Blake Rathie PSR 2 Wk 7 MAN Magazine

 

PSR 2: Primary Source Report on Man magazine, (August 1938, vol. 3, no. 3.)

by Blake Rathie

 

Circulation

 

Man’s circulation reached its peak of selling 200,000 copies for a single issue in 1953, (Barnett, 2015). These cost 2 shillings and the monthly publication began in 1936. According to Barnett (2015), the magazine’s decline in circulation after 1953 was a result of the poor editorial quality, ceasing publication completely in 1974 after not being able to compete against niche interest magazines such as Australian Handyman and Sports Car World (Barnett). Along with this, its risqué aspects were far outdone by Playboy.

 

Figure- MAN August 1938 cover.

Editor

 

For this issue of Man magazine, the editor was Ion Idriess, Idriess’s work with the magazine began with his contribution of a piece of fiction titled ‘The Castaway’ in May 1937 (Ray, 2008). Idriess wrote a piece which gave him some fame called ‘The Sniper,’ which was based on his wartime exeriences. In 1938 there was a great shift within the magazine, with the beginning of Australasiana, which was a magazine within the magazine of Man. As of May that year Idriess’s name began appearing as editor.

The magazine continued as of October 1939, as did Australasiana, but Idriess’s name stopped appearing, and no public announcement was ever made for this change (Ray, 2008).

 

Implied Reader

 

The implied readership of Man is a middle class and middle aged men, who is imagined to be frustrated with their suburban life and marriage, (Barnett, 2015). The magazine presents many instances of frustrations stemming from marriage, and an overall dismissiveness to women as a whole.

 

 

Contents

  

Within this August 1938, there are 174 pages, and out of those there was a single page devoted to photography, 14 features, 5 pieces of fiction, 5 pages on men’s health, and 28 pages of cartoons. The remainder was filled with miscellaneous pieces such as international affairs and ‘have your say’ sections.

 

This content’s tone was overall quite misogynistic and racist, harbouring some very outdated ideals. The magazine’s content began as being for the “young city sophisticate,” but degraded to “middle-aged fantasies of impossible busts,” (Barnett).

 

There are 96 pages of writing, and 13 instances of advertising. Of those ads, only about half had whole pages devoted to the entire ad, and the rest were placed among writing or all clumped together—so all up there was a very minimal amount.

 

As a whole the ads were for things that a suburban man in his middle age would want; such as cars that were affordable but looked expensive, nice holidays to take family on, or alcohol.

   

 

Format

 

There are 174 pages in this sampled issue of Man, and within that there is an extensive use of colour and photography—images are not at all used sparingly and many comics fill its pages. These comics are largely quite demeaning to women, either by the clear objectification, or the scenarios presented as if they are cheating, or being assaulted, or simply made fun of. Along with this there are many racist caricatures.

  

References

 

 

Ray, G. (2008). Ion Idriess in MAN Magazine. http://www.collectingbooksandmagazines.com/ionman.html

 

Barnett, C. (2015). Man's man: representations of Australian post-war masculinity in Man magazine. Journal of Australian Studies (issue 39), volume 2, page 151-169. DOI: 10.1080/14443058.2014.1001422 or https://www-tandfonline-com.elibrary.jcu.edu.au/doi/full/10.1080/14443058.2014.1001422