The New Orleans of Lafcadio Hearn

Illustrated Sketches from the Daily City Item

Delia LaBarre

• Publisher: LSU Press
• Year: 2007
• ISBN:
  9780807148273
• Topic: History
• Subtopic: North American History
• Index: History

Lafcadio Hearn (1850--1904) was a master satirist who displayed a fiery wit both as a writer and as an artist. For seven months in 1880, he surprised and amused the readers of New Orleans with his wood-block "cartoons" and accompanying articles, which were variously funny, scathing, surreal, political, whimsical, and moral. This delightful book collects in their entirety, for the first time, all of the extant satirical columns and woodcut illustrations published in the Daily City Item -- 181 columns in all. Hearn displays immense range, illuminating in words and prints the unique culture of New Orleans, including its Creole history, debauched underworld, corrupt politicians, and voudou practitioners. The columns are expertly annotated by Delia LaBarre, who places them in their unique Crescent City context.
With virtually no training in art of any kind, Hearn began creating his illustrations partly to boost the circulation of a small daily newspaper in a competitive market. He believed in the power of satirical cartoons to communicate big ideas in small spaces -- in particular, to reveal the habits, prejudices, and delusions of the current generation. Blind in his left eye (since a boyhood accident) and severely myopic in his right, Hearn nonetheless painstakingly carved out drawings on wood blocks with a penknife to be printed alongside his articles on the newspaper's letterpress. Hearn developed, from the first of these woodcuts to the last, a unique style that expressed the full range of his wit, from razor-sharp condemnation to tender affection.
Hearn had a keen eye for the absurd, along with an extraordinary ability to modulate his criticism and praise in a continuum from cauterizing vitriol to palliative balm, from the heaviest sarcasm to the lightest wit. In the pieces collected here, there can be found a unifying thread: Hearn's love/hate relationship with the virtues and vices of New Orleans, a city that continually amused and amazed him.
Born in Greece and raised in Ireland, Lafcadio Hearn immigrated to the United States as a teenager and became a newspaper reporter in Cincinnati, Ohio. When he married a black woman, an act that was illegal at the time, the newspaper fired him and Hearn relocated to New Orleans. In the early 1880s his contributions to national publications (like Harper's Weekly and Scribners Magazine) helped mold the popular image of New Orleans as a colorful place of decadence and hedonism. In 1888, Hearn left New Orleans for Japan, where he took the name Koizumi Yakumo and worked as a teacher, journalist, and writer.
"And it may come to pass that I shall have stranger things to tell you; for this is a land of magical moons and of witches and of warlocks; and were I to tell you all that I have seen and heard in these years in this enchanted City of Dreams you would verily deem me mad rather than morbid." -- Lafcadio Hearn, 1880, describing New Orleans in a letter to a friend

Table of contents

• COVER
• TITLE PAGE
• COPYRIGHT PAGE
• CONTENTS
• ACKNOWLEDGMENTS: The Vitriol and Balm of a Nineteenth-Century Prophet
• INTRODUCTION
• EDITORIAL NOTE
• THE HAUNTED AND THE HAUNTERS +
• FREE BOARD AND LODGING FOR THIEVES +
• THE DELIVERING ANGEL +
• THE IDEAL COMMISSIONER +
• THE OPIUM VICE +
• FRANK J. MUMFORD +
• MUMFORD OF OURS +
• “THIS WAY? OR THIS?” +
• DOG DAYS +
• POLICE BOARD +
• THE DEVIL ON CARONDELET STREET +
• THE OARSMEN +
• EXTHRACT FROM THE SPACH OV PADDY WHACK +
• THE TROPICAL PALM +
• (AWAY, AWAY) +
• THE SMILE THAT JOHNSON SMOLE +
• CRUSHING OUT THE VIPERS +
• MILITARY SALUTES
• BOOM-BOOM +
• ILLUSTRATED LETTERS FROM THE PEOPLE +
• ILLUSTRATED LETTERS FROM THE PEOPLE +
• THE AMATEUR MUSICIAN
• THE LAST OF TILDEN AND THE LAST OF GRANT +
• ILLUSTRATED LETTERS FROM THE PEOPLE
• THE UNSPEAKABLE VELOCIPEDE +
• THE BICYCLE FIEND’S DEFENSE +
• THE ORGAN GRINDER +
• ILLUSTRATED LETTERS FROM THE PEOPLE
• THE NURSE MAID
• ILLUSTRATED LETTERS FROM THE PEOPLE +
• FEMININE INTOLERANCE
• HANCOCK AND ENGLISH +
• MORNING CALLS—VERY EARLY +
• THE GO-AT +
• OAKLAND PARK SCENERY +
• “FORTY FIGHTS TO A DANCE”
• CITIZEN-EXECUTIONER SHERMAN +
• IN THE VISE
• ILLUSTRATED LETTERS FROM THE PEOPLE +
• THE LAST SHAKE OF THE BLOODY SHIRT
• HOW THEY DO IT
• THE WOLFISH DOG +
• ILLUSTRATED LETTERS FROM THE PEOPLE +
• ULTRA-CANAL +
• DR. TANNER +
• “SHINE?”
• DR. TANNER +
• ILLUSTRATED LETTERS FROM THE PEOPLE +
• ILLUSTRATED LETTERS FROM THE PEOPLE +
• ILLUSTRATED LETTERS FROM THE PEOPLE +
• DR. TANNER +
• THE KNIFE-GRINDER +
• DR. TANNER’S PRESENT ASPECT +
• “THE DIREFUL BOOST”
• ———!———!! MOSQUITOES!!!
• ILLUSTRATED LETTERS FROM THE PEOPLE
• ATTENTION, ROWDIES! +
• TAXPAYERS’ CATECHISM +
• AH SIN ON THE SITUATION +
• THE FATAL PLUNGE
• ILLUSTRATED LETTERS FROM THE PEOPLE
• INS AND OUTS +
• UNDER THE ELECTRIC LIGHT +
• DR. TANNER +
• SCAT!
• SEEKING A SENSATION
• LAKE-SIDE LICKINGS
• SARAH BERNHARDT +
• ILLUSTRATED LETTERS FROM THE PEOPLE
• VOLUNTARY CONTRIBUTIONS
• JEWELL’S DEFENCE OF GARFIELD +
• BY THE MURMURING WAVES
• HUNTING FOR THE HONEST EIGHT +
• NAUGHTY BOYS
• GHOSTESES
• COMING EVENTS CAST THEIR SHADOWS BEFORE +
• QUACK! QUACK! +
• THE CHINESE VICE +
• CAT-ANKAROUS +
• GO-IT
• MURDER AND VIOLENCE +
• CHAR-COAL
• ROWDYISM SUPPRESSED +
• NOT A DREAM AT ALL +
• OUR GHOULS +
• THE WITCH
• DES PERCHES
• WASHERWOMEN +
• SONS OF THE SEA
• A SMALL NUISANCE
• THE MILKMAN +
• PRICKLY HEAT
• THE HAND-MAIDEN
• DANDY-TRAPS
• CONTRABAND +
• THE INDIGNANT DEAD +
• WHITED SEPULCHRES
• DEAD SEA FRUIT +
• THE FLOWER-SELLERS
• THE MAN WITH THE SMALL ELECTRIC MACHINE
• THE ALLIGATORS +
• THE POLICE BOARD
• THE VENDOR OF WISDOM +
• THE CURSE OF THE NEWSPAPER VENDOR +
• AT THE PHOTOGRAPHER’S
• CAKES AND CANDY +
• THE PULLER OF NOSES +
• YE PILOT +
• AWFUL CONSEQUENCES OF POOR SHOOTING +
• A WARNING TO ADVERTISERS
• FRANTIC APPEALS FOR HELP
• POLICE EFFICIENCY +
• THE MASTER SPIRIT +
• THE POLICE MUTUAL AID SOCIETY
• ILLUSTRATED LETTERS FROM THE PEOPLE +
• YOU PAYS YOUR MONEY, AND YOU TAKES YOUR CHOICE +
• THE GREAT EASTERN +
• THE WAGES OF SIN +
• THAT VERDICT +
• PONEY UP! +
• 329 +
• WANT TO INVESTIGATE
• STATEMENT OF A VICTIM +
• THAT VILLAINOUS BROKER
• IMPROVED POLICE IDEAS +
• BLACKMAILING +
• NOTHING LIKE SELF-ESTEEM
• SCOURGED TO THE BALLOT +
• THE SMOKERS OF PIPES
• THE FESTIVE
• AÏDA +
• HOW HISTORY IS WRITTEN
• NOT 329 BUT 350 +
• AND HE SPAKE TO THEM ANOTHER PARABLE
• DREAMS OF THE ELECTOR—BEFORE AND AFTER
• JOURNALISTIC DISSECTION +
• YOUTHFUL SMOKERS
• COMMERCIAL STATUARY
• SPANISH MOSS +
• FIRE! +
• ALL SAINTS! +
• THE CHINESE POISON +
• DREAMS OF THE BALLET
• A DAY OF RECKONING
• GLADNESS IN THE GRANITE BUILDING +
• FRENCH OPERA +
• THE SHOOTING SEASON
• THAT PIANO ORGAN
• UNE PREMIÈRE DANSEUSE
• THE FRENCH OPERA
• RECOLLECTIONS OF THE THEATRICAL SEASON +
• DISSATISFIED
• THE FRENCH OPERA HOUSE
• THOSE FURNITURE MEN
• THE FRENCH OPERA HOUSE
• THE BONE OF CONTENTION +
• THE FRENCH OPERA HOUSE
• THE FRENCH OPERA
• THE PELICAN’S GHOST +
• SOMETHING TO BE PROUD OF +
• THANKSGIVING
• BRITISH RECOLLECTIONS OF NEW ORLEANS
• THE MAN SOCIALLY LOVED +
• CURIOUS!
• AN ARTFUL DODGER
• AFTER THANKSGIVING
• OUR MODEL POLICE FORCE
• “OFT IN THE STILLY NIGHT,” ETC. +
• UGH!! +
• THE FRENCH OPERA
• MORAL EDIFICATION +
• “WET ENOUGH FOR YOU?” +
• WEB-FOOTED
• TAXES
• TANTALIZING +
• OFFICERS OF THE LAW
• SIGNIFICANT PARAGRAPHS FROM THE PRESIDENT’S MESSAGE
• WON’T WAIT TILL THE HOLIDAYS
• A MILLER WHO COULDN’T MILL +
• THE SANITARY CONFERENCE
• THE INUNDATIONS +
• NOTES ON COLUMNS
• BIBLIOGRAPHY