Geen effectiever vermaak dan leedvermaak. Agressieve humor als politiek wapen in de Lanterne magique of toverlantaern (1782-83).

Abstract

This article discusses the late eighteenth-century Dutch periodical Lanterne magique of toverlantaern. This political journal is analyzed from the perspective of its sense of humor and its rhetorical strategy. The Lanterne magique turns out to offer an interesting counter example to our regular image of the late eighteenth century as a period of Enlightenment, the time when the ‘modern’ political culture was invented, and when values like rationalism and politeness belonged to the staple of public communication. In the Lanterne magique, it is shown, it is all about humiliating political enemies and practicing Schadenfreude. With no hesitance, persons are depicted as drunkards, cowards and perverts. The fact that this journal could be successful at the time, tells us that the culture and society of the Dutch Republic around 1782 in some ways differs fundamentally from that of our own time. Cases like the Lanterne magique offer us a telling glimpse of this far away world, where laughing at other people’s suffering and physical deformities was still normal. As such, they also give us valuable information about the history of laughter, information that goes beyond the idealized prescriptions for the public use of humor that can be found in contemporary textbooks.