{"id":2712,"date":"2019-05-07T15:47:00","date_gmt":"2019-05-07T22:47:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.comic-con.org\/toucan\/?p=2712"},"modified":"2024-01-09T15:50:14","modified_gmt":"2024-01-09T23:50:14","slug":"maggies-world-071-gag-cartoons","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.comic-con.org\/toucan\/maggies-world-071-gag-cartoons\/","title":{"rendered":"Maggie’s World 071: Gag Cartoons"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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MAGGIE’S WORLD BY MAGGIE THOMPSON<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Maggie’s World 071: Gag Cartoons<\/h1>\n\n\n
Maggie Thompson<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n
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When Don and I began our Comic Art <\/em>fanzine in 1960, we named it that because we were fans of all sorts of comics\u2014including magazine cartoons, daily newspaper panels, stand-alone comic-book-cover gags, and similar varieties.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Among single-panel newspaper gag creators was H.T. Webster, who provided gags on a series of topics. \u201cThe Timid Soul\u201d was Caspar Milquetoast, whose name eventually entered dictionaries. \u00a9 2019 N.Y. Tribune Inc. A \u201cgag\u201d can be a grim commentary. Bill Mauldin provided vivid views of (and satiric remarks on) World War II Army life. \u00a9 2019 United Feature Syndicate, Inc.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

The gag cartoon is in a category by itself: standing alone to evoke a reaction. On the other hand, it joins other comic art in that it can be the result of a collaboration. Whereas the cartoonist is most often identified as the gag-cartoon creator, some gag cartoons are a team effort. New Yorker <\/em>cartoonist Helen Hokinson often produced art captioned by others, especially James Reid Parker. Among the most famous New Yorker <\/em>cartoons is a 1928 Carl Rose image of a mother and cherubic child at the dinner table. But the caption\u2014\u201cIt\u2019s broccoli, dear.\u201d \u201cI say it\u2019s spinach, and I say the hell with it.\u201d\u2014was by E.B. White.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Heck, more than a decade ago, All Things Equal, Inc., offered The New Yorker Cartoon Caption Game<\/em>. Players looked at a cartoon, and they had to come up with their own captions. \u201cWe provide the ink. You provide the think.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Themes<\/h5>\n\n\n\n

Some gag cartoonists specialize in themes for their stand-alone humor.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

They\u2019ll Do It Every Time <\/em>by Jimmy Hatlo (1897-1963) in newspapers and Famous Last Words <\/em>by Irwin Caplan (1919-2007) in The Saturday Evening Post<\/em> became comedic catch phrases.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

H.T. Webster and J.R. Williams produced stand-alone cartoons in a number of themes. Webster was known for such captioned themes as \u201cHow to Torture Your Husband,\u201d \u201cHow to Torture Your Wife,\u201d \u201cThe Timid Soul,\u201d \u201cTo Hell with Fishing,\u201d \u201cLife\u2019s Darkest Moment,\u201d and \u201cWho Dealt This Mess?\u201d Williams\u2019 themes in his Out Our Way<\/em> panel included \u201cBorn Thirty Years Too Soon,\u201d \u201cWhy Mothers Get Gray,\u201d and \u201cHeroes Are Made, Not Born.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Other single-panel cartoons featured the adventures of a primary focal character. Through History with J. Wesley Smith <\/em>by Burr Shafer ran in Saturday Review of Literature<\/em>. The jacket flap of a 1950 collection began, \u201cThis is an unusual cartoon book because it presupposes, believe it or not, that people still can read.\u201d (\u201cSmith\u201d involved himself in famous events\u2014as in advising, \u201cBut these ridiculous fairy stories, Aesop. Why not spend your time on serious literary endeavor that will last?\u201d)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Hazel <\/em>and Dennis the Menace <\/em>featured characters with such individuality that they were easily adapted for TV series. The same goes for the Addams Family characters created by Charles Addams. Henry<\/em> and Little Lulu <\/em>gained their own comic book series, with full stories developed by other creators.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Challenges<\/h5>\n\n\n\n

The panel cartoon faces some of the same concerns as other humor. In his Backstage at the Strips<\/em>, Mort Walker noted, \u201cA certain amount of irreverence and disrespect is enjoyed by the public; they may even egg you on. But don\u2019t slip.\u201d He continued with a number of examples of syndicate changes to its strips and panel cartoons and showed what was perceived by many as a stereotyping gag in a Dennis the Menace <\/em>panel\u2014one that resulted in a public apology from The Cleveland Press<\/em>, \u201cYesterday\u2019s Dennis the Menace<\/em> cartoon offended a number of Press<\/em> readers. The<\/em> Press<\/em> apologizes for the affront caused by the cartoonist. It assures subscribers that such a thing will not happen again.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Dave Breger edited a mass-market Bantam Books paperback in 1955 titled But That\u2019s Unprintable<\/em>, in which he collected \u201c135 hilarious cartoons they wouldn\u2019t dare publish!\u201d It had a few printings but never saw later editions, though it was far more than a mere accumulation of \u201cnaughty\u201d cartoons. Breger said he was writing about \u201cthe more or less funny cartoons in the [mass-circulation] American magazines and newspapers.\u201d He wasn\u2019t even writing about what he called \u201cthe cartoons in specialized magazines like the New Yorker <\/em>and Esquire<\/em>.\u201d The focus was rejected submissions by cartoonists aiming at a family audience but rejected by their publishers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

At the end, he offered a \u201cWhat\u2019s My Taboo?\u201d quiz, in which he printed seven cartoons with a multiple-choice option of the censor\u2019s reasoning. He led with one of his own rejected \u201cMr. Breger\u201d gags in which \u201cMr. Breger,\u201d looking at the Agesander statue of Laoco\u00f6n and His Sons in the coils of two sea serpents is saying, \u201cOh, yes, I gotta change the ribbon in our typewriter.\u201d Options given were (a) it shows nude figures; (b) not enough people might know what the statue group represents, (c) it shows snakes; and (d) The National Association of Typewriter Ribbon Manufacturers might object. The answer was \u201cc,\u201d snakes \u201care taboo in cartoons (octopuses are okay).\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And, of course, challenges are even more formidable when it comes to political cartoons.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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John Stanley\u2019s\u00a0Little Lulu\u00a0<\/em>covers evoked the panel gags Marjorie Henderson Buell created for\u00a0The Saturday Evening Post<\/em>.\u00a0Four Color\u00a0<\/em>#131 \u00a9 2019 Classic Media, Inc. On the other hand, characters more usually seen in action-adventure tales could clown around\u2014at least, on covers.\u00a0World\u2019s Finest Comics<\/em>\u00a0#19 (Fall 1945) \u00a9 2019 DC Comics<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Another challenge is the changing market itself; many magazines have left newsstands. Most obvious of those that remain are the New Yorker<\/em>, Reader\u2019s Digest<\/em>, and Playboy<\/em>, but did you know that a number of today\u2019s business publications also carry (and are markets for) cartoons? They include Harvard Business Review <\/em>and Barron\u2019s<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Beyond the gags<\/h5>\n\n\n\n

The skills that produce memorable cartoons can lead to careers beyond one-shot images on the page.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Some gag cartoonists went on to teach. Henry<\/em> creator Carl Anderson offered a course in cartooning and eventually came up with How to Draw Cartoons Successfully<\/em> in a variety of formats in the 1930s and 1940s. New Yorker<\/em> cartoonist Richard Taylor produced Introduction to Cartooning<\/em> in 1947.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Such cartoonists as Shel Silverstein, Syd Hoff, Stan and Jan Berenstain, and Dr. Seuss became better known in careers featuring more than stand-alone panels.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Single-panel gags can provide meta commentaries.\u00a0New Yorker<\/em>\u00a0cartoonist Richard Taylor showed how\u00a0not<\/em>\u00a0to do a gag cartoon.\u00a0Introduction to Cartooning<\/em>\u00a0\u00a9 2019 Penguin Random House LLC. To kick off a new series, John Byrne made a pointed suggestion to potential comics customers in\u00a0The Sensational She-Hulk<\/em>\u00a0Vol. 2 #1 (May 1989). \u00a9 2019 Marvel Characters, Inc.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
Sequential art<\/h5>\n\n\n\n

Will Eisner coined the term \u201csequential art,\u201d and there have been discussions over whether stand-alone gag panels qualify as \u201csequential art.\u201d Given that there\u2019s a mental sequence on the part of the reader, it seems logical to accept that, not only is there often a question as to how events led to the situation, but there is often also a future that is left to the imagination. Or, as Gary Larson put it in The PreHistory of The Far Side<\/em> (1989), \u201cCartoons are, after all, little stories themselves, frozen at an interesting point in time.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Consider what led up to John Byrne\u2019s cover for Sensational She-Hulk <\/em>#1\u2014and what the goal of his gag was.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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The proverbial bottom line<\/h5>\n\n\n\n

Is it funny? Is it understandable? Where do we go from here?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Taylor cautioned, \u201cThe amateur almost always tries for very complicated or \u2018clever\u2019 ideas upon which to base his drawing. The professional knows that the idea for a good cartoon is most effective when quite simple and direct, and that \u2018clever\u2019 ideas have a habit of falling flat. \u2026 Many a very funny cartoon has been based on an extremely slight idea. \u2026 The humorist is one who looks for the absurd side of life and his attitude amounts to a habit of thought.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Larson included instances of cartoons going a bit wrong\u2014among them, a Far Side<\/em> cartoon that had been adjusted to fit on a newspaper page. \u201cI opened the newspaper to the comic section and discovered that someone, in order to compress the cartoon\u2019s size, had chopped off a rather vital part of the humor.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe newspaper ran a correction the following day but, all in all, it\u2019s sort of nice for a change when no one understands one of my cartoons but it\u2019s not my fault.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

These days, panel cartoons\u2014and captioned photo gags\u2014have found online homes, too. Twitter has cartoon Tweets from @SandyBoynton<\/strong><\/a> and photo-captioned Tweets from @catalogliving<\/strong><\/a>, among many others. Where and how will future such gag creators reach us? Get ready for the fun!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Maggie\u2019s World by Maggie Thompson appears the first Tuesday of every month here on <\/em>Toucan!<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n

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Written by<\/p>\n\n\n

Maggie Thompson<\/div>\n\n\n

Published<\/p>\n\n\n