Book name- SELLING WAR LIKE MARGARINE
Author- Jan Myrdal
Published by Setu Prakashani
Price- Rs 5,500
Modern advertising was barely out of its infancy at the turn of the 20th century, yet governments across Europe grasped its potential quickly. They recognised that these tactics could be weaponised to sell war. SELLING WAR LIKE MARGARINE (Setu Prakashani, Rs 5,500) by Jan Myrdal brings together an excellent collection of propaganda and war posters from across Europe that were accumulated by the author and his wife, Gun Kessle.
The posters in Myrdal’s and Kessle’s collection — they have now been donated to the National Library of Sweden — reveal how war posters were used as effective tools of psychological preparation. Designed with care and distributed like commercial campaigns, they turned abstract ideas of duty, glory and sacrifice into tangible products. Myrdal’s analysis of the posters — printed on card stock — is astute. What is particularly interesting is the use of fonts — bold, serif fonts were often used for a call to arms, while more calligraphic styles were used to appeal to mass sentiments.