Vanity Fair Magazine

Articles from Vanity Fair Magazine

Meet Ann Fish: Conde Nast Illustrator (Vanity Fair, 1919)

Some ninety-three years ago, Fish was the name scribbled on those unique cartoon illustrations that could be found throughout VOGUE (both American and British) and VANITY FAIR. The editor of American VOGUE between the years 1914 and 1952, Edna Woolman Chase (1877 – 1957) called this English cartoonist brilliant and began running her drawings from her earliest days in that office; her full name was Ann Fish and this article will tell you all we know about her.

This most cosmopolitan of living black-and-white satirists has never stirred from England in all her days. She has never especially extended herself as a spectator of the London life which she so amusingly depicts. She has never gazed on Fifth Avenue.

Charles Baudelaire (Vanity Fair Magazine, 1915)

British poet and literary critic Arthur Symons (1865 – 1945) wrote about the Nineteenth Century French poet Charles Baudelaire (1821 – 1867) more as a subject of art rather than an influential wordsmith:

Few modern poets have been more frequently drawn, and few have better repaid drawing, than Charles Baudelaire.

Among the list of artists who created likenesses of the poet were his fellow dandy Edouard Manet (1832 – 1883), the photographer Etienne Carjat (1828 – 1906) and an obscure sculptor named Zachari Astrue, who created the poet’s death mask.

David Lloyd George (Vanity Fair, 1916)

An article that served to introduce American readers to the new British Prime Minister, David Lloyd George (1863 – 1945), who replaced the incompetent wartime leader Herbert Henry Asquith (1852 – 1928):

People had began to doubt whether or not Mr. Asquith had ‘the will to win’ the necessary determination to make all things work together to that end. There was no doubt in the case of Lloyd George. He had supported credit, he had supplied ammunition, he had inspired general confidence, he had reconciled the irreconcilable. The question arose whether or not the box seat on the coach of state should not be given to him.


The article concentrates primarily on the radical instinct and liberal leanings of Lloyd George, who is often remembered as the Prime Minister who laid the foundations of the British nanny-state.


In 1940 Lloyd George wrote an editorial in which he condemned the leaders of Europe for procrastinating rather than dealing with Hitler when Germany was still weak Click here to read it.

Edgar Degas: R.I.P. (Vanity Fair, 1918)

Some interesting postmortem thoughts and seldom heard facts concerning the life and times of Impressionist painter Edgar Degas (1834 – 1917); of particular interest was the enormous amount of money fetched at auction for the assorted content of his studio during a time of national crises in France.

European Styles in Cars (Vanity Fair Magazine, 1921)

One of the special correspondents writing for VANITY FAIR on the subject of motoring was the British novelist Gerald Biss (1876 – 1922), who contributed similar pieces to THE STRAND, TATLER, DAILY MAIL and EVENING STANDARD. In this review, Biss gave his drink-deprived American readers the straight dope as to what they can expect to see from the European car manufacturers of 1921. References are made to the products of the Voisin and Vauxhall Companies and there was some lose talk about electric starters and high-grade tweleve-cylinder cars.

Elihu Root Profiled (Vanity Fair, 1915)

A photograph of Elihu Rootstyle=border:none (1845 – 1937) accompanies these two short paragraphs from the 1915 VANITY FAIR Hall of Fame, in which Root was praised as the ablest lawyer and diplomatic expert in the nation at that time. He is remembered today as the one U.S. Secretary of War (1899 to 1904) who was most instrumental in modernizing the American military in such ways that allowed it to meet the demands that would be meted out during the course of the bloody Twentieth Century.


This small notice is interesting primarily because it lets it be known that the United States was jockying for a spot in the European peace negotiations two years prior to even having troops in the field.Business ethics articles
Film Production
Magazines for kids
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W Magazine
Business ethics articles
Film Production
Magazines for kids
Singles
Single
W Magazine
Business ethics articles
Film Production
Magazines for kids
Singles
Single
W Magazine

The Elsie Janis Cocktail (Vanity Fair, 1917)

Anticipating the onslaught of prohibition, the actress Elsie Janis (1889 – 1956; also known as, The Sweetheart of the A.E.F) understood that, even with the absence of alcohol in the United States, boys and girls, men and women would continue their pursuit of love, marriage and divorce.

Understanding Erik Satie (Vanity Fair, 1918)

…But Satie’s music is not difficult to play. Almost all the notes in many of his compositions are all the same or a related value. Appogiatura, syncopation, bravura, he is not friendly with. The pieces are written in facile keys for pianists…

The Case for Leonard Wood (Vanity Fair, 1918)

Major General Leonard Wood (1860 – 1927) served as the U.S. Army Chief of Staff between the years 1910 through 1914 and was relieved of that office by President Wilson, who was unnerved by his wariness concerning America’s inability to wage a modern war. Having alienated the president and other prominent generals in Washington, he continued on this path by launching the Preparedness Movement a year later in which he established four volunteer army training camps across the country.
Wood’s admirer’s were legion, and this article opines that his finely tuned military mind was not being put to proper use:

General Wood has committed the sin of having been right from the very start. He has always been right. He has been right when Washington has been wrong. It is upon the heads of the entire pacifist crew who sold their shriveled souls and their country’s safety to the devil of German propaganda, that is falling the blame for the blood of those who are dying on the hills of Picardy and the plains of Flanders.

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