Get Access to Print and Digital for $23.99 per year.
Subscribe for Full Access
Adjust

From a previously unpublished cartoon by Thomas Nast, an illustrator for Harper’s Weekly in the late nineteenth century. The sketch, completed in 1870, depicts Nast drawing on a woodblock while being scolded by Harper’s editor George William Curtis. Nast was frequently criticized by Curtis for being too harsh on politicians with whom the editor was friendly. In the sketch Curtis says, “Don’t make it too sharp, Tommy, or you’ll spoil the POINT.” Nast replies, “I must be cruel, only to be kind,” paraphrasing a line from Hamlet. The illustration is included in America’s Most Influential Journalist: The Life, Times and Legacy of Thomas Nast, a biography by John Adler, which the author self-published in June.


More from

| View All Issues |

November 1868

Close
“An unexpectedly excellent magazine that stands out amid a homogenized media landscape.” —the New York Times
Subscribe now

Debug