German soldier, bowled over




Inscribing the fantasy of the poster's power: literally run off his feet, as Lily would have it, by a placard announcing the imminent arrival of thousands of fighting Irishmen, the German soldier enacts the dream of the advertiser and recruiter alike. Though not pictorial, the inscribed placard's red lettering picks up explosion in the red sky over the battlefield, as if the power of the inscribed word were being translated into the force of the encompassing image.
 
 
All posters are reprinted with kind permission from the War Poster Collection, Manuscripts and Archives, Yale University Library.