Representation of the Russian-Turkish War of 1877–1878in the Caricature of Great Britain (the «Fun» Magazine)

The article analyzes the coverage of the Eastern question and the RussianTurkish war of 1877–1878 in the British Empire, on the pages of the satirical «Fun». In the context of the modern confrontation between Russia and the collective West, it is an important task to study the origins of Russophobia, the next round of intensification of which occurred in the English society in 1875–1878. The purpose of this article is to study how the events of the Russian-Turkish war were reflected in the English caricature on the pages of the satirical magazine «Fun», and how a negative and hostile image of Russia and its policies was built. This is all the more important in the light of the visual and iconic developments in modern historical science and the achievements of imagology. The methodological basis of the article is interdisciplinary in nature. An important role in the field of interaction between visual and verbal methods is played by the iconological method, which studies and describes the image. Both in English and in Russian historiography, there were no attempts to trace the image of the Russo-Turkish war of 1877–1878 on the pages of the «Fun». The materials of the «Fun» for1875–1878 were the main primary source used in the article. The periodical took liberal and anti-Russian positions. The talented cartoonist George Gordon Thomson was the main representative of that point of view. He worked for the weekly for more than 20years and created hundreds of cartoons on foreign policy issues. The «Fun», spreading criticism on Disraeli’s foreign policy line, actually supported and directed the construction of Russofobic attitudes in the English society.