H. M. Bateman’s humorous cartoons brought him international fame during the middle years of the twentieth century and the very best of his work still represents a timeless comic legacy. Bateman (1887-1970) was most celebrated for his The Man Who… cartoons – a series featuring hilarious social gaffes in which some lonely figure commits a ghastly faux pas to the amazement or outrage of the assembled onlookers. Indeed the English obsession with class, etiquette and order forms the basis of much of his humour. Bateman’s humour is almost entirely visual and his cartoons use simple captions rather than verbal gags. He was also a pioneer of the multiframe story without words style of strip cartoon.

Finding copies of his work to celebrate here has proved difficult but I have managed to put together a collection of 5 volumes from publicly available sources and scans of copies that I have. There is also a selection of individual wartime posters which he created. I hope you enjoy.

The Books

Wartime Posters

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