Censorship.

Donald McGill was the prolific cartoonist that gave Britain most of the 'saucy postcards' that go on sale in our beach resorts. Although a staid Victorian type character, he was master of the double entendre, which, coupled with his drawings, gave us the funny cartoons we all know and love. He created over 12,000 designs, but although these sold in excess of 200 million, he only gained 3 guineas each.

The most bizarre use of the 1857 Obscene Publications Act must be the prosecution of Donald McGill and Constance Publications. In 1954 the government saw fit to put McGill, then an 80 year old man, to trial. He was advised to plead guilty to escape jail and was fined. This lead to many of his printed designs being destroyed.

Reading between the lines, it seems to me that he was encouraged to make his designs more 'bawdy' as it was these that sold better, and his style can be seen to change from his earlier to later work. But more interestingly, his images were quite innocent, as were his captions. A jump in imagination had to be made to make the whole even remotely obscene. So in fact he was charged for projecting a thought, or even a potential thought, into the viewers mind.

I wonder if this is the one and only case where this has happened?

George Orwell wrote an essay about McGill in 1941. Sixteen years later, Big Brother had truly arrived.

Later, McGill parodied his own prosecution, as can be seen here.

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