Publisher's Synopsis
John Bull originated in the creation of Dr John Arbuthnot in 1712, and was popularised first by British print makers. Arbuthnot created Bull in his pamphlet Law is a Bottomless Pit (1712).- Originally derided, William Hogarth and other British writers made Bull -a heroic archetype of the freeborn Englishman.- Later, the figure of Bull was disseminated overseas by illustrators and writers such as American cartoonist Thomas Nast and Irish writer George Bernard Shaw, author of John Bull's Other Island.
