Through the generosity of the late Professor Benedict Anderson and Ajarn Charnvit Kasetsiri, the Thammasat University Library has newly acquired some important books of interest for students of Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) studies, political science, sociology, and related fields.

They are part of a special bequest of over 2800 books from the personal scholarly library of Professor Benedict Anderson at Cornell University, in addition to the previous donation of books from the library of Professor Anderson at his home in Bangkok. These newly available items will be on the TU Library shelves for the benefit of our students and ajarns. They are shelved in the Charnvit Kasetsiri Room of the Pridi Banomyong Library, Tha Prachan campus.

Among them are some newly acquired books that should be useful to TU students who are interested in art, history, political science, humor studies, and related fields.

The Herblock Gallery and related books are by Herbert Lawrence Block, commonly known as Herblock, an American editorial cartoonist and author best known for his commentaries on national domestic and foreign policy.

Block was chief editorial cartoonist for The Washington Post newspaper for 55 years.

The TU Library collection includes several other books about political cartoons.

According to the Library of Congress website where an archive of Herblock’s work is kept,

Through the decades he has remained true to certain issues and principles: supporting civil rights measures, gun control, campaign finance reform, funding for education and democracy for residents of the District of Columbia, among other issues. “Taking one issue at a time and one administration at a time and dealing with it the way you see it,” is how he describes his approach. His longtime assistant, Jean Rickard, suggests that his parents instilled in him a strong sense of wrong and right, the confidence to express his views openly and the courage to stand up for what is right. For example, on the issue of racism, which Herb Block began addressing immediately after World War II (in advance of virtually all other American cartoonists), he notes “I never had those feelings growing up. My father and mother felt that you should simply be a good citizen and think about the other guy.”

Herb Block has been thinking about “the other guy” throughout his career. For more than seventy years, cartoon after cartoon, day after day, he has chronicled the best America has to offer and the worst, from the depths of the Great Depression into a new millennium. No editorial cartoonist in American history, not even Thomas Nast, has made a more lasting impression on the nation than Herbert Block. His influence has been enormous, both on his profession and the general public, although he modestly sloughs off such praise with anecdotes. One was about a comment related to Post publisher, Phil Graham during the 1954 Army-McCarthy hearings. Walter Winchell told Graham that he had come upon Senator McCarthy shaving at midday and complaining that he had to shave twice a day on account of that guy [Herb Block] and his cartoons. Apparently his caricatures of the senator as an unshaven, belligerent Neanderthal in a suit found their mark. When asked if he feels he played a role in checking McCarthy’s rise to power, Herb Block quietly responds, “I sure tried to.” Richard Nixon expressed a similar reaction to the cartoons, saying at one point he had to “erase the Herblock image.”

Humor has been one of his greatest assets, drawing people in, encouraging them to read the cartoons and consider his opinions. Laughter warms the coldest heart and lends perspective to serious issues and events. “I enjoy humor and comedy,” he says, “and try to get fun into the work.” Humor is an important vehicle for delivering a message, making “it a little easier for the medicine to go down.” Herb Block’s cartoons may never cure cancer or the common cold, but for the better part of a century they have helped ward off the ill effects of war, bigotry, economic opportunism, political arrogance, and social injustice. What more could we ask of one man?

The Herb Block Foundation offers funding for programs in Defending Basic Freedoms; Pathways Out of Poverty; and Encouraging Citizen Involvement.

The Foundation’s Commitment:

The Herb Block Foundation is committed to defending the basic freedoms guaranteed all Americans, combating all forms of discrimination and prejudice and improving the conditions of the poor and underprivileged through the creation or support of charitable and educational programs with the same goals.

The Foundation is also committed to providing educational opportunity to deserving students through post-secondary education scholarships and to promoting editorial cartooning through continued research. All efforts of the Foundation shall be in keeping with the spirit of Herblock, America’s great cartoonist in his life long fight against abuses by the powerful.

According to the Foundation website,

Herb Block is among the world’s best known and most admired political cartoonists. […] Herb Block was known as a gentle, self-effacing man with a steely resolve to use his work to bring injustices to light.

The Foundation also offers advice about how to analyze a political cartoon:

Analyzing a Cartoon

• Look at the cartoon and think about the people, items, actions portrayed, and words within the drawing.
• Who is in the cartoon? Can you identify specific people? How do you know who the people are? If you can’t identify specific people by name, who might the people portrayed represent?
• Whose story is being told? How would the cartoon change if it were told from a different point of view?
• Break the cartoon into quadrants. What details do you see in each quadrant?
• What objects (tools, signs, vehicles, furniture, technology, etc.) are in the cartoon and why are the objects important?
• What can you figure out about the setting (time–year or decade, place), and how do you know? Why is the setting important?
• You learn about characters from what they do and say and how others react to them. What can you learn about the people in the cartoon from these things?
• Are any symbols used in the cartoon? What are they and what do they symbolize?
• Why are the symbols important?
• Are there any metaphors in the cartoon? What are they?
• What information does the caption provide? Does it support the drawing or provide a different perspective?
• What can you infer from this cartoon? List evidence to support your answer.
• What is the viewpoint of the artist? How do you know (list evidence from the cartoon to support your answer)?
• What questions does the cartoon raise in your mind? Where might you find answers to those questions?

(All images courtesy of Wikimedia Commons)