Vanity Fair (British magazine)

Subtitled "A Weekly Show of Political, Social and Literary Wares", it was founded in 1868 by Thomas Gibson Bowles, who aimed to expose the contemporary vanities of Victorian society. Colonel Fred Burnaby provided £100 of the original £200 capital, and inspired by Thackeray's popular satire on early 19th-century British society suggested the title Vanity Fair. Bowles wrote much of the magazine himself under various pseudonyms, such as "Jehu Junior", but contributors included Lewis Carroll, Arthur Hervey, Willie Wilde, Jessie Pope, P. G. Wodehouse (who also wrote for the unrelated Condé Nast magazine of the same name) and Bertram Fletcher Robinson (who was editor from June 1904 to October 1906). Lewis Carroll created a series of word ladder puzzles, which he then called "Doublets", which first appeared in the 29 March 1879 issue. Thomas Allinson bought the magazine in 1911 from Frank Harris, by which time it was failing financially. He failed to revive it and the final issue of Vanity Fair appeared on 5 February 1914, after which it was merged into Hearth and Home. ==Caricatures==

A full-page, colour lithograph of a contemporary celebrity or dignitary appeared in most issues, and it is for these caricatures that Vanity Fair is best known then and today. Subjects included artists, athletes, royalty, statesmen, scientists, authors, actors, soldiers, religious personalities, business people and scholars. More than two thousand of these images appeared, and they are considered the chief cultural legacy of the magazine, forming a pictorial record of the period. They were produced by an international group of artists, including Sir Max Beerbohm, Sir Leslie Ward (who signed his work "Spy" and "Drawl"), the Italians Carlo Pellegrini ("Singe" and "Ape"), Melchiorre Delfico ("Delfico"), Liborio Prosperi ("Lib"), the Florentine artist and critic Adriano Cecioni, the French artists James Tissot ("Coïdé"), Prosper d'Épinay ("Nemo") and the American Thomas Nast. ==Image gallery==

File:James Hamilton, Vanity Fair, 1869-09-25.jpg|The Duke of Abercorn by Carlo Pellegrini ("Ape") in the 25 September 1869 issue File:Benjamin Disraeli, Vanity Fair, 1869-01-30.jpg|Benjamin Disraeli by Carlo Pellegrini in the 30 January 1869 issue File:Nawab of Bengal.jpg|Mansur Ali Khan of Bengal by Alfred Thompson ("Ἀτη") in the 16 April 1870 issue File:William Thomson, Vanity Fair, 1871-06-24.jpg|William Thomson, Archbishop of York, by Carlo Pellegrini in the 24 June 1871 issue File:VanityFair-Darwin2.jpg|Charles Darwin by James Tissot ("Coïdé") in the 30 September 1871 issue File:MidhatPashaVanityFair.jpg|Caricature of Midhat Pasha by Leslie Ward ("Spy") in the 30 June 1877 issue File:Thomas Hardy Vanity Fair 1892-06-04.jpg|Thomas Hardy caricature by Leslie Ward in the 4 June 1892 issue File:Carlo Pelligrini-Richard Owen Old Bones.jpg|Captioned "Old Bones", caricature of an elderly Richard Owen in 1873 File:Alexandre Dumas01.jpg|Alexandre Dumas fils by Théobald Chartran in the 27 December 1879 issue File:Portrait of 'Steel' (4671260).jpg|Captioned "Steel", Sir Henry Bessemer by Leslie Ward in the 6 November 1880 issue File:Joseph Rudyard Kipling, Vanity Fair, 1894-06-07 (Yale).jpg|Rudyard Kipling by Leslie Ward on 7 June 1894 File:Paul kruger00a.jpg|President Paul Kruger of the South African Republic by Leslie Ward in the 8 March 1900 issue File:Christabel Pankhurst Vanity Fair 15 June 1910.jpg|Suffragette Christabel Pankhurst in the 15 June 1910 issue File:Queen Alexandra, Vanity Fair, 1911-06-07.jpg|Queen Alexandra (unsigned) in the 7 June 1911 issue File:William-gillette-sherlock-holmes.jpg|William Gillette playing Sherlock Holmes, drawn by Leslie Ward in the 27 February 1907 issue File:Henrik Ibsen Vanity Fair 1901-12-12.jpg|Henrik Ibsen by "Snapp" in the 12 December 1901 issue File:Oscar Wilde (1854-1900) from Vanity Fair Issue 812, April 1884..jpg|Oscar Wilde by Carlo Pellegrini in issue 812, April 1884 File:Horace Gordon Hutchinson, Vanity Fair, 1890-07-19.jpg|Caricature of golfer Horace Hutchinson by Leslie Ward on 19 July 1890 File:Henry Irving Vanity Fair.jpg|Caricature of Henry Irving in the melodrama The Bells, in the 19 December 1874 issue File:Pierre and Marie Curie Vanity Fair 1904-12-22.jpg|Caricature of Pierre and Marie Curie in the 22 December 1904 issue File:WSGilbert by Spy.jpg|W. S. Gilbert by Leslie Ward, published on 21 May 1881 Winston Churchill Vanity Fair 1900-09-27.jpg|Winston Churchill by Leslie Ward, 27 September 1900 File:Mark Twain Vanity Fair 1908-05-13.jpeg|Mark Twain by Leslie Ward on 13 May 1908 File:Robert Baden-Powell Vanity Fair 19 April 1911.jpg|Captioned "Boy Scouts", Robert Baden-Powell in the 19 April 1911 issue ==See also==