The Aspiring Men of Punch

In the mid 1830s, engraver Ebenezer Landells and journalist Henry Mayhew began discussions about establishing a satirical news magazine together. Their aspirations were realized with the printing and circulation of the first issue of Punch on July 17, 1841. By the mid 1850s, however, the radical ideas that had initially dominated Punch were stripped away and replaced with a more respectable worldview under the editor, Mark Lemon. The increased emphasis on respectability in Punch can be explained by the desire of the Punch men to be recognized as gentlemen. The status of gentleman was much sought after in Victorian Britain, with the result that the varying definitions of this status were heavily contested. Journalists had not frequently been recognized as gentlemen before, but the efforts of William M. Thackeray (a Punch man) to change the definitional terms of ‘the gentleman’ made this possible. Based on Thackeray’s understanding of the gentleman, the Punchites used Punch magazine, and their commentary on morality, social class, and fads in Victorian men’s fashion within it, to further both a shift in the popular understanding of the gentleman and their recognition as such.