp, a brief biography by Jon and a further piece by Cyril James that help put the work into context, and make you realise just how important Jon's work was to many, many people. We all know that times have changed and that cartoons now battle with all sorts of instant comment on news and events, so it's refreshing to read just how much of an impact the Two Types once had.
If you'd not heard of the Two Types either, perhaps you owe it to the history of cartooning to make yourself a little more familiar with them. I raise my glass of grappa to them.
And if you liked that: Take a look at similar books available from www.cartoonbooks.co.uk
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