A COMIC SOAP OPERA: Harry Furniss and Advertising Cartoons.

Cartoons have been used in advertising in Great Britain for at least 200 years, to promote anything from alcohol and tobacco to motor cars and holidays. With the lifting of taxes on advertising in the British press in the nineteenth century, and the publication of the first major illustrated newspapers, pictorial advertising really took off and cartoons became a significant weapon in the advertiser's armoury. One particular drawing from 1884, by the Punch cartoonist Harry Furniss, became especially well known. Originally intended as a joke about a Pears' Soap advertisement featuring the actress Lillie Langtry (mistress of King Edward VII) it was later used to promote the brand itself. The caption for the cartoon even entered the Oxford Dictionary of Quotations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]