valinaraii: Two caricatures about the Spanish flu (which of course didn’t originate in Spain)

valinaraii:

Two caricatures about the Spanish flu (which of course didn’t originate in Spain) appeared in the press of Madrid in 1918. The first one refers to the illness by the nickname Soldado de Nápoles (Soldier of Naples), from the name of a catchy chorus of a zarzuela,La Canción del Olvido (The song of forgetfulness), a tune that was extremely popular back then. The man dressed in a frac flees from the other two, poorly dressed, and singing the piece from the zarzuela screaming:  But, who is not suffering from this epidemy?  In the other caricature, a doctor (Nothing: this is nothing; it’s only a fashionable illness) is examining the bear that figures in Madrid’s coat of arms, an allusion to the quantity of population who became ill in the city. My scan.